| Author | Message | ||
     Griff (Griff) Username: Griff Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.100 |
57 customer reviews on Amazon.co.uk. Why the excitement with this particular book? (I've not read it yet.) | ||
| Matt_cowan (Matt_cowan) Username: Matt_cowan Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 68.249.109.126 |
It's wonderful! One of my all time favorites!  | ||
| Albie (Albie) Username: Albie Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.195.236.131 |
I thought this wasn't out till may 1st. That's what it says on the news page of Ramsey's site. Or is that a reprinting? | ||
| Albie (Albie) Username: Albie Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.195.236.131 |
"It's not a book that leaves you alone readily; I'm stunned by the overall effect. This was actually the first novel of Campbell's that I've read -- but it won't be the last, no way." http://community.livejournal.com/50bookchallenge/tag/horror This guy was stunned by it. Good. Stay stunned! | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.236.211 |
Set those phasers for stun. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.143.178.131 |
It is very very good indeed. And it does live with you long after you close the book. The nearest thing to a waking nightmare in terms of a reading experience. Extraordinary and haunting. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 212.74.96.200 |
I'm hoping it burns up the country through word of mouth. Ramsey's gigging at Waterstones in Manchester next month to promote it. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.100 |
Gigging - you're right. I thought you said giggling. That would be Smilemime. | ||
| Matt_cowan (Matt_cowan) Username: Matt_cowan Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 68.249.106.58 |
The scene in that book where the main character went into the old theater with the snow coming in through holes above, with his parents, has to be one of the most spine-chillingly creepy ones ever written. Tremendous! | ||
| Lincoln_brown (Lincoln_brown) Username: Lincoln_brown Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 121.219.99.204 |
Matt, I agree - brilliant. Have you read 'The Retrospective', by Ramsey? | ||
| Albie (Albie) Username: Albie Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.195.236.131 |
I just bought a copy from a shop. A SHOP. But I won't read it just yet. I'll play with it first. Like a cat, pawing it and chasing it like it's alive. | ||
| Griff (Griff) Username: Griff Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 172.202.111.245 |
Albie Write a story for us. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.24.122.40 |
He did. It's over there. | ||
| Matt_cowan (Matt_cowan) Username: Matt_cowan Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 68.249.106.58 |
"Matt, I agree - brilliant. Have you read 'The Retrospective', by Ramsey?" I have not. I'm not sure what that one is. Is it a novel or a short story? I did just order a copy of Hungry Moon from Amazon the other day. I heard it's another great one. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 212.74.96.200 |
GRIN gets a good review in one of the SF magazines. Not SFX but a similar mag. It's one of the few "Must Read" tagged in the mag. Ha! This is great, Ramsey back in the top field again and slogging them over the horizon. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.184.141 |
Was it DEATHRAY, Mark? I've found their reviews to be far more consistently on the mark, and more knowledgeable and in-depth, than SFX, whose reviews are pretty shallow, in my opinion. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.240.83 |
I absolutely adored THE GRIN OF THE DARK. It's a wonderful novel: bold, terrifying, and uterly compelling. The ending was a stroke of genius. | ||
| Karim Ghahwagi (Karim) Username: Karim Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 83.93.30.31 |
Yes this story was completly impossible to put down. And a spot on MMS intro with an excellent cover and book design. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 212.74.96.200 |
>>Was it DEATHRAY, Mark? No, Huw. Science Fiction Now or something like that. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 212.74.96.200 |
GRIN OF THE DARK Waterstones reports: Tenterden = Nil Ashford = Nil Canterbury = 50/50 (two branches, one had, one hadn't) Huddersfield = 50/50 (two branches, one had, one hadn't) I've got a copy, though. I'm saving it and savouring it. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.163.48.60 |
I've got a copy, though. I'm saving it and savouring it. Me too! Must read it... Currently reading a collection of John Gordon's tales. | ||
| John_l_probert (John_l_probert) Username: John_l_probert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 90.208.214.35 |
Is it good, Mick? I've got it on the shelf (if it's Left in the Dark) | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.179.124 |
I've got it too (unsurprisingly). Our book and DVD libraries would all look very familiar to each other if we ever met up... ;-) | ||
| John_l_probert (John_l_probert) Username: John_l_probert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 90.208.214.35 |
I'm starting to wonder if collectively we are responsible for the survival of most of the small presses | ||
