Rating: 
Summary: A promising story with a bait-and-switch ending
Review: Five young classmates agree to be locked for three days in a cellar, which they refer to as "the hole," located beneath a seldom-used school building. Masterminded by a sixth classmate, Martyn -- known around school for his stunning pranks -- he's set the five up for more than they bargained for. After the three days, Martyn doesn't appear, then the water and electricity stop. The five begin to realize that they may never leave the whole. Or is there more to Martyn and this "prank" than they were lead to believe?"The Hole" starts a well-crafted story that slowly builds its suspense through both the story of the five in the hole and through remembrances from a survivor. But, just when I found the conclusion to be very satisfying, an epilogue is thrown in that tossed in many confusing new questions about the reliability of the survivor and the veracity of the events I'd just read. If this ending had been hinted at throughout the book, I probably would have found the epilogue more palatable than I did. Instead, I felt cheated and disappointed.
Rating:
Summary: A promising story with a bait-and-switch ending
Review: Five young classmates agree to be locked for three days in a cellar, which they refer to as "the hole," located beneath a seldom-used school building. Masterminded by a sixth classmate, Martyn -- known around school for his stunning pranks -- he's set the five up for more than they bargained for. After the three days, Martyn doesn't appear, then the water and electricity stop. The five begin to realize that they may never leave the whole. Or is there more to Martyn and this "prank" than they were lead to believe? "The Hole" starts a well-crafted story that slowly builds its suspense through both the story of the five in the hole and through remembrances from a survivor. But, just when I found the conclusion to be very satisfying, an epilogue is thrown in that tossed in many confusing new questions about the reliability of the survivor and the veracity of the events I'd just read. If this ending had been hinted at throughout the book, I probably would have found the epilogue more palatable than I did. Instead, I felt cheated and disappointed.
Rating: 
Summary: an amazing psychological drama
Review: Having been anticipating the film version of this book for some time, I was pleasantly surprised to find it in the stacks of Barnes and Noble during a late-summer shopping trip. I read it in one sitting because I couldn't bear to put it down. The plot, briefly: a teenager conducting a 'life experiment' shuts five of his friends in a hole and just walks away. What happens next is the subject of this book. Burt is a diabolical mind, and he's created a story that will keep you thinking about it long after you've finished the volume. I would say that this is probably our generation's answer to Lord of the Flies, a fantastic horror story by William Golding. Though the chronological jumps can be a bit jarring and you don't finish the book feeling you know any of the charactesr, this is still one of the most inventive novels I've read in a long time.
Rating:
Summary: an amazing psychological drama
Review: Having been anticipating the film version of this book for some time, I was pleasantly surprised to find it in the stacks of Barnes and Noble during a late-summer shopping trip. I read it in one sitting because I couldn't bear to put it down. The plot, briefly: a teenager conducting a 'life experiment' shuts five of his friends in a hole and just walks away. What happens next is the subject of this book. Burt is a diabolical mind, and he's created a story that will keep you thinking about it long after you've finished the volume. I would say that this is probably our generation's answer to Lord of the Flies, a fantastic horror story by William Golding. Though the chronological jumps can be a bit jarring and you don't finish the book feeling you know any of the charactesr, this is still one of the most inventive novels I've read in a long time.
Rating:
Summary: Very disturbing and well written book
Review: I'm normally a tough grader and hardly ever give 5 stars to a book. This book deserves between 4.5 and 5 stars. The book is a shocking, deeply disturbing tale of psychological suspense. It would be a good to very good book until the last few pages are reached. The ending twists the rest of the book around, and gives a solid explanation for some of the problems that you see before and raises the book to the status of excellent. I enjoyed the book more than "Lord of the Flies". Its a quick read -- you can toss it off in 2 hours, but I don't have any problem with that. If you prefer longer books, then this might not be right for you. I certainly got value and then some for my money.
Rating: 
Summary: The film is better
Review: I've already reviewed the film, so I won't go into too much detail, but after seeing the film, I desperately had to get the book. And now I have it, I really wished I hadn't.
Guy Burt wrote this while he was still in school, and you have to think what on earth was going on in his head to make him write this. If you look at the film and then read the book, they're totally different.
In the film, there are four main characters (not counting Martyn), who are well-described: Frankie - the tart without a heart; Liz - the maybe nerdy, thinking ahead person; Mike - the good looking one; and Geoff - the football jock kinda person. In the film, all of them are given backgrounds. In the book, you're thrown in at the deep end. There are no real introductions to the characters, you don't find out about their personalities, and to boot, there were two characters who were very obviously cut out of the movie - or never bothered to put: Lisa (is she a different character?) and Alex. Alex is another one of them who is down the hole, and has as much to do in the book as the others. So there's no reason why the film-makers wanted to cut her out. None of them get hurt in the book (to put it mildly), and the whole storyline is totally different. Basically, what the filmmakers did, was take the main idea, and then change everything else around it, including the beginning, give backgrounds to the characters, and change the outcome of the entire story.
