Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.68 AVERAGE
3.68 AVERAGE
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
A weird one, but just interesting enough to keep me reading it.
3.5/5
Library book đź“–
3.5/5
Library book đź“–
dark
sad
tense
fast-paced
A fairly scary novel from [a:Joe Hill|88506|Joe Hill|http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1279308605p2/88506.jpg], son of legendary horror writer [a:Stephen King|3389|Stephen King|http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1261866457p2/3389.jpg]. Many of the reviews of this book seem to fall into the understandable trap of comparing the author to his father, but I'm not sure that's entirely fair. [Author: Joe Hill] does a good job of creating multidimensional characters, although the plot itself does seem to be a bit "convenient" at times. All in all, I'd say this is a good start for an author who shows some promise.
Rating: 3.75
Plot:
Judas Coyne, a middle aged rocker and the lead singer of the popular band, Jude’s Hammer, is a collector of the macabre: a cookbook for cannibals, a snuff film, a hangman’s noose, Jude’s got it all.
However, he’s going to wish he wasn’t an occult fanatic pretty soon. One day, his assistant Danny Wooten, comes to him with an advertisement of an online auction, where the auctioneer claims to be selling the ghost of her dead stepfather.
Jude already intrigued, puts in his bid but little does he know that the game is rigged and that he’s signed himself up to ride the night road with a dead man willing to do anything in order to make Jude feel pain and suffering for a crime he did not commit.
Characters:
Now I did like the character development in this book, especially the relationship between Jude and Georgia (Marybeth). I feel like after the hell they went through, no bond could be stronger than theirs. Also I loved how loyal, protective and intelligent Jude’s dogs were, it was adorable seeing them interact with their owners, and terrifying to imagine them when they were angry.
I also enjoyed reading about Anna (Florida) and I loved that despite everything that happened between her and Jude, she kept her word and helped him in the end. And lastly we come to Marybeth, more commonly known as Georgia throughout most of the book. Can I just say that she is a complete badass! Honestly I was so happy when I was reading about her because she doesn’t act like a damsel in distress; she uses her head and gets stuff done. Yeah, she’s scared who wouldn’t be in their situation? But despite that, she does everything in her power to keep herself and Jude alive and that’s a respectable quality in a female character and one I admire greatly.
thoughts:
Where to start? So to begin with, I did enjoy the book, it’s not one of favorites but I definitely liked it. There were quite a few new ideas and concepts presented in this book that I enjoyed for example the hypnosis, the dog souls, the power of pain and the reality of truth.
Those are just a few key concepts I liked. Next to that I also enjoyed the fake death report scene in Jude’s house, which was brilliant. I was so shocked by it and I think that was something to really suck me in. You cannot imagine the relief I felt when I read about Jude switching off the T.V. I actually had to reread that paragraph, three times before I calmed down enough to move on.
Anyways, I also liked the plot twist; you’d never expect it from dear old Craddock now would you? I didn’t and that’s one of my first complaints, the plot twist came out of nowhere. Normally I like to guess as to what the twist is but this one seemingly came out of the blue.
Another thing I didn’t like was the lack of introductory pages, normally I like to read books with a bit more back ground on the characters in the beginning and then that background is built on throughout the course of the book. This novel didn’t have as much background in the start but made up for it in the middle.
My last complaint is another minor one: it was too fast paced, I mean thirty pages in and the ghost is already trying to kill Jude.
But other than these things and a few others that I won’t mention as I don’t want to spoil anyone, I enjoyed this read. I’m looking forward to reading more of Hill’s work in the future.
If you like old time rockers who can put up one hell of a fight and old ghosts who go to any extreme to get what they want, go read this.
Plot:
Judas Coyne, a middle aged rocker and the lead singer of the popular band, Jude’s Hammer, is a collector of the macabre: a cookbook for cannibals, a snuff film, a hangman’s noose, Jude’s got it all.
However, he’s going to wish he wasn’t an occult fanatic pretty soon. One day, his assistant Danny Wooten, comes to him with an advertisement of an online auction, where the auctioneer claims to be selling the ghost of her dead stepfather.
Jude already intrigued, puts in his bid but little does he know that the game is rigged and that he’s signed himself up to ride the night road with a dead man willing to do anything in order to make Jude feel pain and suffering for a crime he did not commit.
Characters:
Now I did like the character development in this book, especially the relationship between Jude and Georgia (Marybeth). I feel like after the hell they went through, no bond could be stronger than theirs. Also I loved how loyal, protective and intelligent Jude’s dogs were, it was adorable seeing them interact with their owners, and terrifying to imagine them when they were angry.
I also enjoyed reading about Anna (Florida) and I loved that despite everything that happened between her and Jude, she kept her word and helped him in the end. And lastly we come to Marybeth, more commonly known as Georgia throughout most of the book. Can I just say that she is a complete badass! Honestly I was so happy when I was reading about her because she doesn’t act like a damsel in distress; she uses her head and gets stuff done. Yeah, she’s scared who wouldn’t be in their situation? But despite that, she does everything in her power to keep herself and Jude alive and that’s a respectable quality in a female character and one I admire greatly.
thoughts:
Where to start? So to begin with, I did enjoy the book, it’s not one of favorites but I definitely liked it. There were quite a few new ideas and concepts presented in this book that I enjoyed for example the hypnosis, the dog souls, the power of pain and the reality of truth.
