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A review by tobin_elliott
OLD TOO SOON by Brian Bowyer
dark
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.25
Geez. I kinda don't even know where to begin with this one.
Maybe with a signature phrase I think I've read in all three of Bowyer's books that I've read? "Let me hit that whiskey."
Someone else has already said, if you've read any Bowyer, you know what to expect. That's mostly true. You're going to get an awful lot of psychopathic behaviour, and characters who have lost all sense of morality. Bowyer tends to write one of two types of characters...those who kill, or those who will be killed. There's virtually no one in between.
Bowyer writes some really bleak, nihilistic, violent horror. He's Jack Ketchum with absolutely no conscience or morality.
And please do not take any of this as negative statements, none of it is meant that way. Bowyer is a sadistic Hemingway who writes the sparest prose I may have ever read. His killers are dispassionate in the extreme. I don't think anyone else writes like this, and I'm sure I could pick out Bowyer's writing anywhere.
I will say, having read his biography, this one reads very much like an alternative universe Brian Bowyer, as I recognized a lot of the situations from the tales he told of his own life.
This is one mean motherfucker of a book. I don't read a lot of this stuff because, quite honestly, it bothers me. But I do make the exception for Bowyer.
Maybe with a signature phrase I think I've read in all three of Bowyer's books that I've read? "Let me hit that whiskey."
Someone else has already said, if you've read any Bowyer, you know what to expect. That's mostly true. You're going to get an awful lot of psychopathic behaviour, and characters who have lost all sense of morality. Bowyer tends to write one of two types of characters...those who kill, or those who will be killed. There's virtually no one in between.
Bowyer writes some really bleak, nihilistic, violent horror. He's Jack Ketchum with absolutely no conscience or morality.
And please do not take any of this as negative statements, none of it is meant that way. Bowyer is a sadistic Hemingway who writes the sparest prose I may have ever read. His killers are dispassionate in the extreme. I don't think anyone else writes like this, and I'm sure I could pick out Bowyer's writing anywhere.
I will say, having read his biography, this one reads very much like an alternative universe Brian Bowyer, as I recognized a lot of the situations from the tales he told of his own life.
This is one mean motherfucker of a book. I don't read a lot of this stuff because, quite honestly, it bothers me. But I do make the exception for Bowyer.