Scan barcode
A review by diziet
Books of Blood, Volumes 1-3 by Ramsey Campbell, Clive Barker
challenging
dark
mysterious
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.75
Crazy, imaginative and dark short-stories. Surprised that more of them have not been made into movies - some really novel ideas even now years later.
Would not say I enjoyed all of them - some of them are ‘what did I just read…??’
Mostly the monsters, bad guys and overall evil wins - or more correctly everybody looses. If there are survivors they are changed - and not really for the better.
The short intro by Clive Barker is interesting. He writes about revisiting earlier work. How short-stories are like time-capsules of the authors life, as it was when he wrote story.
"I look at these pieces and I don't think the man who wrote them is alive in me anymore...We are our own graveyards; we squat amongst the tombs of the people we were."
Made me think both about how I view myself and also how I review books. With some authors I love their early books - the later ones not so much. But it is kinda unfair to criticize author for this - after all they are not the same as when they wrote books 10 or 20 years ago. Also I am not the same as when I read books for the first time. Tho there are books that I enjoy just as much now as when I read them for the first time.
Barker writes different kinds of stories now - he still liked the old stuff - even if he would like not to be primarily know for the early horror novels and being a ‘horror writer’. But still they please him and ‘That’s the most you can hope, I think: that the work you do pleases, both in the doing and the revisiting’
- we should all be so fortunate.
Would not say I enjoyed all of them - some of them are ‘what did I just read…??’
Mostly the monsters, bad guys and overall evil wins - or more correctly everybody looses. If there are survivors they are changed - and not really for the better.
The short intro by Clive Barker is interesting. He writes about revisiting earlier work. How short-stories are like time-capsules of the authors life, as it was when he wrote story.
"I look at these pieces and I don't think the man who wrote them is alive in me anymore...We are our own graveyards; we squat amongst the tombs of the people we were."
Made me think both about how I view myself and also how I review books. With some authors I love their early books - the later ones not so much. But it is kinda unfair to criticize author for this - after all they are not the same as when they wrote books 10 or 20 years ago. Also I am not the same as when I read books for the first time. Tho there are books that I enjoy just as much now as when I read them for the first time.
Barker writes different kinds of stories now - he still liked the old stuff - even if he would like not to be primarily know for the early horror novels and being a ‘horror writer’. But still they please him and ‘That’s the most you can hope, I think: that the work you do pleases, both in the doing and the revisiting’
- we should all be so fortunate.