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sonice 's review for:
The Imago Sequence and Other Stories
by Laird Barron
Blended score of 3.5 stars.
So this is waaaayyyyyy out there stuff. Lovecraft meets psilocybin meets the most lucid fever dream you've ever experienced. Paying attention to every little thing in each story is critical in order to grasp the overall concepts, but even then most of these pieces manage to be so surreal and dreamlike that it's hard to tell what's going on. As I went along I feel like I got better at reading it, and as a result my enjoyment increased as well. I will have to revist this in the not too distant future to take another stab at the Black Sloth one.
Old Virginia 3.0. Not enough going on, maybe too short/rushed. I didn't have enough time to even be creeped out before it wrapped up. Had potential though.
Shiva, Open Your Eye 3.5. Creepy and very well written. Still a little light on actual plot and more like a memoir written by some eldritch abomination.
Procession of the Black Sloth ... I literally can't rate this yet..buh? I did really like it as I went, but after it ended I was just baffled and completely lost as to what the hell it was about, or what the ending meant. I had to Google it and...oh, he's dead and in Hell? I figured he was a paranoid schizophrenic having hallucinations, or was being drugged a lot as someone had found him out, or all the drinking and late nights were causing him to trip balls. Now I feel I need to read it again before I can rightly say how I feel about it. Also, I feel like a dumb dumb now, thanks Laird.
Bulldozer 2.5. Ehhh, like I get it (I think, lol) but it's pretty lame. Lovecraft did this kind of thing to death. Not sure why this one seems to be a favorite for a lot of people.
Proboscis 3.5 and I'm now realizing how carefully you have to read this stuff for it to make a lick of sense. Like BotNS levels of 'pay fucking attention'. This one went right by me until I read it again, and Im STILL not 100 that I fully grasp it.
Hallucigenia 4.0. Creepy as shit and not a total fucking mystery like some if the others. Gross and intriguing, loved it.
Parallax 4.5. Awesome style, cool twist ending, and just the right amount of vagueness and unanswered questions.
The Royal Zoo is Closed 2.0, I'm assuming MC was a schizophrenic who committed suicide at the end but seriously, who the fuck knows. Way too surreal to be able to determine basically anything. Cool prose though.
The Imago Sequence 5.0....good god. Speechless, this might be the most balltrippy thing I've ever read. Whhaaaaaat.
Hour of the Cyclops 4.0, manages to kinda fool you and then twist the ending despite being only a few pages long, I liked it.
So this is waaaayyyyyy out there stuff. Lovecraft meets psilocybin meets the most lucid fever dream you've ever experienced. Paying attention to every little thing in each story is critical in order to grasp the overall concepts, but even then most of these pieces manage to be so surreal and dreamlike that it's hard to tell what's going on. As I went along I feel like I got better at reading it, and as a result my enjoyment increased as well. I will have to revist this in the not too distant future to take another stab at the Black Sloth one.
Old Virginia 3.0. Not enough going on, maybe too short/rushed. I didn't have enough time to even be creeped out before it wrapped up. Had potential though.
Shiva, Open Your Eye 3.5. Creepy and very well written. Still a little light on actual plot and more like a memoir written by some eldritch abomination.
Procession of the Black Sloth ... I literally can't rate this yet..buh? I did really like it as I went, but after it ended I was just baffled and completely lost as to what the hell it was about, or what the ending meant. I had to Google it and...oh, he's dead and in Hell? I figured he was a paranoid schizophrenic having hallucinations, or was being drugged a lot as someone had found him out, or all the drinking and late nights were causing him to trip balls. Now I feel I need to read it again before I can rightly say how I feel about it. Also, I feel like a dumb dumb now, thanks Laird.
Bulldozer 2.5. Ehhh, like I get it (I think, lol) but it's pretty lame. Lovecraft did this kind of thing to death. Not sure why this one seems to be a favorite for a lot of people.
Proboscis 3.5 and I'm now realizing how carefully you have to read this stuff for it to make a lick of sense. Like BotNS levels of 'pay fucking attention'. This one went right by me until I read it again, and Im STILL not 100 that I fully grasp it.
Hallucigenia 4.0. Creepy as shit and not a total fucking mystery like some if the others. Gross and intriguing, loved it.
Parallax 4.5. Awesome style, cool twist ending, and just the right amount of vagueness and unanswered questions.
The Royal Zoo is Closed 2.0, I'm assuming MC was a schizophrenic who committed suicide at the end but seriously, who the fuck knows. Way too surreal to be able to determine basically anything. Cool prose though.
The Imago Sequence 5.0....good god. Speechless, this might be the most balltrippy thing I've ever read. Whhaaaaaat.
Hour of the Cyclops 4.0, manages to kinda fool you and then twist the ending despite being only a few pages long, I liked it.