The Brave by Gregory McDonald

 

(hb; 1991)

 

From the inside flap:

“Rafael’s world is a place where armed guards patrol a dump to prevent poor families from foraging through the garbage. With his family, Rafael lives on the edge of the refuse heap in a forgotten corner of America’s Southwest.

“Desperately poor, he is determined to give his family some respite from their dire poverty, even if it means trading his own life to do so.

“Rafael finds a man who says he will pay many thousands of dollars in exchange for his life:  so he agrees to ‘star’ in a snuff film.”

 

Review

Brave, with its stark language, grim-flat tone and likely doomed characters is a work of horrific beauty, with Rafael (a simple, largely illiterate young man) willing to sacrifice his life to improve those of his family and his also-impoverished community. No words wasted in this fast-moving, taut-emotions-between-the-lines (and relatively short) novel, its third chapter—which comes with a foreword/warning from Mcdonald—fairly (possibly) stomach-churning for those not used to bluntly stated inhumanity and potential horror (in a weird way, Brave put in the mindset of director/co-screenwriter John McNaughton’s 1986 film Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer). This is one of the best books I’ve ever read in any genre, up there with Robert Bloch’s Psycho (1959) and Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange (1962), and highly recommended for fans of Cormac McCarthy and Richard Stark’s twenty-four-book Parker series.

#

 

The resulting 1997 film, directed, co-scripted by and starring Johnny Depp, was not released stateside. Depp was upset by the negative reaction of U.S. film critics and refused to release it in that country. It debuted at Cannes Film Festival in May 1997 and was released in other countries throughout the remainder of that year. (Brave’s co-screenwriters also included Paul McCudden and D.P. Depp.)

Depp played Raphael (not spelled “Rafael” as it is in Mcdonald’s source novel). Marlon Brando played McCarthy, a snuff filmmaker who spells it out for Raphael. Marshall Bell played Larry, McCarthy’s shifty nephew.

Floyd “Red Crow” Westerman played Raphael’s “Papa.” Luis Guzmán played Luis, Raphael’s older brother. Pepe Serna played Alessando, Raphael’s other brother, who whines a lot and is an especially doomy do-nothing.

Frederic Forrest, Brando’s co-star in Apocalypse Now (1979), played Lou Sr. Clarence Williams III played Father Stratton. Max Perlich played Lou Jr. Iggy Pop played “Man Eating Bird Leg.”

Scary Book: Insects by Kazuo Umezu

 

(pb; 2003, 2006: second volume in Umezu’s Scary Book manga series. Japanese-to-English translation by Kumar Sivasubramanian; lettering and retouch by Kathryn Renta. Followed by Scary Book: Faces.)

 

From the back cover

“Kazuo Umezu, ‘The Stephen King of manga,’ returns with the second frightening volume of Scary Book. In ‘Butterfly Grave,’ a young woman, Megumi, is paralyzed by an inexplicable, devastating fear of butterflies, a phobia brought on by the mysterious and untimely death of her mother when Megumi was still an infant. Upon visiting her mother’s grave years after her death, Megumi becomes haunted by a black butterfly that only she can see and which seemingly causes waves of destruction and misery to Megumi’s family and friends wherever it appears. But when Megumi’s father decides to remarry. Megumi begins to fear that her new mother is turning into the very thing she dreads most.”

 

Review

As with the first Scary Book (Reflections), manga/J-horror fans may easily find much to enjoy in this second volume of Umezu’s Scary Book trilogy. The artwork is mainstream manga-realistic, plausibly slipping into its characters’ visualized mindsets and realities (veering between horror, silliness and bloody violence), its writing mostly solid, entertaining, at least until its last third.

Unlike Insects, this second volume is one 227-page story (“Butterfly Grave”), a mix of The Babadook (2014; director/screenwriter: Jennifer Kent), J-horror manga and Alfred Hitchcockian psychological mystery and intrigue. It’s Babadook-esque in that Megumi is often irritating and bizarre in her loud, violent constant-panic-mode behavior (like young Samuel in Babadook). It’s Hitchcockian in that as the story progresses, it seems Megumi’s off-putting behavior might be justified by the seeming intentions of some around her, who might not wish the best for her.

As noted before, Insects has a good, entertaining, steady build storyline for the most part. Near the end Megumi’s seemingly irrational flights of nightmare and its Reveal/climax scenes run a bit long. Still, it’s a fast, worthwhile read, one worth checking out. Followed by Scary Book: Faces.

Nightlife by Thomas Perry

 

(pb; 2006)

 

From the back cover

“When the cousin of Los Angeles underworld figure Hugo Poole is found shot to death in his home in Portland, Oregon, homicide detective Catherine Hobbes is determined to solve the case. But her feelings, and the investigation, are complicated when Hugo simultaneously hires Joe Pitt. As Joe and Catherine form an uneasy alliance, the murder count rises. Following the evidence, Catherine finds herself in a deadly contest with a cunning female adversary capable of changing her appearance and identity at will. Catherine must use everything she knows, as a detective and as a woman, to stop a murderer who kills on impulse and with ease, and who becomes more efficient and elusive with each crime.”

 

 

Review

Nightlife, like Perry’s best writing, is a near-impossible-to-set-down, tautly penned and edited police-procedural thriller, with well-developed characters worth rooting for or hissing at (even the emotionally immature/defensive, cold-blooded killer,Tanya Starling, aka Charlene Buckner, aka other names, can be sympathized or at least understood, given her fully realized backstory). That Perry provides effective character motivations imbues the resulting violence, all of it masterfully edited and written, with an impressive, reads-fresh, character-sourced intimacy, even as he sidesteps certain action-thriller tropes, and an ending that deftly blends key-character trepidation and hope into a “would love to see these characters again” finish. Top-notch book, top-notch author.