If you haven't seen the movie, you will find this book really confusing. If I hadn't seen the movie, I probably would have put it down after the first couple of pages. It's written half in first person, and the other half in third person. It jumps back and forth, so when you're reading, you have to readjust yourself, and try to remember what happened a few pages back. Once you get into the swing of it, it's fine, but you never really get 'introduced' to the narrator until about a quarter of the way through - although if you've seen the movie, you'll know who it is.
It's a very short book, so it won't take you long to read. But by the time you get to the end of the book, your whole perspective will have changed, and it's like the whole story was a complete farce. It's still quite interesting to read, and it's one of those that stays with you for a while afterwards. But watch the movie first.
Rating:
Summary: Heartwrenching
Review: It is vacation time and the parents believe their children are on a field trip while the school administrators assume the six went home. Instead, the sextet decides to perform a human experiment. Five of them (Frankie, Goeff, Alex, Mike, and Liz) will climb into a forgotten "Hole" in a building in a neglected section of the massive school. The sixth Martyn will shut the door to the cellar to lock the quintet inside, but come back three days later to release the participants from the Hole. They would be heroes among their peers for this glorious prank.
During the volunteer stage of their captivity, the five students discuss their dreams and fears. However, as the time for freedom arrives and passes without Martyn opening the cellar door, the teens panic fearing death. They become desperate and start doing ugly things in hopes that someone will save them from the ordeal.
THE HOLE is a strong psychological thriller that will remind readers of the Lord of the Flies, but though quite good is not at that level of excellence. The story line is told in two voices. A therapist-narrator working with the survivor who is writing her story down as part of her healing. This technique takes away from the tension because the audience knows the results of the ordeal early on. Still, Guy Burt writes a taut, albeit slim thriller that will please those readers who enjoy dark psychological tales of human failure. Harriet Klausner
Rating: 
Summary: The Hole
Review: Like many of the other reviewers, I thought this book was very good, but at times confusing. The book switches back from the people in the hole, to someone's life before the hole, and after. The catch is,you don't know who is the narrarator until the end. This book is definitely one you may have to read over, but is very well-written. A definite worth-while read.
Rating:
Summary: The Hole
Review: Like many of the other reviewers, I thought this book was very good, but at times confusing. The book switches back from the people in the hole, to someone's life before the hole, and after. The catch is,you don't know who is the narrarator until the end. This book is definitely one you may have to read over, but is very well-written. A definite worth-while read.
Rating:
Summary: THE HOLE, a suspenseful and electrifying novel
Review: One beautiful spring day, Martyn decides that he is going to create the greatest prank "Our Glorious School" has ever seen. Martyn is a brilliant prankster, always conceiving dirty, sly jokes that send ripples throughout the school. Everyone knows who the culprit is, but since he is so quiet and so good --- handing in homework on time, doing tons of extra credit work --- he never gets caught. Martyn hopes that this will be the case again. He rallies five specimens to take part in this prank with him, but he isn't looking to get a laugh out of them. Martyn is testing a theory. He wants to create an "experiment with life," one that none of them will ever forget.
The five students come from all cliques in the school: Geoff the strong, Frankie the festive, Alex the meek, Mike the brave, and Liz the savior. All venture down into a long-forgotten pit inside the school grounds while the rest of their classmates are on a school trip. Their parents all assume the five are on the trip as well. Sound cool, so far? The five students have time on their hands, time to chill, party and --- become trapped in the scariest predicament imaginable!
Martyn is supposed to pick them up three days later. When night comes on the third day, they realize he isn't coming back. And so the five unwittingly become part of an unimaginable mind game. Food, water, and then lastly light are taken away from them, one after the other. Fear, anxiety, hopelessness, and tension grow and threaten the five. Will they ever get out of there alive?
THE HOLE, a suspenseful and electrifying novel, digs deep inside the mind of Liz, the narrator and writer of the novel. Liz's perspective becomes dulled and strange as the book continues on, due to the deprivation and horror with which she is faced. Is Liz telling the truth? What really happens?
THE HOLE compares favorably to such books as William Golding's LORD OF THE FLIES and John Fowles's THE COLLECTOR. If you like psychological suspense and crave a quick reading thriller, THE HOLE is the medicine you've been looking for. The uncertainty as to what really occurs is definitely what British author Guy Burt is aiming for, and he knows how to keep his audience captivated through different perspectives and personalities. How do five completely different people survive an incident so insane? You'll have to read to find out!
--- Reviewed by Rachel, high school student and reading diva
|
