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drewweber's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.25
lamphouse's review against another edition
4.0
really 3.5 but rounded up out of respect for the man. the pov changes were a little clunky at times, but something about the way darnielle describes things in such seemingly simple ways makes everything just a touch more terrifying, and a touch more saddening as well. it's full of a bleak mystery, then a bleak, creeping horror, and then an equally bleak hope (that, to be fair, i didn't feel was fully cohesive, but that's another story). the ending felt a bit strained, the hope that it points towards made less effective by its brief resurgences earlier on with other characters jumping ahead in time, but the getting there was so good i barely cared.
yesterday i was talking to my friend about thriller books and this in particular, about how i can watch hours and hours of scary movies and never once experience the same kind of fear or edge-of-my-seat, staring-at-a-slow-motion-trainwreck thrall i get from a good book. with films, if i turn it off, i don't have to think about it anymore. sure the good ones stay with you, give you images to linger over in the space between flicking the lights off and getting into bed, but books are different. you're half of the creation—the story gives you the words, the general look, a specific here and there, but you fill in the rest. the image is yours, created with the bits and pieces your brain knows will best make it stick, and you can never just turn that off. on page 29, after jeremy first watches the clip in she's all that and is trying to go to sleep, he talks about how the scene won't leave his head, "How it sped up and slowed down as his brain tried to find some context within which to situate it. The image seeking out and finding the internal circuits where it would be able to live forever. The figure under the canvas, rising." that's the feeling i'm talking about—except here, it doesn't have to find the circuits. it came from them in the first place. being an active participant in the visualization is what makes "She, or he, wears a canvas bag for a hood" (22) so terrifying all on its own, and what makes the shadows lurking in the corners, the things you know are just there out of sight, enough to paralyze you as though you were in the one in the dark.
anyway, i really enjoyed this. i'm a big fan of the mountain goats, and specifically john darnielle's lyrical prowess, so i was really really pleased to see that that same skill translated into prose. (every time i explained who the author was when someone asked what i was reading, they all said that it makes sense he would be a good novelist as well as lyricist? which is silly—they're drastically different forms. count me definitively impressed, mr. darnielle. cheers.)
yesterday i was talking to my friend about thriller books and this in particular, about how i can watch hours and hours of scary movies and never once experience the same kind of fear or edge-of-my-seat, staring-at-a-slow-motion-trainwreck thrall i get from a good book. with films, if i turn it off, i don't have to think about it anymore. sure the good ones stay with you, give you images to linger over in the space between flicking the lights off and getting into bed, but books are different. you're half of the creation—the story gives you the words, the general look, a specific here and there, but you fill in the rest. the image is yours, created with the bits and pieces your brain knows will best make it stick, and you can never just turn that off. on page 29, after jeremy first watches the clip in she's all that and is trying to go to sleep, he talks about how the scene won't leave his head, "How it sped up and slowed down as his brain tried to find some context within which to situate it. The image seeking out and finding the internal circuits where it would be able to live forever. The figure under the canvas, rising." that's the feeling i'm talking about—except here, it doesn't have to find the circuits. it came from them in the first place. being an active participant in the visualization is what makes "She, or he, wears a canvas bag for a hood" (22) so terrifying all on its own, and what makes the shadows lurking in the corners, the things you know are just there out of sight, enough to paralyze you as though you were in the one in the dark.
anyway, i really enjoyed this. i'm a big fan of the mountain goats, and specifically john darnielle's lyrical prowess, so i was really really pleased to see that that same skill translated into prose. (every time i explained who the author was when someone asked what i was reading, they all said that it makes sense he would be a good novelist as well as lyricist? which is silly—they're drastically different forms. count me definitively impressed, mr. darnielle. cheers.)
jamiezaccaria's review against another edition
2.75
This is by no means a bad book, I think I was just expecting something different. Rather than horror, it was more of Gothic midwestern drama, with slice-of-life and character-based storylines. The plot was a bit confusing, although I do like how it tied together in the end.
acrousey's review
Coming from Iowa, from around Ames, I really, really wanted to like this book. Hearing about Mary Greeley and Casey's and North Grand Mall was all very nostalgic. It was just hard get into the plot of the story. It just moved a little slow for my taste.
deliafrances's review against another edition
2.0
I thought this was going to be good but then it wasn’t. The beginning was promising but then it just never delivered. 2 stars because the I enjoyed some of the imagery but honestly this just was not it
rockhoppingpenguin's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
zmull's review against another edition
2.0
The Good: The cover is beautiful.
The Bad: Universal Harvester sucks. What a shame because John Darnielle's first novel, Wolf in White Van was fantastic. This second novel is dreary and unfocused. There's a plot, but it goes nowhere slowly. The acknowledgements at the end describe the novel as "about mothers." If you say so. If you haven't read Wolf in White Van, drop this and go read it. If you have read his first book and are looking forward to this one... sorry, guys. Thumbs down.
The Bad: Universal Harvester sucks. What a shame because John Darnielle's first novel, Wolf in White Van was fantastic. This second novel is dreary and unfocused. There's a plot, but it goes nowhere slowly. The acknowledgements at the end describe the novel as "about mothers." If you say so. If you haven't read Wolf in White Van, drop this and go read it. If you have read his first book and are looking forward to this one... sorry, guys. Thumbs down.
karleighreads's review against another edition
2.0
The beginning of this book was so promising. Creepy and I was really invested but then it changed and jumped around and got really confusing. I don’t even know what happened I couldn’t keep the characters straight because of the time jumps. Disappointed.
kaycee27's review against another edition
3.0
Initially I thought this book was going in a different direction than it ended up. At times the jumping back & forth & addition of new characters took a minute to adapt to, but overall this was a good, quick read with a sad yet hopeful tone to finish.