My Work Is Not Yet Done: Three Tales of Corporate Horror

Rating:
Summary: Ligotti's work not done
Review: After reading Thomas Ligotti's latest opus, "My Work Is Not Yet Done", the author, once again, reinvents himself to show that he is a force to be reckoned with. This is exemplified in the first piece...the novella, "My Work Is Not Yet Done". This is basically the ultimate tale of revenge, and is Ligotti at his nihilistic best. The writing in this novella I had never seen before. The transitions and how it all flows together is amazing. Truly one of his best.

"I Have A Special Plan for this World" is alright...it kind of leaves the reader wanting more. I think it's kind of like an extension of the first piece (you can only do so much with the theme of "corporate horror"). The whole concept of the yellow haze and such is interesting.

"The Nightmare Network" I enjoyed. This had the most interesting concept of the three (and it's kind of hard to describe...people being used for nightmares?) Once again, Ligotti flexes his artistic muscles and some pieces are morbid and the others make you say to yourself, "What the hell?" I really liked this last piece.

All in all, yet another amazing work by Thomas Ligotti. This book is extremely hard to find. I checked it out from the Los Angeles Central Library and they had it. Ligotti needs to find a bigger publisher (he doesn't win those Bram Stoker awards for nothing). I would like to find his screenplay-er whatever it may be- entitled "Crampton" but that's even harder to come by.

Thomas Ligotti's work is not yet done.

Rating:
Summary: Ligotti's work not done
Review: After reading Thomas Ligotti's latest opus, "My Work Is Not Yet Done", the author, once again, reinvents himself to show that he is a force to be reckoned with. This is exemplified in the first piece...the novella, "My Work Is Not Yet Done". This is basically the ultimate tale of revenge, and is Ligotti at his nihilistic best. The writing in this novella I had never seen before. The transitions and how it all flows together is amazing. Truly one of his best.

"I Have A Special Plan for this World" is alright...it kind of leaves the reader wanting more. I think it's kind of like an extension of the first piece (you can only do so much with the theme of "corporate horror"). The whole concept of the yellow haze and such is interesting.

"The Nightmare Network" I enjoyed. This had the most interesting concept of the three (and it's kind of hard to describe...people being used for nightmares?) Once again, Ligotti flexes his artistic muscles and some pieces are morbid and the others make you say to yourself, "What the hell?" I really liked this last piece.

All in all, yet another amazing work by Thomas Ligotti. This book is extremely hard to find. I checked it out from the Los Angeles Central Library and they had it. Ligotti needs to find a bigger publisher (he doesn't win those Bram Stoker awards for nothing). I would like to find his screenplay-er whatever it may be- entitled "Crampton" but that's even harder to come by.

Thomas Ligotti's work is not yet done.

Rating:
Summary: Strange and unsettling
Review: Thomas Ligotti has carved out a unique place for himself in modern weird fiction. The power of his work comes from his ability to create a strange atmosphere that enables one to not so much suspend disbelief as actually become a part of the story. I always come away from reading Ligotti's work with a feeling of having been somewhere, sometime, not quite normal. His characters fit into these worlds, sometimes seeming to bleed over into that of the reader.

MY WORK IS NOT YET DONE continues this trend. This connected series of works (I decline to call them stories, exactly) concern themselves with corporate life (a timely enough topic) and the machinations of those who work within the corporate world. The bulk of the book is taken up with a fascinating monologue as told by a cog in a particularly devious and poisonous corporation. What this person does, what happens to this person, and how he comes to influence those around him can only be described as weird fiction at its finest. It's confusing, unsettling, disturbing. (And I have to admit that part of this work goes completely over my head, which didn't prevent me from enjoying it immensely.)

Once again, Ligotti has created fiction that takes the reader along, perhaps not completely willingly. He is an amazing talent.

