Possessions

Rating:
Summary: One of the most gratifying book I have ever read!
Review: Here is an author with a fresh perspective, a little individuality and a lot more personality with a psychotic neurosis that would make Carl Panzram blush.

The plot, although not original, is pure unadulterated gluttony. Moore takes a little bit of such classics as: Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Alien, and The Thing and adds his own twist of terror to the mix with skill. The only problem with the story is it never truly explains the reasoning behind most of what occurs. For example, why did the mom have the necklace, who is their father and what's the deal with the lottery ticket? With so many holes abound, it can make a reader feel drafty and miss that old blanket.

The pace in the story is a thrilling roller coaster ride. Starting out with what seems like a perfectly normal afternoon, the suspense begins to build and maneuvers throughout with subtlety and finesse. You actually never notice the tension building until you suddenly realize you've had your hand clenched the entire time and you now have half-moons on your palm. Moore's style of writing is receptive, sardonic and laced with a lurking compassion. Right from the first page you realize that he isn't writing for you and he's not writing for the critics, he's writing for himself and to see just how much he can get away with. Perfect!

The atmosphere in the book is filled with a sense of traumatic instability. The air becomes palpable and you can almost visualize the thin ice these characters tread on mentally and physically. The characters in the book are inviting, credible and at times, completely moronic. Reminding me of my own brother, Moore pulled off what so few have - sincerity. Capturing a photo-shot of adolescence, the author ingrains each mood, emotion and insane significance of what it's like to be a teenager.

Rating:
Summary: Just plain bad...
Review: I give Mr. Moore one star for creating something from nothing (I'm working on my first horror novel, so I know how hard it is) and another star for convincing Leisure Books to publish this bad idea of a horror novel...Where to begin? The 17 year old hero gets his ass kicked so many times in the course of three days that he should have been dead before the halfway point. And then he wins the lottery and that's never mentioned again - why? And those aliens/monsters that Mr. Moore seemed to have created from a bad Lovecraft story - the descriptions were horrible and I could never picture any of them. And where exactly did they come from? And why were they after the Western Key? And why did Chris's mom have the key in the first place? Nothing was explained. The entire book was a series of fist fights/brawls. That's all it was. Bad, just plain bad. Sorry.

Rating:
Summary: excellent horror tale; hopefully Moore forthcoming soon
Review: The last happy moment Chris Corin will experience in a long time is his eighteenth birthday celebration with his closest friends and family attending. When his mother leaves early to work she realizes the necklace she always wears is at home; moments later she dies in a traffic accident caused by a creature not of this world. Chris' best friend Jerry and his girlfriend Katie help him and his fourteen year old sister Brittany get through the days preceding the funeral. After the funeral, Chris sees that someone tore up his mother's room looking for something.

People that change into creatures seek the Golden Key, going so far as to dig up the grave of Chris's mother. They finally grab it off Brittany's neck but Chris is determined to get it back. He learns where the creatures are conducting a ceremony and accompanied by Katie and Brittany he goes there to stop them and rescue Jerry and Brittany's boyfriend who are encased in a gel like substance. Their doppelgangers are upstairs performing a ritual that if completed will let an untold evil into the world.

Add a pinch of Stephen King, a dash of Dean Koontz, a flowering of Peter Straub and one part Bentley Little and readers will have an idea what a horror novel by James A. Moore is like. He is a grand storyteller who can hold his own with these masters. The good guys are so well developed and realistic that readers will fear for their safety and hope that if they survive, more stories starring this fine young group will be forthcoming.

Harriet Klausner

Rating:
Summary: ouch!
Review: This book hurt. I usually can tolerate some silliness in pulp horror, but this book was awful. Moore makes Bentley Little look like James Joyce. A series of drawn out fight scenes makes up the plot. The main character took so many beatings and stayed alive that I thought we were heading towards an Unbreakable finale where he ends up being a superhero. Oh, and they also hit the lottery. This is not early Stephen King, this is more like early Don King.
Skip this one.

Rating:
Summary: Horror Stew
Review: What would you get if you took Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys and gave them the fearless personalities and physical toughness of the hard-boiled detectives of 30's and 40's pulp novels and mixed them up in one "Weird Tale" with H. P. Lovecraft's Old Ones, John Carpenter's "The Thing," "Alien," and "Invasion of the Body Snatchers?" Well, you might get something very much like James A. Moore's "Possessions."
James Moore's previous novel, the more adult "Fireworks," was a wonderful take on the alien spacecraft-small town scenario that focused on the reactions of the citizens and the government forces more than the occupants of the spacecraft itself. This device allowed Mr. Moore to very effectively bring an entire town to life. In "Possessions," he focuses on a small group of adolescent characters and, as with the townsfolk in "Fireworks," also gives them all distinctive personalities. The novel is mostly a wild ride that features an incredible horde of bizarre shape-changing monsters trying to bring "the Other" into the world by means of magic necklaces, one possessed by the mother of two of the characters, a brother and sister. After dispatching their mother in a suspensefully written opener, the other-worldly creatures find that she is not wearing the necklace and the chase is on to find it.
"Possessions" is a fun, pulpy read that wears its many influences on its sleeve. The characters are interesting and believable, if their actions and abilities to take repeated kicks, punches, blows to the head, and explosions are not. Much is left unanswered, such as the origin of the neclaces, the mysterious absense of any family other than the mother of the brother and sister, the whereabouts and story of their father and the source of their, and their friends', almost supernatural courage and physical attributes. Also, at the beginning of the novel, the brother and sister win a lottery that makes them rich. The consequences of this are not known, nor is the reason for the seemingly purposeful timing of this windfall. It appears to almost be a supernatural gift given in compensation for the loss of their mother. Who is this force watching out for them? Mr. Moore is writing a sequel to "Possessions" and perhaps these, and other, questions will be answered. Could be a fun series for teens and those nostalgic and young at heart by a talented and very entertaining writer.