Is it penance? Cockiness? A final burst of youth? Whatever the reasons, in recent years, several middle-aging horror authors have written children's books (rarely marketed as such): Whitley Strieber's Wolf of Shadows (1985); Stephen King's The Eyes of the Dragon (1987); Dean Koontz's Oddkins (1988)—and now, from Barker, a ``fable'' about a wish-granting house that may be the weakest of the lot. Barker's adult novels (Imajica, 1991, etc.) deal with the play between our world and fabulous alternate realities. Here, too, the hero—ten-year-old Harvey Swick—encounters another world, by having his cry of boredom answered by a yellow-skinned man named Rictus who flies through Harvey's bedroom window and offers to take him to ``Holiday House.'' The boy agrees and, led through a wall of fog, finds himself in a magical place where, during each 24 hours, all four seasons pass (hot, sunny afternoons; snowy winter nights, etc.) along with their holidays, including Christmas mornings that find Harvey's most cherished wishes answered beneath the tree. It's paradise, Harvey thinks at first, but soon wonders: Why is fellow- visitor Lulu so morose? What kind of fish are those, with eyes like ``prisoners,'' lurking in the pond out back? And where is Mr. Hood, the House's wish-granting owner? In time, Harvey senses evil at work and flees, only to find that, back home, his parents have aged a year for every day at the House. And so he returns to the House, to find and battle Mr. Hood and win back his stolen years.... The House is a splendid conceit, but Harvey (Barker's first child hero) is as real as a Norman Rockwell kid, and the studiously simple narration—leached of Barker's usual X-rated, riotous imagery—lacks spirit. If this were a limited edition, it'd be a minor collector's item; with a 100,000 first printing, it's a major miscalculation. (Drawings—42—by Barker.)
Pub Date: Nov. 18, 1992
ISBN: 0-06-017724-1
Page Count: 240
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 1992
Natural storyteller Hunter knows the value of the occasional poignant scene to give his firefights breathing room. Not for a...
In the category of slam-bang, testosterone-laden, body-bag filling, hellzapoppin' potboilers, this is as good as it gets.
For those who may have wondered about the gene pool that helped produce master sniper Bob Lee Swagger, the author's demigod of a series hero (Time to Hunt, 1998, etc.), here's the tell-all prequel. Earl Swagger, valiant marine, Congressional Medal of Honor winner, is Bob Lee's demigod of a daddy. We also meet Bob Lee's brave and beautiful mama. It's the summer of 1946, and Hot Springs, Arkansas, is under the thumb of gangster Owney Maddox, who has a dream: he wants to refashion Hot Springs into an oasis of sin, a place where Meyer Lansky, Lucky Luciano, Bugsy Siegel, et al., will feel safe, comfortable, and cosseted. He’s halfway there. On the surface Special Prosecutor Fred C. Becker doesn't seem much of a deterrent, but Becker has a dream too: he wants to be Arkansas's youngest governor ever. Moreover, he has a plan: to bring Owney down by recruiting and training an elite task force that can strike hard, fast, and ruthlessly. Earl Swagger—who better?—is charged with the training. At first, things go right. The recruits are eager and motivated. Aided by the element of surprise, they deliver a series of blows that shake the Maddox realm to its Sodom-like foundations. But then Maddox, with the whole of New York gangsterdom to draw from, recruits his own elite force. The stage is set for blood-drenched confrontations, during which lots of bad men are killed, some good men are betrayed, and Earl performs exactly the way Bob Lee's progenitor should.
Natural storyteller Hunter knows the value of the occasional poignant scene to give his firefights breathing room. Not for a minute to be taken seriously, but, all in all, a blast.Pub Date: July 3, 2000
ISBN: 0-684-86360-X
Page Count: 480
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2000
A major novel — the first since East of Eden — this brings into focus a conflict within a man's personality which will have wide, perhaps too wide, recognition value. John Steinbeck's special gift of compassion might have turned this into a sentimental exercise. As it develops, however, this is a taut, realistic, controversial portrait of Ethan Allen Hawley, scion of an old family, bearing his heritage of high ideals, intrinsic honesty — and fear of insecurity, while confronted with a shattered fortune- the old homestead the only thing left, and a job as grocery clerk in a store he had once owned. The pressures on him come to a head in this winter of his discontent, as his wife (who is basically an ideal mate, sensitive, perceptive, loving) lashes out at him for not giving his family the wherewithal to support their name; his son and daughter chide him for his failures — and a tiny inheritance of his wife, Mary, offers a possible loophole for taking a long chance. And then he is shown a way — involving a compromise with his integrity, a betrayal of his standards-and he succumbs, actually going beyond the initial opportunity to trap two men to whom he owes affection and loyalty. What happens is not wholly within the accepted pattern — nor is the outcome predictable. But Steinbeck sustains the reader's suspense, poses issues of responsibility — a man to his friend, to his employer, to his son, to himself — and leaves the resolution in final analysis to the reader. It is a fascinating and disturbing book, uncomfortably close to the challenge the average man faces in today's materialistic world.
Pub Date: June 23, 1961
ISBN: 0143039482
Page Count: 274
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 5, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 1961
SEEN & HEARD
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