Lair

Rating:
Summary: The best of the 'Rats' Trilogy
Review: Being 13 and still reading comics was too much for my brother, so he threw a copy of 'Lair' at me, with instruction to 'start reading something more grown up'.

Ever since that day I have been a fan of not just this book, but of James Herbert too.

This is a follow up to 'Rats' and a prequel to the last of the trilogy - 'Domain'. Having read Lair first, then Rats, then Domain (and then all again in the right order), only Lair is the one I continually return to. Rat's reads like what it is - his earlier work, and Domain can be a little too heavy going.

Lair is a perfect balance, and just like sitting down to watch you fave movie for the hundreth time, this book just calls out to be read every so often and you never put it down till you reach the end.

Along with Moon and The Dark, Lair rates as my favourite horror novel and a masterpiece of the genre.

Incidentally, whereas the pages of Amazon list this as now being out of print, my local British stores stock recently reprinted copies of all his work.

Rating:
Summary: Pleasantly Surprised About This Great Suspense Story
Review: For those of you who don't know the order of the Rats trilogy already, let me go ahead and get that out of the way first. It starts off with Rats, then Lair, and finally concludes with Domain. All are great books but I must admit when I started Lair I wasn't ready to give it the credit it deserved. It was a sort of neglected middle child out of the "Rats" family. The first book, Rats, sets up the plot for the entire trilogy, as would be expected and while the premise by itself (people being mutilated and killed by giant mutant rats) seems like something out of a 50's B Horror movie, Herbert actually manages to pull it off, due probably more to his skill as a writer than anything else. And this was when he was an up and coming writer. Reading his later works one can see how much he has evolved [kind of like his rats :):)]. Rats was the starting point and was pretty interesting in and of itself, while Domain was a straight home run out of the park. When I started Lair, with the knowledge of what was to come in Domain, I read it mainly so I could get to Domain, kind of how you drive through Jersey so you can get to New York. But I guess the surprise was on me because I actually really enjoyed reading the book. The rats come back and in full force, except instead of being in the London docks they are in Epping Forest, an outskirt of London. The no nonsense, tough as nails hero with a vendetta in this book is Luke Pender (although if you like Pender you'll really like Captain Mather, a sort of British John Wayne). Pender works for Ratkill, the extermination agency that helped stop the London outbreak four years earlier. People looking for recurring characters might be disappointed (although not surprised since many of the main characters in Rats either got terribly mauled or killed) as the only one we get is Stephen Howard, a grunt in the original Rats novel, but now the big cheese at Ratkill in Lair. The book is action packed with lots of rat attacks, as would be expected, the usual gratuitous sex scenes one always expects from Herbert (just joking Mr. Herbert) and a great finale worthy of the House of Usher. This book can be thought of as an extension of the first book, Rats. One could read Lair in and of itself but it would make more sense if they read Rats first then Lair, as it involves the reader more in the story. Yes, the book has some predictable scenes. One sometimes wants to shout "Don't go in there" but Herbert's prose does make up for any misses. For richness of plot you might want to turn to Harlan Ellison or Ray Bradbury, but if you like smooth prose that floats off the mind like a fine wine as well as a riveting action adventure novel then give Herbert a try. (And don't forget to read the other two books in the trilogy).

