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Nightworld

Nightworld

List Price: $21.95
Your Price: $21.95
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Not the best end to an otherwise incredible series...
Review: I just finished the Adversary Cycle with Nightworld and have read all of the Repairman Jack novels that lead up to this final novel. Unfortunately I have to say that Nightwold was a disappointing end to Repairman Jack's world as created by F. Paul Wilson. I loved all of his previous books, even "The Touch", which at the time seemed completely unrelated to any of the rest. My main gripe with this book was the final confrontation, which seemed way too easy and was clumsily written. I found it difficult to understand the scene and exactly what was happening. It also seems silly that the antagonist, while powerful enough to remake the planet to his own liking could be so easily vanquished. And finally the antagonist seemed incredibly out of character in the end. I don't want to spoil it, so let's just say that he didn't go out the way he was written through out the Adversary cycle. Worst of all, the "support" the protagonist needed from the crowd of New Yorkers in order to defeat his enemy was worse than cheesy it was plain ridiculous.

My next gripe was with continuity and was more of an annoyance than a problem. If you haven't read any on the Repairman Jack novels, particularly the newest ones, this won't be an issue for you. In Nightworld, Jack learns a great many things that he has long since known about, and as a result needs to be convinced of what is happening to the world around him. My final issue is, unlike Reborn and Reprisal, Nightworld isn't very edgy, it just doesn't have that suspenseful feeling that wouldn't let me put down either of its two most recent predecessors. Sure there plenty of disgusting scenes such as a man being gouged by a 10-foot millipede which lays eggs in his abdomen that hatch and eat him alive. But that was more gross than scary, which is true of most of the book.

I would have liked to see more scares thrown at the population of Nightworld like the antagonists ability to control the dead, not just scary insects and killer winged beasts. What I was really hoping for was a greater explanation of the to eternal opposing forces, which are fighting for the planet. No luck there.

That said, I still enjoyed the book, as it brought back characters from all of the previous adversary cycle books and my favorite, Repairman Jack. And while it wasn't the best ending to an otherwise excellent series, it still was a somewhat satisfying ending to the story arc. I just think it could have been better, and wish Wilson had waited to write Nightworld after he decides (hopefully not soon) to end the RJ Series, that way the two story arcs could have merged and ended at the same time. But if you've read the previous books in the adversary cycle you'll of course have to read Nightworld and I would recommend doing so, albeit with low expectations so that you won't be too disappointed or if you completely disagree with my review you're pleasantly surprised.


Rating: 5 stars
Summary: One of the top-ten best books of all time!
Review: I love this book! Nightworld is the book all other books aspire to be.It doesn't get any better than this.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: If you like horror and fiction, read this book!
Review: I personaly enjoyed the book. I love a well written story. And this is one. The charaters are are three dememsional and believable. This book centers around the fight of good verses evil and the problems of the heroes. I especially have sympathy for the ultimate hero, once you find out who it is, and his/her (No I'm not even going to give a hint. You have to find out for yourself.) problems and situation. I picked this book up not thinking that it was the end of a series and now I find I will have to read the first books. Don't get me wrong this book is a great story by itself. But I want to read the rest of the series because I fell in love with the charaters. If you love fiction and horror, I suggest you read this book.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Apocalyptic horror with fantasy undertones.
Review: In Nightworld, the sixth and final book in the Adversary Cycle, F. Paul Wilson achieves a beautiful climax to the millenia-old war between the champions of good and evil, Glaeken and Rasalom. As the days become progressively shorter because of a late-rising and early-setting sun, cries of armageddon resound around the globe. Then a 200-ft hole opens up in Central Park, each night out of which pour swarms of alien insects who devour anything and everything they can. As scientists futilely try to understand these phenomena and the world is plunged further into inescapable madness, one wizened old man must struggle to gather a group of unlikely heroes together for the final stand against the force behind the chaos--Rasalom, ancient champion of evil. In Nightworld, F. Paul Wilson manages to stitch together the previous books in the series(The Keep, The Tomb, The Touch, Reborn, and Reprisal), most of which seem to have been thought up on completely different drawing boards, into a skin-crawling page-turner. Although adding The Tomb and The Touch to the Adversary Cycle seems somewhat of an afterthought at times, when you finish Nightworld you will have nothing but fond (as well as freaky) memories of the series. I reccomend that you read the rest of the books in the series before you touch Nightworld, as it might otherwise make quite a bit less sense. Also, reading the previous books will help you develop more of an understanding of the characters, particularly Glaeken, Father Bill, and Repairman Jack. Also, if you like fantasy, the series hints several times about earth's distant past...

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: WOW !!
Review: It seems that normally a story that is built up over a series of books (Nightworld is the last of six) can never have a truly satisfying ending, all the build-up will eventually lead to disappointment...not so with Nightworld. As richly written as most of FPW's books, Nightworld delivers on plot, characters, dialogue, and imagery. The climax is just long enough to be suspenseful, not too long as to want to make you merely skim through it. Truly some frightening and suspenseful writting, and while the characters may not be as fleshed out as in previous novels due to space constraint, they are true to their nature. A great way to round out the Adversary Cycle.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: "THE END OF LIFE AS WE KNOW IT"?
Review: Nightworld is a seriously scary book. Not personally scary but scary for the world as we know it. Nightworld completes the Nightworld series, which consists of six books, starting with The Keep. I've read all books and until the publication of Nightworld, it was called The Adversary Series, taken from the fact that the underlying element of this series is the ongoing confrontation through eternity and through the universe of two powerful forces.