| Albie (Albie) Username: Albie Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.195.236.131 |
I pulled one out of a ditch once. They were all in there, spluttering in office chairs with the computers fizzling and melting, waving their cardigan clad arms, chapbooks floating off under the railway bridge, screams turning into gargles, eyes filling up with tea-brown water. By the time I'd fished them out they were just soggy rag dolls putting out hate pamphlets. Imagine that: by the side of a ditch, wet rag dolls at toy computers putting out hate rags...minds struggling to swim in the choking drowning memories of that horrible day in the water. Running around after every publication, scaring the local dogs and cats. | ||
| Albie (Albie) Username: Albie Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.195.244.67 |
I SAID IMAGINE IT! | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 212.74.96.200 |
Hmm. Enjoying GRIN OF THE DARK, but noticed an odd thing. Names. There's a Simon and a Mark, and I think I saw a Rob. Could Bebe be one letter behind A? As I read on will I spot other familiar names, or is it all just a coincidence, a wry grin in the dark?! A bird just flew by, must've been big, cos for a moment I thought its wingbeats were the flapping oversized feet of a clown . . . | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.196.225 |
Doesn't worry me at all that the main source of fear in the book is an overweight jokester called Lane. Face. Bothered? | ||
| Gcw (Gcw) Username: Gcw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.43.119.208 |
All of RC's recent work has been top notch:- Fuckin hell, even his occasional wobble is better than most others best! gcw | ||
| Albie (Albie) Username: Albie Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.195.236.131 |
Has everyone read it enough so I can quote my favourite lines? DAMN IT! Huuuurry.  | ||
| Des (Des) Username: Des Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.161.241.208 |
GRIN OF THE DARK arrived in the post. And I only ordered it yesterday on Amazon! | ||
| Griff (Griff) Username: Griff Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.100 |
I'm still reading SECRET STORY. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.108.51.144 |
Just finished reading THE GRIN OF THE DARK. Stunning. One of the most ambitious weird fiction novels of modern times. It gets under your skin and then turns the world inside out. Insidious, challenging, painful. Even by Campbell standards, this is remarkable. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.249.146 |
That's exactly what I thought, Joel. It's up there with Campbell's best, IMHO. And the ending is sublime. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 212.74.96.200 |
It's very, very good so far. I've got the man-flu, poor me, such woe upon a single soul, and so have paused in the reading so I don't attach negative feelings to the book. That happened to me before.. I remember reading Iain Banks's COMPLICITY when I was halfway to dead and now everytime I pick it up I feel like crap. Sad, because a lot of books I read back then kept me from complete insanity. But if I read a book full of flu, it'll just put me off it next time I pick it up, so I'm in pause mode. Should really get a stock of really crap books in . . . | ||
| Gcw (Gcw) Username: Gcw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.151.123.101 |
The Grin Of Dark is A1. I am halfway through thieving Fear...Review to come. gcw | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 212.74.96.200 |
I'm passing the rest of the flu with a book about Beatrix Potter and her life in the Lake District. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.24.122.40 |
Benevolent old soul, wasn't she? | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 212.74.96.200 |
Quite a sad life, really, as portrayed here in this book by Hunter Davies. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.24.122.40 |
Yeah, the death of her intended, etc. Her bullying folks. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 212.74.96.200 |
Even the fact she had a fiance was frowned upon because he was seen to come from "trade". Keep the poor girl all but locked in her bedroom while she's still in her 30s, dressing up and painting her pets, and see where that'll get her. Class, eh? | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.24.122.40 |
Aye. | ||
| John (John) Username: John Registered: 05-2008 Posted From: 82.24.4.67 |
It is read, Albie. Quote away! | ||
| Albie (Albie) Username: Albie Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.195.236.131 |
Nope. There's a few stragglers. "SIMPKINS! Stop looking for anagrams!" | ||
| Griff (Griff) Username: Griff Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
It's not on the shelves of Borders or Waterstones in Cardiff. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.149.134.59 |
