The Tower
I didn’t expect anything from Simon Clark’s latest, THE TOWER, than a quick, mindless read. I should have lowered my expectations.
We’ll keep this short: Five members of a rock band named after a spitoon accept a month-long housesitting gig in the Middle of Nowhere, because the old manor – formerly an elder-care facility – would be a totally bitchin’ place to work on some new tunes. No sooner have they stepped over the threshold when Strange Things Start to Happen. A clock chimes – but they can’t find the clock! The walls move in on you – or do they! There’s a weird man outside!
I’m all for stories of haunted houses and people trapped in enclosed spaces, but THE TOWER left me wanting. The plot simply isn’t engaging, not helped by dull characters or the fact that the book is littered with errors; for instance, Clark switches the name of two characters twice in the first chapter. Full disclosure: This one fell prey to my 100-page rule.
this is the k00lest b00k i hav ever read and im 0nly 5!!!
[...] UK horror author Simon Clark rebounds in a big way from the singularly wretched THE TOWER with DEATH’S DOMINION, a modern-day FRANKENSTEIN update. In Clark’s imagined near-future, the dead can be resurrected and used as virtual slaves, doing the bidding of their masters without being able to harm them, thanks to some transformation coding. But somehow that last part is lost on Dominion, a monster who clobbers several “Sapheads” (as the humans are called) as he sets out on a revenge-laden journey with fellow “God Scarers” Elsa (subtle, no?) and Dr. Marias in tow. As soon as Dominion revolts – which happens quickly – DOMINION the book takes off and bolts. It may run out of steam before the end, but fright fans will appreciate the straight-ahead horror take as opposed to Dean Koontz’s police-procedural approach. [...]
[...] J.F. Gonzalez’s THE BELOVED begins with promise, as a man wishing to interrupt his wife’s affair finds her canoodling with an alien life form. But that prologue then gives way to a rather confusing first chapter, in which about a dozen characters are introduced in the span of less than seven pages, with a woman named Elizabeth suddenly referred to as Michelle (similar appellation problems plagued Simon Clark’s THE TOWER). The story follows a newly divorced loser Ronnie having lots of crazy sex with his new girlfriend, Diana, who’s hated by the family, and especially Ronnie’s ex-wife, as Diana threatens to whip her daughter and let the family dog mount her. (If you’ve read Gonzalez’s SURVIVOR shocker from last year, you know this is child’s play by comparison.) This, however, is the least of their problems with Diana. As I’ve noticed with many recent horror efforts, the novel is overwritten by half, diluting whatever power Gonzalez can muster with his story. [...]