These forces are not defined by good and evil for they are not. But one force, which is called the Other in the books, is brutal and caring nothing for humanity, tends to use evil means to achieve it's goal, while his adversary though not necessarily Good utilizes humanity to thwart His Adversary, The Other.

The Anti-Other, throughout history, has utilized a human champion to battle the Other. This champion is empowered with Godlike powers and made immortal for this purpose.

In the initial book, The Keep, which I've mentioned, the earthly agent of The Other, Rasalom, was weakened and imprisoned in a specially constructed prison by a champion of a long gone age, maybe a champion named Glaeken, whose subsequent job in The Keep was to keep tabs on The Other and make sure it didn't escape.

The Keep is a marvelous story wherein, Rasalom, because of some Nazi soldiers, almost escapes his incarceration. I won't go into the story but at the end, Rasalom is vanquished and ostensibly terminated but this is not to be and through the course of two more books, Reborn and Reprisal, Rasalom is rejuvenated, recuperated re-empowered and is set to take revenge upon troublesome humanity. The stage is set for Nightworld.

Nightworld
"If thou gaze into the abyss, the abyss will also gaze into thee"

What in the world is going on! Sunrise was five plus minutes late! we're in early summer, surise should be later not earlier, and then another shocker, sunset was ten minutes early! This continues on the second day etc and then a bottomless hole 200 feet across and perfectly round opens up in New York's, Central Park.

The world's scientific community, though at a loss for these occurrences, downplay these episodes and insist there is a rational explanation for these phenomenons. However, there is one who knows what's going on and he has a birds eye view of the Central Park event from his apartment.

It is the ancient warrior Glaeken, who is now in his 80s (his immortality ended after his 1941 battle with Rasalom), living under a pseudonym, Mr. Veileur. Glaeken knows exactly what's going on and he immediately sets out to gather a group of individuals to try to effect some sort of resistance, admittedly an enormous longshot but the only shot humanity has.

Main Charactersin order of appearance

Rasalom [Evil agent of the Other]
Dr. Nicholas Guinn [Physicist and friend of Bill Ryan]
Glaeken/veileur [Aged champion of the Anti-Other]
(ex father) Bill Ryan [Friend and confidant of Glaeken]
Carol Teece [mother of the reborn Rasalom]
Repairman Jack [hero of "The Tomb", a resourceful replacement for the aged Glaeken]
Kolabati [an ancient Indian Priestess who has two artifacts Glaeken needs]
Ba Nyguen [a special forces trained Vietnamese body guard for the following]
Sylvia Nash [mother of the adopted boy Jeffery]
Dr Alan Bulmer [Sylvia's husabnd and Jeffery's father]
Jeffery [a boy who has a healing power called Dat-tay-vao which Glaekin needs in his battle]

Glaeken meets with his would be recruits and of course his story is met with some skepticism, however, as Glaeken predicts, on the second night, hoards of large flying killer insect like creatures(later named by Glaeken as Belly Flies and Chew Wasps descend on an unsuspecting population and kill hundreds of people, horses, dogs etc. Also thousands of these creatures make a beeline to the home of Jeffery and his parents, in an obvious effort to kill Jeffery.

These creatures and the even more deadly creatures that follow can't stand sunlight but of course, day by day, the sunlight is slowly disappearing. In addition thousands of new holes open up around the world and every effort to cap them has been futile, with additional casualties. Humanity is quickly being wiped out and the daylight is getting shorter and shorter!

Things indeed look bleak for humanity but at least the recent horrors have solidified our cadre. Repairman Jack, with Ba in tow is off to Maui and Bill Ryan is off to Rumania, all to retrieve the artifacts that Glaeken needs to have a chance to counteract the carnage.

Can Repairman Jack and Glaeken, along with his unlikely cadre save "life as we know it", or will Rasalom rule over an Unholy Nightmare World?

Author

If you've never read F.Paul Wilson, I recommend him heartily.
He has a nice easily readable writing style and he seems to always have unusual if not unique plots to his stories. This particular book is the culmination of a series that I'm sure did not start out as such. "The Keep" was the original book as I have mentioned and is the basis for the series and as mentioned "Reborn" and "Reprisal" were definitely created to make a series out of a single novel but the resourceful Wilson managed to tie two unrelated books "The Tomb" and "The Touch" into episodes in the series in this last book and it works very well for me.

I was also glad to see Wilson reprise the ever popular Repairman Jack. Wilson has gone on to write several more Repairman Jack novels.

Reviewers Note

Because of the nature of this story. this book tends to be fairly gory and graphic about it. If this is not your cup of tea, then do not read this book. Then again, what are you doing reading any horror books?

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: High chill factor
Review: Rarely do you come across a horror novel that truly chills you to the bone. This is one of those books. The days get shorter and creepy crawlies come out of holes that pop up all around the world. The monsters and their need for flesh make this a difficult job for REPAIRMAN JACK. Will he make it out alive. You'll just have to read it for yourself. My only critisism of this book is I thought it was rushed at the end, and the loose ends were'nt tied-up.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: A book with no equal
Review: This book grabs you from the beginnig. I have never before read a book that I was litterally unwilling to put down until the final page.....I think I need to read the other F. Paul Wilson books.

I really wanted to give it 10 out of 5 stars....

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: A book with no equal
Review: This book grabs you from the beginnig. I have never before read a book that I was litterally unwilling to put down until the final page.....I think I need to read the other F. Paul Wilson books.

I really wanted to give it 10 out of 5 stars....

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Just when I thot it couldn't get better.....
Review: This book is a wonderful end to the series that started with The Keep (which happens to be the best horror book I have ever read and continue to re-reading occasionally). After I read Reprisal, I waited with impatient eagerness for this book and I was not disappointed. I love it.


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