The Town of Pigs by Hideshi Hino

 

(pb; 1983, English translation 2022: manga)

 

From the back cover

“One night, under a blood red moon glimmering with demonic beauty, a group of devilish creatures armed with axes and spears came riding into a quiet city on horseback.

“One by one, they loaded the villagers up into cages and carried them off without any explanation. . . I barely managed to escape alive.”

 

Review

This 185-page manga, with little-to-no explanation for its immediate, violent and gory events and its bizarre, character-centric end-twist, is a blast of a read, with great artwork, a confident tone (it doesn’t spoon feed anything to its readers) and overall impressive delivery. Great read, might be puzzling for those who aren’t big on reading between strange lines.

Clown in a Cornfield by Adam Cesare

 

(pb; 2020: YA novel. First book in Frendo/Clown in a Cornfield trilogy. Followed by Clown in a Cornfield 2: Frendo Lives!)

 

From the back cover

“Quinn Maybrook just wants to make it to graduation, but she might not make it to morning. When Quinn and her father moved to a tiny town with a weird clown for a mascot, they were looking for a fresh start. But ever since the town’s only factory closed down, Kettle Springs has been cracked in half.

“Most of the town believes that the kids are to blame. After all, the juniors and seniors at Kettle Springs high are the ones who set the abandoned factory on fire and who spend all their time posting pranks on YouTube. They have no respect and no idea what it means to work hard.

“For the kids, it’s the other way around. And now Kettle Springs is caught in a constant battle between the old and new, tradition and progress. It’s a fight looks like it will destroy the town. Until one homicidal clown with a porkpie hat and a red nose decides to end it for good. Because if your opponents all die, you win the debate by default.”

 

Review

Clown is a great, if sometimes overwritten (and sometimes plot-convenient-character-dumb, even for a slasher story) novel.

Criticism first.

I get that many of the characters are emotionally tumultuous adolescents and adults, but some of their melodramatic behavior (not adapting to oh-so-necessary survival mode when they have seconds to live) jarred me out of the otherwise beguiling read. I further understand that this is a YA novel where emotions are writ large in Crayola colors like obvious graffiti on an alley wall, but certain characters seem to be kind of dumb, having to learn the same fatal-for-others lessons over and over.

I also had difficulty buying into one of its central conceits, considering how many single-minded characters feel about others, and the violence resulting from those angry feelings. The sheer number of these aggressors, Frendo-friendly or otherwise, didn’t strike me as realistic, even with what’s going on now in the real world.

And some of the action/kill scenes run way too long, with certain characters getting way too much time to emote. Friday the 13^th (1980) kill-scene concise Clown is not.

It should be noted that for a Young Adult [YA] book, Clown has a lot of profanity, particularly f-bombs—this is not a complaint, merely a caveat for readers not anticipating Cesare’s constant, character-realistic use of profanity.

 

Praise.

For the most part, though, Cesare’s writing flows well, not a full-on horror book until six or so chapters in. It’s often pop-culture/our-current zeitgeist stellar, bordering on addictive, with cinema-worthy scenes—not surprisingly, the resulting film, directed and co-penned by Eli Craig, is scheduled for a stateside 5/9/25 release.

Reborn by F. Paul Wilson

 

(pb; 1990, revised in 2005: second book in the Nightworld Cycle, aka the Adversary Cycle.)

 

From the back cover

“When an ancient artifact dissolves in the hands of a man calling himself Mr. Veilleur, he knows something has gone wrong. . . terribly, cosmically wrong.

“Dr. Roderick Hanley, a Novel Prize-winning geneticist, dies in a plane crash. His last words: ‘The boy! They’ll find out about the boy! He’ll find out about himself!’ When Jim Stevens, an orphan and struggling writer, learns that he is the sole heir to the Hanley estate, he is sure he has at last found his biological father.

“He’s only half right. The true nature of his inheritance—and the truth about his conception—will crush him. In New York City, a group of charismatics has been drawn together with a sense of great purpose. Satan is coming, and they have been chosen to fight him.

“Mr. Veilleur has been drawn to the group as well, but he realizes it’s not Satan who is coming. Stan would be a suitable au pair compared to the ancient evil that is in the process of being. . . Reborn.”

 

Review

Reborn didn’t thrill me as much as its prequel, The Keep. A big reason for this might be Keep’s setting—I love WWII-era horror novels that waste no time jumping into character-centric action, something Reborn is not. (Please note that I'm not condemning any choices that Wilson might've made with Reborn; I'm merely stating a personal leaning.)

Reborn is a different type of novel. Set in stateside 1968, it mostly focuses on Jim and Carol Stevens, husband and wife, and what happens when Jim—a temperamental, struggling horror writer with mysterious parentage—inherits a fortune from a man he’s never met (Dr. Robert Hanley). In addition to the fortune, though, there are terrible secrets, secrets which may have something to do with the struggle between Rasalom and Glaeken (possibly now going by the name Gaston Veilleur) in Keep.

Reborn, with its relatively slow, steady setup (as well as more characters), is an above average, sometimes clever read from a great writer. When it comes together at the end, it generally delivers, but ultimately, it—like the rest of Reborn—feels like a setup for larger story that does not come about in this book. Fans of Ira Levin’s 1967 novel Rosemary’s Baby (and Roman Polanski’s 1968 cinematic adaptation of it) might especially enjoy Reborn, which explicitly acknowledges the 1967 novel’s influence.

Worth owning, this. According to F. Paul Wilson’s official website, Reborn is followed, story-wise, by F. Paul Wilson’s The Touch (1986).