Rating:
Summary: Get the book to follow Ligotti's course
Review: Thomas Ligotti in this work has excellent ideas, ones very workable and horrifying and well developed; and a world very absorbing because of its familiarity. But I think he is a bit clumsy in his imposition of the supernatural in the first tale. I don't know how to just go with the device that allows for the forwarding of his story -- maybe it's my own believability block. If things don't need to be explained, even that fact needs to be clearer. But ultimately, once you get past it, it doesn't affect the story's thrust. Now, in the second and shorter tale, when he's really got the dark elements going more concisely, it seems he again subverts the actual plot to a degree that dissipates the relished mystery. The third piece is even more concise and comes off brilliantly. So there is fantastic stuff in this book, anyone should be glad to pay whatever price they can afford, but it could be better (maybe I've come to expect a lot from him). It feels like Ligotti sometimes tries to wrap things up too much, or give typical horror-story send-offs to the reader, just as he's done in a few of the stories in THE NIGHTMARE FACTORY. And here, in "I Have a Special Plan for This World," instead of really going for it and facing us with a truly universal evil, we are forced to come back to some character's personal situation, and his responsibility for the evil goings-on, which is ironic considering how the author has stated his basic distaste for naturalism. The author needn't think he needs to step into overly individualized cut-outs (Blaine) for his purposes. And he wasn't, at first. I often wish I (or he) could/would cut off or rewrite the last page or two of his texts. Sometimes just lopping off a last line would do. His rare film script CRAMPTON succeeds more as a coherent story. But this book is an admirable step, and worth it for all its basic content and creep. These are mostly impressions from just after I read the book. I've tried to revisit them today (6/4/04). Wish they could be more specific...

Rating:
Summary: one of the best horror novels in years
Review: thomas ligotti is, without a doubt, the greatest living horror writer today. although this one diverges significantly from his other work in setting and characterization, the sense of cosmic doom and pessimism is, as always, unrelenting and laid on wonderfully thick. in "my work is not yet done", a dissatisfied employee (to say the least), frank dominio, decides to quit his job and take vengeance on his equally bizarre and twisted co-workers. after being hit by a bus (without realizing it), he projects his bitter and hateful spirit on his fellow employees and takes them out in, eh, unconventional ways. this is oddly amusing in a way that "the nightmare factory" or "noctuary" is not, and strangely enough, the humor only serves to make the work more bleak. the atmosphere of misery and dehumanization never lets up, and the ending is even more crushing than the beginning--which is saying something. this is more kafkaesque than kafka. look especially for the really fascinating references to dominio's obsession with dilapidated and decayed houses. absolutely superb.

Rating:
Summary: Title story is awe-inspiring.
Review: Thomas Ligotti, My Work Is Not Yet Done (Mythos Books, 2002)

Thomas Ligotti stamped himself as a force to be reckoned with in horror fiction from the release of his very first collection, Songs of a Dead Dreamer, almost fifteen years ago as I write this. He has remained, unfortunately, obscure ever since, despite putting out some of the highest-quality horror to be found anywhere in recent years. Now, along comes My Work Is Not Yet Done, and it's released by the smallest of presses, virtually ensuring it will not find the audience it deserves and catapult Ligotti to the top of the bestseller lists, where he has belonged all this time.

My Work Is Not Yet Done is a short novel (the title piece) and two previously collected stories. Of the three, "My Work Is Not Yet Done" is the collection's best piece. While Ligotti has always been a writer of unimpeachable quality, the critics who likened his early work "derivative of Lovecraft" were not all that far off the mark. "My Work Is Not Yet Done" is a whole new Ligotti; it's as if his own voice suddenly broke through and he left behind the shed skin of Lovecraft. And Ligotti's own voice is just as compelling, if not even more so. His protagonist in this story has a lot to say, and says it well. Traces of the ridiculously erudite still remain, but the guy sounds more like someone sitting next to you in a restaurant than someone delivering a lecture to PhD candidates.

The other two stories in the book are minor works, but still indicative of the brilliance of Ligotti. "I Have a Special Plan for This World" puts a completely alien spin on the urban landscape, giving us just enough details to get queasy without actually giving us the goods a la the splatterpunks and their spinoffs. "The Nightmare Network," the collection's weakest piece, takes an impressionist dada look at the world of the corporate merger. It seems as if Ligotti were going for the same "give them just enough" vibe from the previous story, but fell short by a few yards. Still, what's there is capable of evoking a vague sense of dread, rather than simply falling flat on its face, as so many unsuccessful horror stories do.

Absolutely wonderful. Probably very hard to find. Absolutely worth it. If you haven't yet discovered the wonder that is Thomas Ligotti, you owe it to yourself to find this and read it. As soon as possible. ****