Rating:
Summary: Pleasantly Surprised About This Great Suspense Story
Review: For those of you who don't know the order of the Rats trilogy already, let me go ahead and get that out of the way first. It starts off with Rats, then Lair, and finally concludes with Domain. All are great books but I must admit when I started Lair I wasn't ready to give it the credit it deserved. It was a sort of neglected middle child out of the "Rats" family. The first book, Rats, sets up the plot for the entire trilogy, as would be expected and while the premise by itself (people being mutilated and killed by giant mutant rats) seems like something out of a 50's B Horror movie, Herbert actually manages to pull it off, due probably more to his skill as a writer than anything else. And this was when he was an up and coming writer. Reading his later works one can see how much he has evolved [kind of like his rats :):)]. Rats was the starting point and was pretty interesting in and of itself, while Domain was a straight home run out of the park. When I started Lair, with the knowledge of what was to come in Domain, I read it mainly so I could get to Domain, kind of how you drive through Jersey so you can get to New York. But I guess the surprise was on me because I actually really enjoyed reading the book. The rats come back and in full force, except instead of being in the London docks they are in Epping Forest, an outskirt of London. The no nonsense, tough as nails hero with a vendetta in this book is Luke Pender (although if you like Pender you'll really like Captain Mather, a sort of British John Wayne). Pender works for Ratkill, the extermination agency that helped stop the London outbreak four years earlier. People looking for recurring characters might be disappointed (although not surprised since many of the main characters in Rats either got terribly mauled or killed) as the only one we get is Stephen Howard, a grunt in the original Rats novel, but now the big cheese at Ratkill in Lair. The book is action packed with lots of rat attacks, as would be expected, the usual gratuitous sex scenes one always expects from Herbert (just joking Mr. Herbert) and a great finale worthy of the House of Usher. This book can be thought of as an extension of the first book, Rats. One could read Lair in and of itself but it would make more sense if they read Rats first then Lair, as it involves the reader more in the story. Yes, the book has some predictable scenes. One sometimes wants to shout "Don't go in there" but Herbert's prose does make up for any misses. For richness of plot you might want to turn to Harlan Ellison or Ray Bradbury, but if you like smooth prose that floats off the mind like a fine wine as well as a riveting action adventure novel then give Herbert a try. (And don't forget to read the other two books in the trilogy).

Rating:
Summary: An enjoyable follow up to The Rats
Review: If you liked The Rats, then you will like this one, as it is more of the same, except this time the rats are on the rampage in a forest just outside London. (This is the second part of a trilogy, although the books can be read separately.) No-one does this quite like Herbert: The action is taut, the description is vivid, and the story is gripping. If the characterisation is a little one dimensional and the story a bit predictable, it doesn't ruin the enjoyment of the book. Come to it with average expectations and enjoy. Not his best but a good one nevertheless.

Rating:
Summary: Formulaic
Review: James Herbert is Englands Dean Koontz. His books are formulaic, samey and predictable. They consist of a main character who is oddly similar to every other main character he has written, a love interest who's general purpose is to provide a lurid, by-numbers sex scene, and vignettes of people getting killed in elaborate ways. Lair is the extremely tedious tale of killer rats, like 'rats' basically but with different killings. Herbert does has talent, he wrote a really good book called 'Shrine' (set near where i live!) which was a generally scary book and another book called 'The Jonah' whose plot i can't remember but it was quite sexy. So check those out and ignore this piece of amateur 'shock' writing.

Rating:
Summary: Rats 2 delivers the gruesome goods.
Review: The only thing connecting this novel to the previous entry, as well as the one that followed it, are the rats themselves. Here they have escaped to a wooded area that surrounds London and are gulping down campers and hikers as well as rural townfolk. Herbert's vignette laced narrative is a deceptive breeze to read, for it makes the blood curdling attacks, of which there are quite a few, all the more effective. Animal attack fans should need no encouraging to hunt this down, but others will find something to enjoy as well. Recommended.

Rating:
Summary: Rats 2 delivers the gruesome goods.
Review: The only thing connecting this novel to the previous entry, as well as the one that followed it, are the rats themselves. Here they have escaped to a wooded area that surrounds London and are gulping down campers and hikers as well as rural townfolk. Herbert's vignette laced narrative is a deceptive breeze to read, for it makes the blood curdling attacks, of which there are quite a few, all the more effective. Animal attack fans should need no encouraging to hunt this down, but others will find something to enjoy as well. Recommended.

Rating:
Summary: The sequel to 'The Rats', but basically more of the same.
Review: This sequel to 'The Rats' is basically the same. Meet John Doe, hear about his life, watch him get horribly mauled by vermin. However, this book goes more in depth as far as the main characters are concerned, and give an inkling of what motivates the rats themselves. The fast pacing, and short length (just over 200 pages) make 'Lair' an enjoyable way to kill a rainy day, and leaves a hunger to read 'Domain', which is the final, and by far the best, book in the trilogy.