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A review by aditusmaximus
Weaveworld by Clive Barker
4.0
I enjoyed this wildly imaginative story, but this book took me forever to get through. And I’m not quite sure why. (Long ramble below but no spoilers!)
It has all the things I enjoy. I love the scope of unbridled creativity with this book. A mysterious realm that gets hidden away in the weaves of a magical rug? Hell yes! What a unique concept, and the story remained unique and creative throughout!
It ended up being more of a dark fantasy story than a straight horror book. But I love fantasy as well, so that wasn’t a problem for me. This whole story reads like a whimsical fairy tale at times. But the villians were definitely straight out of a horror dimension. The Three Sisters, the Rake (shudder), The Scourge! Awesome and terrifying villians that’s will live on in my head for a long time!
I also love Clive Barkers prose. He has almost a poetic way with words in this book and it made this book really fun to read, definitely building on the surreal fairytale feeling of the story.
I think I had two problems with this book that caused me to struggle through it at times.
One was that the two main characters were… flat. They started off strong but eventually seemed to turn into one dimensional pawns that were just there to (very slowly) move the story forward. I rarely knew what they were thinking or what they wanted. After a while I stopped caring about them, and got stuck every time the story returned to them. I felt the same way about the Seerkind characters. Most of them didn’t feel developed at all to me and often they all felt interchangeable. I think this was even more noticible to me because the villians actually seemed well developed and interesting. So it’s not like Clive Barker can’t develop characters. Maybe he just thinks the good guys are boring lol.
My other challenge with this book was the pacing of the story. It didn’t feel consistent, there wasn’t a steady build up. Instead it felt like three or four short stories haphazardly connected together. After the peak of each short story, it felt like a long drag to get the momentum building to the next story again. About 2/3 of the way through the book I just got stuck and struggled to push forward. I’m glad I did though.
In the end, despite my two main issues, I do think I love this story! And I almost feel like this is a book I would enjoy more upon a re-read, when I can just lose myself in the prose and wild imagination, rather than getting frustrated with the characters or growing impatient with the pacing.
Also, I generally don’t like movie adaptations of books. But having seen Pan’s Labyrinth, I would love to see what kind of similarly creepy movie or miniseries adaptation Guillermo Del Toro could do with this book ! Lean a little more into the villians and the dark sides of this story and make something really creepy !
It has all the things I enjoy. I love the scope of unbridled creativity with this book. A mysterious realm that gets hidden away in the weaves of a magical rug? Hell yes! What a unique concept, and the story remained unique and creative throughout!
It ended up being more of a dark fantasy story than a straight horror book. But I love fantasy as well, so that wasn’t a problem for me. This whole story reads like a whimsical fairy tale at times. But the villians were definitely straight out of a horror dimension. The Three Sisters, the Rake (shudder), The Scourge! Awesome and terrifying villians that’s will live on in my head for a long time!
I also love Clive Barkers prose. He has almost a poetic way with words in this book and it made this book really fun to read, definitely building on the surreal fairytale feeling of the story.
I think I had two problems with this book that caused me to struggle through it at times.
One was that the two main characters were… flat. They started off strong but eventually seemed to turn into one dimensional pawns that were just there to (very slowly) move the story forward. I rarely knew what they were thinking or what they wanted. After a while I stopped caring about them, and got stuck every time the story returned to them. I felt the same way about the Seerkind characters. Most of them didn’t feel developed at all to me and often they all felt interchangeable. I think this was even more noticible to me because the villians actually seemed well developed and interesting. So it’s not like Clive Barker can’t develop characters. Maybe he just thinks the good guys are boring lol.
My other challenge with this book was the pacing of the story. It didn’t feel consistent, there wasn’t a steady build up. Instead it felt like three or four short stories haphazardly connected together. After the peak of each short story, it felt like a long drag to get the momentum building to the next story again. About 2/3 of the way through the book I just got stuck and struggled to push forward. I’m glad I did though.
In the end, despite my two main issues, I do think I love this story! And I almost feel like this is a book I would enjoy more upon a re-read, when I can just lose myself in the prose and wild imagination, rather than getting frustrated with the characters or growing impatient with the pacing.
Also, I generally don’t like movie adaptations of books. But having seen Pan’s Labyrinth, I would love to see what kind of similarly creepy movie or miniseries adaptation Guillermo Del Toro could do with this book ! Lean a little more into the villians and the dark sides of this story and make something really creepy !