The Monsters Come Out
Written: Apr 13 '07
|
Product Rating:
|
|
|
Pros: Interesting concept
Cons: Loses momentum, unsatisfactory ending, a bit gory
The Bottom Line: A good start fizzles out as it gets to the end
|
|
|
| Rocketgirl's Full Review: Richard Laymon - One Rainy Night |
Richard Laymon has a string of successful horror novels, so I thought I would try one. I enjoy horror but its hard to find good books with a good mix of mystery and suspense and believability without being too gory. Unfortunately I think this particular novel did meet my hopes. The story starts out quickly, but soon fizzles out. I wasn't happy with the explanation of events either. Here's how it goes.
One night in the town of Bixby, California, people go about their business. A couple gets ready for a night on the town. A girl gets ready to go babysitting. Another girl gets ready for her job delivering pizza. Some boys and their girlfriends sit around drinking. And a cop gets ready for his shift. Then it starts raining. A funny warm black rain. Anyone that comes in contact with the rain undergoes a personality change. They don't literally change into monsters, but they do turn into killing machines. The feel of the rain is almost erotic as they suddenly feel the desire to tear the next human into little bits. They grab any weapon at hand and kill and maim and drink blood. The rest of the story is a contest between the infected ones and those who find shelter to keep from getting killed.
The one thing that keeps this story moving and brings some degree of suspense is that it keeps switching back and forth between the few characters. Just when you think the babysitter is safe then one of the "crazies" gets in and they have to fight him. Then the story cuts to the restaurant, where the adults are having dinner and trying to keep the crazies out of the restaurant. And on and on. The only problem is that after a while nothing significantly different happens and so it actually gets boring.
A couple of the characters are interesting and really the ones that I gave the most attention. Denise is the babysitter and is tough enough and presence of mind to subdue the crazy that gets into the house. Once they wash the rain off of him he returns to normal. Funny thing is the person remembers they were crazy after the rain is off them. Later Denise and Tom have to escape from more crazies. She is probably the one to cheer for throughout the story and the most rounded out character. Maureen is one who gets rain on her and attacks another boy. They clean her up and they the boy rapes her. But apparently she is not clean enough as she bides her time before she can get her revenge on him, which she does. How she does it was rather humorous and may be the highlight of the whole story.
The gore can be a turnoff. It really would have been enough to just describe that a person is using such and such weapon and killed another. But to describe entrails and so forth, is a bit much for me. Or how they chew on their victims. Reading about humans behaving like animals is not my most favorite thing to read about.
And the resolution of why the rain is falling and how to stop it was probably the biggest problem with this story. The cop just thinks of who it might be and goes there. There is never any speculation, any investigating, any thoughts of anything else. It was "it's this" and it is. I hate those type of resolutions. It really takes the fun out of getting to the end of the story when apparently the writer didn't feel like adding any twists and turns, but just ending the slaughter.
Four hundred pages, most of which is describing people killing and hurting others and people trying to get away. It just got boring after awhile. Though this is probably no more violent than the average R action movie, it would still probably be unacceptable for kids. Though it does have a few good characters and an interesting premise, the plot just doesn't hold it all together. Its a fast read due to dialogue and short chapters but not necessarily to suspense. Good enough to finish I guess.
Recommended:
Yes
|
|
|
|
Epinions.com ID:
Rocketgirl
|
 in Books |
|
Member: Beth
Location: Tri-Cities, WA
Reviews written: 398
Trusted by: 224 members
About Me:
So many books, so little time.
|
|
|
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.