Those are just a few key concepts I liked. Next to that I also enjoyed the fake death report scene in Jude’s house, which was brilliant. I was so shocked by it and I think that was something to really suck me in. You cannot imagine the relief I felt when I read about Jude switching off the T.V. I actually had to reread that paragraph, three times before I calmed down enough to move on.
Anyways, I also liked the plot twist; you’d never expect it from dear old Craddock now would you? I didn’t and that’s one of my first complaints, the plot twist came out of nowhere. Normally I like to guess as to what the twist is but this one seemingly came out of the blue.
Another thing I didn’t like was the lack of introductory pages, normally I like to read books with a bit more back ground on the characters in the beginning and then that background is built on throughout the course of the book. This novel didn’t have as much background in the start but made up for it in the middle.
My last complaint is another minor one: it was too fast paced, I mean thirty pages in and the ghost is already trying to kill Jude.
But other than these things and a few others that I won’t mention as I don’t want to spoil anyone, I enjoyed this read. I’m looking forward to reading more of Hill’s work in the future.
If you like old time rockers who can put up one hell of a fight and old ghosts who go to any extreme to get what they want, go read this.
So this was sitting in my to be read pile for years. YEARS. I started it easily 10 years ago and didn’t get more than 2 or 3 chapters in. I was deep into horror novels back then and this just wasn’t cutting it for me.
Fast forward to yesterday and I decided to give it another go. Not so into horror novels these days but a quite partial to thrillers and ghost stories and I found I couldn’t put it down.
Sometimes it’s not the book, it’s you
Fast forward to yesterday and I decided to give it another go. Not so into horror novels these days but a quite partial to thrillers and ghost stories and I found I couldn’t put it down.
Sometimes it’s not the book, it’s you
I've been waiting for this book to get my heart rate going with some sort of thrills and scares but it eventually fell short. This is my first Joe Hill book I've read so maybe his other works may have better influence on me. I ended up DNF on this book.
http://teklakonyvei.blogspot.hu/2014/10/joe-hill-sziv-alaku-doboz.html
Hihetetlen Ă©s lehetetlen, mesteri törtĂ©net, zseniális leĂrások, no Ă©s persze a nagyon jĂł könyveknĂ©l már megszokott "csak mĂ©g egy fejezetet", Ă©s az "elnĂ©zĂ©st a kĂ©sĂ©sĂ©rt, belefeledkeztem a könyvembe" tĂpusĂş mondatok voltak jellemzĹ‘ek az olvasás ideje alatt. Továbbá nĂ©hol elkĂ©pzeltem, hogy ha megfilmesĂtenĂ©k (nagyon remĂ©lem, mert kár lenne kihagyni!), akkor hogyan oldanák meg. SzĂłval ha a Szarvak sorsára jut A szĂv alakĂş doboz, akkor viszi szerintem az Ă©v horrorfilmje cĂmet.
Hihetetlen Ă©s lehetetlen, mesteri törtĂ©net, zseniális leĂrások, no Ă©s persze a nagyon jĂł könyveknĂ©l már megszokott "csak mĂ©g egy fejezetet", Ă©s az "elnĂ©zĂ©st a kĂ©sĂ©sĂ©rt, belefeledkeztem a könyvembe" tĂpusĂş mondatok voltak jellemzĹ‘ek az olvasás ideje alatt. Továbbá nĂ©hol elkĂ©pzeltem, hogy ha megfilmesĂtenĂ©k (nagyon remĂ©lem, mert kár lenne kihagyni!), akkor hogyan oldanák meg. SzĂłval ha a Szarvak sorsára jut A szĂv alakĂş doboz, akkor viszi szerintem az Ă©v horrorfilmje cĂmet.
I wanna say I did like this book and probably deserved a strong 3.5 instead of a 3.0 but alas. I think the first part of the book was creepy and I was really bothered by the image of Craddock. I will say that Joe Hill is very good at setting the stage and provide ample descriptors for me to paint a mental image of what’s happening. I was thoroughly spooked when the main characters were just starting to be haunted.
I was more inclined to round it down to a 3, instead of up to a 4 because I felt like the creep factor kinda fell off at the latter part of the book. It wasn’t bad by any means, just that I wasn’t freaked out and it became more like a thriller. As I finished up the book, it did sometimes feel like the book kept going on and on, where I’m like, holy shit there’s more??
I also have to say, Jude sucks. I don’t like his character, I’m sure he wasn’t meant to be liked anyways, but man is he nasty!
I was more inclined to round it down to a 3, instead of up to a 4 because I felt like the creep factor kinda fell off at the latter part of the book. It wasn’t bad by any means, just that I wasn’t freaked out and it became more like a thriller. As I finished up the book, it did sometimes feel like the book kept going on and on, where I’m like, holy shit there’s more??
I also have to say, Jude sucks. I don’t like his character, I’m sure he wasn’t meant to be liked anyways, but man is he nasty!
dark
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Content Warnings
Graphic: Incest
Minor: Blood, Vomit
I liked this, but I didn’t love it. It held my interest throughout, and the ending was okay too, so it wasn't that there was really anything wrong with it. Just a personal preference, I guess. The fact that there is a somewhat HEA did make me happy, as I was expecting the worst.