Poor distribution kills most 'mass-market' books from the outset. If the sales in the first fortnight aren't as high as those of the bestselling titles, the shops don't restock. A 'bookseller' in the USA said recently that the shelf life of a paperback should be equivalent to that of a fresh yoghurt, i.e. less than a month. The only solution is to keep ordering the books you don't see on the shelves. But if you already own them, that might be a quixotic gesture. Buy them for your friends, and be flamboyant about the ordering process: "I'm SO upset to find this book unavailable, and don't want to have to use that HORRIBLE Amazon dot co dot uk..." Amazon. That word used to suggest heroic and powerful women. Now it suggests vicious little dweebs writing know-nothing 'customer reviews' and bookshops going out of business.  | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 212.74.96.200 |
Amazon? Are you aware of this, Joel: http://www.bookarazzi.com/front/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=257&It emid=55 Huddersfield now have stocks of GRIN in both stores. I just kept asking different members of staff about it on different days. One has sold already. Hurrah. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.149.134.59 |
Amazon is like a children's playground where they forgot to build a toilet. So they dug a hole in the ground and called it Customer Reviews. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.5.7.172 |
The benefits of Amazon, Joel, outweigh the debits: books long out of print, impossible to find anywhere - even rare bookstores - can be found here, and often for incredibly good prices. A book can be missing from your 1000 mile radius, but thanks to Amazon, can be easily obtained. And me, I ignore Customer Reviews as a rule, so.... | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.149.134.59 |
You can also have the intriguing surprise of a book sold to you as being in 'very good' condition actually being wrecked, dog-eared, creased, stained and falling apart. It all adds to that sense of living on the edge. | ||
| Des (Des) Username: Des Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.161.241.208 |
It seemed coincidentally apt, but in the dentist waiting room this morning, I started reading GRIN from where I had got up to : ie the beginning of Chapter 28...! (I'm really enjoying this book...) | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 218.168.197.28 |
Aha! I remember chapter 28, as I stopped reading at that point for a couple of days, due to an interruption (thankfully non-dental). 'Tubby's Tremendous Teeth'  | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.24.122.40 |
And the only full-price bookshop in Whitby has copies of ...THE GRIN OF THE DARK!!! | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 212.74.96.200 |
Excellent. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.159.143.25 |
It's a great book - finally got around to reading it t'other week. I love the "Ramsey-ness" of it, and the great puns on existing film titles, specially those on THE CORSICAN BROTHERS and YOU'RE DARN TOOTIN', and I even watched LEAVE 'EM LAUGHING again just to see if I could see Tubby at the end! | ||
| Griff (Griff) Username: Griff Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
He's back! | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.159.143.25 |
Indeedy, scarred but alive... | ||
| Griff (Griff) Username: Griff Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 92.8.114.224 |
You're no longer used to advertise Ben & Jerries Ice cream in the Independant, Mick. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 85.158.137.195 |
That'll be due to the scarring then... | ||
| Griff (Griff) Username: Griff Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
Zoiks! You been hideously maimed, Mick?! | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.159.143.25 |
Not quite, but I had a bit of a tumble on holiday. I badly twisted my ankle in April 07 in Paris, on a wonky paving stone, and I think my ankle has been a bit weak ever since. The first day in Kendal two and a half weeks back I went crashing over, and badly scraped and cut my chin, nose, left cheek and upper lip. A visit to the hospital, a bit of cleaning up and a Tetanus shot later and I looked like the victim of a bad road accident, so I hid away (in the gorgeous flat owned by our friends - view from their balcony on the first evening there):-  ...for a week until I was reasonably presentable, and our friends said we could stay on a second week so's we still got to have a nice break, so all's well in the end! | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.159.143.25 |
As well as GRIN OF THE DARK, on me hols I also read:- The Coming of Jonathan Smith by Harry Ludlam in the recent Ash Tree paperback release. I hadn't read this since I read the Arrow paperback thirty-five years ago - it's a great little book, and I think I may still have the original. Somewhere. Hide & Seek by Ian Rankin - good copper stuff The Rain Before It Falls by Jonathan Coe - great book by a favourite writer Plus (and Gary F. will be impressed) Ruth Rendell Collected Stories 2, which contains the following short story collections:- The New Girlfriend Blood Lines The Copper Peacock Piranha to Scurfy All of which were superb, so I now have a copy of volume 1 on my shelves ready to be read! | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.24.122.40 |
Good stuff, Mick! Glad you enjoyed them. She's a fine writer. Did you read the novellas 'The Strawberry Tree' or 'Heartstones' - both insidious! | ||
| Gcw (Gcw) Username: Gcw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.132.52.195 |
