Silent Children

Rating:
Summary: A distasteful thriller.
Review: I grew up both reading and loving Ramsey Campbell's dark hearted horror stories, and still do (Nazareth Hill is one of the all time great haunted house stories), but this suspense novel proved too much for me. A serial killer of children buries his victims in the houses he renovates for customers. The sympathetic main characters, who are unfortunate enough to own and still live in a property Woolie (the aforementioned killer) used to hide his latest victim, are beseiged by the usual hypocrites, know-it-alls, and inhumanly cruel villans one finds populating Campbell's books. As usual Campbell he makes the reader empathize with their suffering completely. But, as I said earlier, the book proved far too disturbing and discomforting for me. I just had to close it, get some fresh air, and read something else. A dip into darkness too many for me.

Rating:
Summary: Campbell's Decline
Review: It has become apparent that Ramsey Campbell has slipped into a pattern that horror fans may find familiar. Author displays brilliance in early work, then the nineties come along, and suddenly their writing degenerates into mystery/thriller type stuff, or plots derivative of their own early work. I am sure you all know several writers that this statement applies to, so I won't name any names. At this point I must confess that I did not even finish Silent Children. I struggled halfway through it, and decided that to read any further would be a waste of my time. I simply had no interest in reading another typical, common serial killer book. "Why is he being so harsh?" I hear you asking. The reason is this: I just cannot express how much Campbell's recent work has disappointed me. If I wanted to read a book about a crazed murderer, I would get a book by Thomas Harris. When I read Ramsey Campbell, I want to read about supernatural horrors lurking in the darkened forest and streets of Liverpool. Who could forget the sinister majesty of early work like "The Doll who Ate His Mother," "The Parasite," "Midnight Sun," and in fact any of Campbell's books from the seventies and eighties. These books displayed a style unlike any other. There was something about them that just kept you hooked and hungering for more. I am convinced that Campbell has either exhausted his creative inkwell, or that he saves his best work for short stories (check out "Ghosts and Grisly Things" for newer short stories by him. It's wonderful!), as these are always great. He must just write these novels to pay the bills. However, I have heard that he has returned to form with "The Darkest Part of the Woods." Let's all hope so.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent horror tale
Review: No one loved children as much as Hector Woolie. He hated when he felt a parent neglected or abused a child. However, he loved them so much, he abducted the lambs from their nasty parents, but when they failed to behave he made them perfect by killing them. Almost caught, Hector faked his death by using pliers to yank his teeth to prove he drowned. In reality, Hector simply vanished into the night.

Years later, Ian's parents' divorce leaves him shattered and depressed. Hector is Ian's next door neighbor and soon he kidnaps the teenager and his stepsister. His mother is one wall away, but only her sobs penetrate Ian's frightened mind.

No author today can take a reader into a worse abyss than Ramsey Campbell does. Mr. Campbell makes the darkest nightmare feel genuine because his characters seem real as they struggle with day to day living even before they end up in a crisis. SILENT CHILDREN is fast-paced and loaded with so much tension that the audience is sent into a panic because they believe that Ian is going to die on the next page and each subsequent page afterward. Mr. Campbell graphically but authentically portrays the worst sins humanity can perform on one another in a true horror tale.

Rating:
Summary: Don't wait too long to read this one.
Review: Ramsey Campbell is brilliant yet again. It a pleasure to read such a strongly written novel. Great plot, richly detailed characters and that overpowering sense of evil that only the very best can emanate from the page. Don't wait too long to read this one.

Rating:
Summary: Horror as it SHOULD be written
Review: What if your son "disappeared" but was really, secretly, only a room away, hearing every word you said? That's one of the situations in the book - and it makes for a totally suspenseful and unique tale.
Believable characters that I cared about, continuing suspense and twists that I didn't foresee are what kept me glued to the pages of this one. Even the killer has his reasons, however skewed, and he truly believes he is "saving" the children he murders. What I found particularly compelling in this book was the portrait of the teenager, Ian. By the time he and his stepsister disappear, they've become truly compelling characters and the reader cares about what happens to them.

Rating:
Summary: Horror as it SHOULD be written
Review: What if your son "disappeared" but was really, secretly, only a room away, hearing every word you said? That's one of the situations in the book - and it makes for a totally suspenseful and unique tale.
Believable characters that I cared about, continuing suspense and twists that I didn't foresee are what kept me glued to the pages of this one. Even the killer has his reasons, however skewed, and he truly believes he is "saving" the children he murders. What I found particularly compelling in this book was the portrait of the teenager, Ian. By the time he and his stepsister disappear, they've become truly compelling characters and the reader cares about what happens to them.