Took a while to get into, but glad I persisted
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It took me a good few chapters to get into this one which is unusual for a James Herbert Novel as I am usually hooked straightaway. But once it had got my attention I could barely put it down. It was excited and scary and Joe Creed is portrayed as a rogue that you cant help but like. The ending was exciting and scary although it did leave me with a few unanswered questions.
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This is ok, but not great.
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I felt reading this that I could see the joins in the plot - rather like a Dan Brown novel - you can see the thought process governing the book's structure, and that for me was a let down.
The lead character is great, though. A slimy, smarmy photographer - with, of course, a bad boy's charm - plying his trade in London Town.
The main problem with the book is that it doesn't seem to know what it is exactly. Is it a Horror novel? A thriller? Or maybe even a Comedy? All the elements are there for it to have been anyone of those.
For example: The lead character's son gets kidnapped, then the kid's mother comes to pick him up, so his dad - Joe Creed, the novel's main man - has to come up with an excuse for the kid not being there, right? So he tells his estranged wife that their son has joined the scouts and gone off to camp - this he has to make up on the spot, and gets into a flap when the ex-wife says she'll go and pick him up. This whole scene seems to have been added purely for laughs, but it hardly seemed appropriate under the circumstances, and therefore seemed forced and contrived.
Creed - the character - is well written, and we know just exactly what he's like, but in my little opinion, Herbert makes a huge mistake. Creed is a smoker, and Herbert decides that he will smoke Roll-ups, using Brown licorice fag papers. Sorry - NO WAY! I thought that was wrong from the first time we see Creed doing it, and couldn't work out what was going on. Joe Creed should be smoking Marlboros, and sparking them up with a tatty Zippo - no question.
I think it's a testament to how convincing the character is that this minor detail bothered me so much.
All in all, the book's okay, not my favourite Herbert novel, but the first I have bothered to review.
I think Haunted is the best of his that I've read, by the way.
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Demons today are a shoddy lot...
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Soon after beginning this book, I decided I needed to stop reading it. Not because it was a bad story, nor because I was scared, but because I couldn't put up with UK bestseller James Herbert's style of writing. The way he fills up the pages with brackets and odd personal comments really put me off, but thankfully the main character and the storyline managed to hold onto me. The titular character Joe Creed is a London-based paparazzi photographer about to make the worst mistake of his life, in photographing a strange man who appears in the aftermath of a funeral. Creed soon finds himself trying to unravel a string of occurrences that become more twisted and more unfathomable each step of the way. Creed isn't a unique character, but he is a well-developed one. He is very believable as a brash paparazzo, and is generally very likeable. Herbert definitely knew exactly who he was dealing with here.
The story aswell, while expectedly trashy horror affair, is a lot of fun, genuinely chilling, and the emphasis on the media and Creed's occupation give it a certain edge. Herbert's writing does seem to settle down after a few chapters, but my major qualms lie in the feeling that this novel, despite it's maturity, still feels like a Point Horror book at times. The chapters ending on 'cliffhangers' are the worst offenders.
You know, where the shadowy figure enters through the doorway, but it turns out to be a cat? I caught onto those when R.L Stine used them at the end of every single chapter in every single Goosebumps book.
But you know, I can still see the humour in this, and I have a really hard time saying that this sort of thing actually detracted from my enjoyment of the book. A decent read, sure to entertain, but nothing more.
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Ghoulish fun
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James Herbert's 15th novel continues the high standard of Haunted, albeit in a completely different style. The cover copy probably overstates the case - "You'll Be Afraid to Laugh" runs the tagline - as Creed is by no means an outright comedy, but it does have it's rotting tongue in cheek on more than one occasion. This isn't quite the knowing post-modernism of Wes Craven's Scream, but it certainly comes close on occasion. What makes the book a success is that these flashes of blackest humour derive from the voice of the main character - Joe Creed - a cynical member of the despised tabloid paparazzi, a slob whose only real interest is himself, and with no belief in anything supernatural. Just watching Creed struggle through his career is entertaining enough, and the fact that he isn't some flawless hero makes his reactions to the supernatural more believable. Add in an unwanted child dumped on him by his estranged wife and his delicate balancing of doing the right thing and earning money makes for some great drama. While there are moments of black comedy however, Creed for the most part works as a successful horror novel, in fact this novel contains some of Herbert's most chilling material, with Creed being harassed by a bizarre nocturnal visitor and doubting his own sanity. If there is a criticism here then the ending feels a little rushed, but with it's winning combination of chills, black humour, and an intriguing lead character Creed is never less than entertaining reading, and one of Herbert's best books.
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The main character's surname as book title...again???
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However...an interesting and original idea, written in typical Herbert style. I enjoyed reading it but once I got to a certain point in the book, I sensed deja vu. There was definately a similarity with one of his other books, which I won't name so I don't give away any endings. However still a stimulating read :)
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