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A review by pkfire199x
Shadowland by Peter Straub
2.0
For such an interesting premise, Shadowland fails to deliver a story that is sharp and concise enough to be a powerful horror fantasy story. It takes a great while to get into anything remotely frightening, and even then, the horror was not really that horrifying at all. It was more akin to someone trying their darnedest to tell you the scariest ghost story at a campfire, but instead of evoking any fear in you, you can't help but feel sorry for their poor attempt at spookiness. And the fantastical moments were not much better. While imaginative, there wasn't much weight to them, causing certain scenes that were intended to be powerful to fall flat.
Perhaps I would've been more invested in the goings-on if Straub was a better writer. His sentences and descriptive choices often left me scratching my head or repulsed. The way in which an author chooses to write their story is just as important as the story itself, for how can you grab readers' interest if your writing style is underdeveloped? Sometimes it doesn't matter how great or deep a book is, you can still alienate the reader if the writing is flawed.
I saw the promise here--the setup, the way that magic was handled--but it wasn't executed well at all. One of the other issues was that characters act in comically bad ways, making it hard to feel invested in their lives--and thusly, every major story event. And the convoluted way that the story is told in makes it hard to enjoy anything, regardless of how poorly the characters are written. Straub's focus is all over the place and he never really settles down long enough to get anything substantial going. Surprisingly, Shadowland was a chaotic mess that squandered anything good that Straub tried to set up. Maybe I'll find some of his older, punchier works to be more enjoyable, but I don't think I'll be giving those a shot for a long time.
Perhaps I would've been more invested in the goings-on if Straub was a better writer. His sentences and descriptive choices often left me scratching my head or repulsed. The way in which an author chooses to write their story is just as important as the story itself, for how can you grab readers' interest if your writing style is underdeveloped? Sometimes it doesn't matter how great or deep a book is, you can still alienate the reader if the writing is flawed.
I saw the promise here--the setup, the way that magic was handled--but it wasn't executed well at all. One of the other issues was that characters act in comically bad ways, making it hard to feel invested in their lives--and thusly, every major story event. And the convoluted way that the story is told in makes it hard to enjoy anything, regardless of how poorly the characters are written. Straub's focus is all over the place and he never really settles down long enough to get anything substantial going. Surprisingly, Shadowland was a chaotic mess that squandered anything good that Straub tried to set up. Maybe I'll find some of his older, punchier works to be more enjoyable, but I don't think I'll be giving those a shot for a long time.