Mick Curtis!-What have you been doing to yourself!? gcw (Soozy licks lipstick scented tissue and prepares to repair the wounded soldier...) | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.24.122.40 |
Btw, the opening novella in Piranha' was apparently based on Stephen King. Apparently Rendell and Tabby K. correspond. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.159.143.25 |
Did you read the novellas 'The Strawberry Tree' or 'Heartstones' I have a dreadful memory for short story titles (even if they're Ramsey's!) and I no longer have the book so can't check up, but according to Wikipedia The Strawberry Tree was in the book I read, so yes! There were some stunning shorts in the collection; amongst the longer ones I read that stayed with me were the one about the village that was up to sexy goings on and the other about the girl who's brother and his girlfriend disappear when they're young and reappear forty years later. Oh curse this alcohol-befuddled brain! Indeed, gcw, what the hell have I been doing?!!! Debs did a wonderful job looking after me though, popping into the local M&S and phoning me up from there to help decide what to eat each evening! | ||
| Griff (Griff) Username: Griff Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
"Hide & Seek by Ian Rankin - good copper stuff" Rankin's a great author. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.24.122.40 |
High Mysterious Union, Mick? The sexy one? And the other sounds like Strawberry Tree, only they aren't her brother and girlfriend - they're pretending to be them, but she's so desperate, she keeps up the pretence. Devastating tale. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.159.143.25 |
only they aren't her brother and girlfriend - they're pretending to be them Indeedy, but I didn't want to say that as I thought it was a bit of a spoiler for folk who've not yet read it - 'twas bloody excellent, that'un. And yes, it was High Mysterious Union - the book was one of many in a bookcase in the foyer at the flats we were staying at, and residents just drop off books there they'd read, and others borrow them, which is why I don't have a copy, but I'll buy it now - it's a wonderful collection with nary a duff story in sight. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.159.143.25 |
...and I'm looking forward to reading the remaining three collections in the first collected volume. Before reading these stories I'd only read JUDGEMENT IN STONE many years back at the recommendation of my mum - I'm a real convert now though. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.24.122.40 |
Mick, you MUST read A SIGHT FOR SORE EYES and THE BRIMSTONE WEDDING. Terrifying, both. Scary as Ramsey. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.159.143.25 |
I'll make a point of getting those soon, Gary - cheers for the tip. I've just been to Amazon and ordered them... Oh, and I picked up a copy of THE WATER'S LOVELY a few months back as the third book in a 3 for 2 offer in Waterstones, but I've not yet read it. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.159.143.25 |
...and I picked up THE MINOTAUR recently too - again, not yet read it :-( | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.148.103.184 |
Ooh, Rendell is good. Her stuff is tasty. A genuine, unsung horror writer. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 212.74.96.200 |
Glad you're okay, Mick. When you've a long way to fall, it must hurt when you get to the end . . . >>Rankin's a great author. There was a repeat of REICHENBACH FALLS, a TV movie based ona s tory idea of his, last night. In it there's a lot of rumination and playing with the notions of what might, uh, befall (?) the author of series novels and the interaction/relationship between the author and his lead character. Good stuff. Lots of Rankin/Rebus references in it. The flat they show is Rebus's, the typeface of the books Rankin's. . . And of course Rankin wrote under the name Jack (not to be confused with John) Harvey. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.159.143.25 |
Cheers Mark... Didn't really like REICHENBACH FALLS when I saw it on its first showing. Maybe I'll give it another go; it'll probably be on a million times before it wears out anyway. | ||
| Des (Des) Username: Des Registered: 06-2008 Posted From: 86.163.170.232 |
Now and again, throughout life - and I'm 60 - one comes across books that are landmarks in one's reading reality. And 'Grin of the Dark' is - for me - one such book. This is a fine example of what I call 'magic fiction' (as opposed to 'magic realism') -- and there is a subliminal intertitle in the book that eventually clinched it for me: He who opens the portal is the portal. But it turned out not to be subliminal at all. Life itself is perhaps an intertitle. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
Smilemime thanks you, Des! I am but his mask. | ||
| Albie (Albie) Username: Albie Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.195.244.67 |
Haha. Ramsey is doing an albie. He does that. That albie fella'. | ||
| Albie (Albie) Username: Albie Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.195.244.67 |
Yeah. We hate that albie fella'. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.149.134.59 |
Albie Damned. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.148.96.124 |
Albie Buggered. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.148.96.124 |
Well Albie... |