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A review by misstwosense
Carrion Comfort by Dan Simmons
2.0
It's 2020- You can do better.
This book is insanely racist. Both the overt racism of the "n" word (used more and more frequently as you progress in the book, a cheap device the author uses as if the reader is too dumb to get that one character is both capital E Evil and going mad), and lots of more subtle racism in too many shapes and forms to count (these clearly NOT intended, just the real life horrors of a white man writing about- and often in the voice of- black people, Jewish people, Asian people, etc).
The writing itself is simple but without any economy of word or thought. It feels like it could have been a novella if Simmons had cut out the CONSTANT over explaining, repeating facts, trying to add depth to characters that still feel paper thin, and Marty-Stuing all over place. (Hard to deal with the very, very obvious way the author sees himself in the Sheriff and, upsettingly, the rapist character.)
Oh, btw, do you like reading endless scenes of highly sexualized rape? Do you like stories with female protagonists that are written by a man who appears to have never even seen an actual woman, let alone spoken to one? Do you like EXTREMELY unsatisfying endings that are completely illogical to how actual humans think and act but are necessary to further the story? Well then, boy is this the yada yada yada.
But lo, it's not just wildly racist and misogynist, its homophobic as well. The really troubling thing is, though, I've read two novels by Simmons at this point. They were written nearly 20 years apart in his career yet BOTH have eeeevil gay male characters. In the more modern book, The Terror, he balances it out by having not evil gays too, but this is a pattern now. I question Simmons' relationship to gay people. The whole book is a pretty strong case for writers writing only in a voice similar to their own. I'm not necessarily saying a straight white cis man can't write good female or poc characters. I'm saying THIS one sure cant
The story itself I would call Interview with a Vampire meets any generic airport political thriller, all mixed into a SNL "The Californians" sketch based broth. You WILL learn the best routes to take in LA, Chicago, or all of Germany. Simmons had to justify those travel costs somehow!
Back to the point. He writes every chapter in a different voice, some first person, most 3rd. This leads to the aforementioned constant repetition as we see characters discover things we the reader have known about for chapters already. Seeing people solve mysterious isn't fun if we already know what happened, and the constant pov changing grinds every chapter to a screeching halt as we switch from something interesting to someone else having a cup of coffee. DAN SIMMONS SURE LOVES COFFEE.
I could continue to go on about this book, because there's plenty more I disliked. However, I'm giving it two stars because it IS horrifying to read. Not scary, but unpleasant, uncomfortable, etc. So it at least succeeded in that. Yeah? But ultimately I want to say it's 2020. The tropes in this book are super tired at this point, so don't waste your time on a brick filled with so much ick. Find modern horror literature and you can have all the scares without the baggage. No one needs to be reading something this racist, this unnecessary, and this unnecessarily racist in 'modern' times. You can find better. Don't waste your time.
This book is insanely racist. Both the overt racism of the "n" word (used more and more frequently as you progress in the book, a cheap device the author uses as if the reader is too dumb to get that one character is both capital E Evil and going mad), and lots of more subtle racism in too many shapes and forms to count (these clearly NOT intended, just the real life horrors of a white man writing about- and often in the voice of- black people, Jewish people, Asian people, etc).
The writing itself is simple but without any economy of word or thought. It feels like it could have been a novella if Simmons had cut out the CONSTANT over explaining, repeating facts, trying to add depth to characters that still feel paper thin, and Marty-Stuing all over place. (Hard to deal with the very, very obvious way the author sees himself in the Sheriff and, upsettingly, the rapist character.)
Oh, btw, do you like reading endless scenes of highly sexualized rape? Do you like stories with female protagonists that are written by a man who appears to have never even seen an actual woman, let alone spoken to one? Do you like EXTREMELY unsatisfying endings that are completely illogical to how actual humans think and act but are necessary to further the story? Well then, boy is this the yada yada yada.
But lo, it's not just wildly racist and misogynist, its homophobic as well. The really troubling thing is, though, I've read two novels by Simmons at this point. They were written nearly 20 years apart in his career yet BOTH have eeeevil gay male characters. In the more modern book, The Terror, he balances it out by having not evil gays too, but this is a pattern now. I question Simmons' relationship to gay people. The whole book is a pretty strong case for writers writing only in a voice similar to their own. I'm not necessarily saying a straight white cis man can't write good female or poc characters. I'm saying THIS one sure cant
The story itself I would call Interview with a Vampire meets any generic airport political thriller, all mixed into a SNL "The Californians" sketch based broth. You WILL learn the best routes to take in LA, Chicago, or all of Germany. Simmons had to justify those travel costs somehow!
Back to the point. He writes every chapter in a different voice, some first person, most 3rd. This leads to the aforementioned constant repetition as we see characters discover things we the reader have known about for chapters already. Seeing people solve mysterious isn't fun if we already know what happened, and the constant pov changing grinds every chapter to a screeching halt as we switch from something interesting to someone else having a cup of coffee. DAN SIMMONS SURE LOVES COFFEE.
I could continue to go on about this book, because there's plenty more I disliked. However, I'm giving it two stars because it IS horrifying to read. Not scary, but unpleasant, uncomfortable, etc. So it at least succeeded in that. Yeah? But ultimately I want to say it's 2020. The tropes in this book are super tired at this point, so don't waste your time on a brick filled with so much ick. Find modern horror literature and you can have all the scares without the baggage. No one needs to be reading something this racist, this unnecessary, and this unnecessarily racist in 'modern' times. You can find better. Don't waste your time.