Incarnate

Rating:
Summary: I just didn't get it
Review: After reading three other books of this author which I liked a lot, this was a disappointment. I must admit that I just didn't get the plot. For example what did Molly do to the policeman which made him confess the murder? And who or what was the always sleeping old women at Joyces' appartment. And so on... After 500 pages I'm still as unknown as after the first 100 pages. I give it two stars because it's nicely written. Some explicit and emotional scenes I liked a lot.

Rating:
Summary: Campbell is the master of creeping, psychological horror.
Review: Being already a fan of Ramsey Campbell, I went into this book with high expectations. It's by no means a recent book of his, but I just now discovered it. Campbell does NOT disappoint. The story centers on five people brought together for an experiment in precognative dreaming. During the course of the experiment, they share a common, horrifying vision. The story then skips ahead eleven years to find all five of the subjects are beginning to dream the future again after years of suppressing their visions. Campbell's style is such that he can make the most fantastical things that happen to his characters seem perfectly common place. I found myself stopping and re-reading passages because I read right through them and then said to myself, "What did he just say?" and realize that something insane happened and Campbell never changed his tone. It can be unsettling sometimes, which is why I like Ramsey Campbell so much. All his books are like that. Incarnate ranks r! ight up there with his brilliant The Parasite and The Doll Who Ate His Mother. A good introduction to Campbell's style and a great story.

Rating:
Summary: Too Bad It's Out of Print
Review: It's really too bad that Incarnate, as well as many other Ramsey Campbell titles, are out of print. This guy is good. I've read a handful of his work, and have never failed to be impressed. Now, he is not for everyone. He has sort of a dense way of saying things sometimes, and you'll find yourself having to reread a sentence to make sense of it. Some of this is the fact that he's British (I'm American), but that's not all of it. It's like HE knows what he means, but he doesn't say it clearly. That is his one downfall, but by no means a showstopper. While it was once an annoyance for me, now I just see it as a Ramsey Campbell quirk. That warning aside, this author is well worth reading. His novels are unique, eerie, and always contain twists and turns. You will not find a "typical" horror story by Campbell; it will be fresh and new. Incarnate got off to a slow start, but I knew from previous experience that the action would probably be worth waiting for, and it was. It starts with a flashback to a research experiment where 5 people who can "dream the future" are brought together. You're not real sure at the beginning what exactly is going on, or what significance any event has. But as the story unravels, bit by eerie bit, you find yourself drawn into the lives and fears of each character. By about 3/4 of the way through the book, you will have worked yourself into such a sense of doom and foreboding, that you may have trouble sleeping (I did)! I don't want to give anything away, because this book is worth reading all the way through so you get the full sense - and shock - of the surprises. The only reason I give this a 4 instead of a 5 is because of the previously-mentioned language style. Highly recommended!