DOUBLE REVIEW: The Shining, by Stephen King (4.5*)

**THIS DOUBLE REVIEW WILL CONTAIN SPOILERS FOR THE BOOK AND FILM, JUST BECAUSE IT'S TOO EPIC NOT TO TALK ABOUT PROPERLY!**
 

~ The Book ~

 

by Stephen King (New English Library, 1978)

My rating: 4.5 stars

"It was the place he had seen in the midst of the blizzard, the dark and booming place where some hideously familiar figure sought him down long corridors carpeted with jungle...  It was here.  It was here.  Whatever Redrum was, it was here."

I really only knew the absolute basics about this book when I started reading it.  I'd never seen the film, and the sum total of my knowledge ran to it being about a writer called Jack Torrance, madness, a haunted hotel, a psychically gifted son, and this:

Which didn't turn out to be very helpful, because it's not even in the book, yet DOES manage to spoiler an important twist in the novel.  In fact, as I'll explain in the film section of this post, the movie is so different to the book that I really wasn't surprised by the time that famous scene came around...

Soooo, The Overlook is a hotel in the Colorado Rockies.  A hotel with a colourful history, forced to shut down over the winter thanks to the brutal snowstorms that render the mountain roads impassable every year.  Enter Jack Torrance, the new winter caretaker, his wife Wendy and young son Danny.  On their first day at the Overlook, while his father is being shown around by the manager, Danny meets Dick Hallorann, the hotel cook, who recognises his 'shining', or psychic gift.  Mr Hallorann warns Danny that bad things have happened in the hotel over the years, but tells him he should be alright if he remains calm and watchful... and stays away from Room 237.  Unfortunately, it doesn't take long for Danny's visions to reach fever pitch, as the hotel starts to affect not only him, but also his parents.  What is Redrum?  Who are the masked partygoers in the ballroom?  What did that chambermaid see in 237?  And most importantly, what is chasing Danny through the corridors in his terrifying nightmares?

My synopsis probably makes absolutely no sense - and that's probably because this book is so complex, the storyline slowly filling out, the terror gradually escalating, the themes swelling in importance, that my review is never going to do it justice.  Buuuuut that's kind of the point of having a book blog, so here we are.  This book is so fantastic, the menace so tangible, the characters so real...  To read it is to slowly descend into the Overlook's madness, to become immersed in the claustrophobic atmosphere and to see at least part of this horror through the eyes of a little boy who can't escape his own abilities.  King is an expert at playing on our fears and weaving a plot of such utter brilliance that he draws us in and traps us so that once the horror truly begins to unfold, it's too late.  All we can do is hope and breathe and read on.

In a tiny way, the book had already been spoilered - not just by the iconic moments in the film (which sort of relate to the book even if they don't actually appear in it), but also by the reemergence of Danny in King's newest novel, Doctor Sleep.  In some ways, that was quite reassuring for me: "Even if everything else falls apart, if other people die, at least I know that little boy escapes with his life."  It allowed to me to absorb the themes outside the horror without being too preoccupied; as always with Stephen King, this isn't merely a horror story - it is a novel about growing up, facing loss, inner demons, alcoholism, writing, domestic violence, winter and childhood fears.  Stephen King writes people, writes humanity, so perfectly that once again I was blown away.   

More than anything, it is a novel about bravery in the face of danger and grief.  The hotel coming alive is so scary because it is inescapable and inevitable.  Danny has seen the future, and the bitter storms mean there's no getting away - but thanks to a handful of good people with great strength - Danny's bravery, Wendy's maternal selflessness and Dick Hallorann's all-round good nature - they somehow manage to beat the unbeatable and stop the hotel's rampage.  There are some genuinely awful moments that more than counter the interesting-but-gentle buildup, and the tense, moving and truly haunting ending likewise balances against the gradual onset of Jack's madness.  When the hotel possesses Jack, the novel becomes truly nightmarish - the image of the "thing in the lift", with its bloody, rolling eyes, a horrific mimicry of a human being, pushed beyond lunacy to monstrosity, is still lurking at the back of my mind despite the fact that I finished the book nearly a month ago.  *awed clap for Stephen King, Master of All*

Soooo, yeah, I loved this book.  It was one of those horror novels where the actual horror creeps up so gradually yet so inescapably that by the time it starts to manifest itself more strongly, you're already hooked and have to read on, and on, and on...  The supernatural elements are so well done, and although they are undoubtedly real, they are so entwined with Jack's madness and the hotel's history that the reader begins to question everything, both on the page and off.  It gets under your skin, dropping hints and placing symbols and filling you with a sense of foreboding.  It's maybe not for the squeamish - there are some truly gruesome moments - but if this review has made you even vaguely curious, then give it a go...  It's definitely going to be one of my top books of 2013!

 

Notable Quotables:

• "The truth is that monsters are real, and ghosts are real, too.  They live inside us, and sometimes they win.  That our better angels sometimes - often! - win instead, in spite of all odds, is another truth of The Shining.  And thank God it is." - Stephen King's introduction
• "In that instant, kneeling there, everything came clear to him.  It was not just Danny the Overlook was working on.  It was working on him, too.  It wasn't Danny who was the weak link, it was him.  He was the vulnerable one, the one who could be bent and twisted until something snapped."
• "Now his ears were open and he could hear them again, the gathering, ghosts or spirits or maybe the hotel itself, a dreadful funhouse where all the sideshows ended in death, where all the specially painted boogies were really alive, where hedges walked, where a small silver key could start the obscenity.  Soft and sighing, rustling like the endless winter wind that played under the eaves at night, the deadly lulling wind the summer tourists never heard.  It was like the somnolent hum of summer wasps in a ground nest, sleepy, deadly, beginning to wake up."

Source: This book came into our bookshop a few months ago and I pilfered it to add to my King stash!

~ The Movie ~

Directed by Stanley Kubrick, starring Jack Nicholson and Shelley Duvall (1980)

My rating: 3 stars

 

Aaaaaand so to the movie.  Which really did NOT impress me, especially coming so soon after my reading of the original novel.  Perhaps if I'd seen the film first I'd have been able to appreciate both individually, but I had such high hopes given how amazing the book was and how highly rated I know the adaptation to be...  Well, let's just say that the three stars I've given it were mostly for the clever cinematography and the awesomeness that is Jack Nicholson.  (By the way, I find it quite creepy that Jack played Jack and Danny played Danny... that must have made it difficult to separate out character from actor sometimes?)  The rest was... what the term 'meh' was made for.  Sadly.

 

I guess my problem with the film can be very pithily summed up in one sentence: It's not The Shining.  It's set in a hotel and scary stuff happens and the characters' names are the same.  But the plot, the focus, the characters' personalities and motivations... all changed.  To illustrate: in the book, the hotel wants Danny, because of his Shining.  In the film, it wants Jack, for unknown reasons that may or may not have something to do with reincarnation, or maybe the old 'Indian burial ground' cliche that is quietly mentioned at the beginning of the film.  In the book, Jack is a family man who descends into madness.  In the film, he's clearly veiling violent insanity from the onset.  In the book, the dark forces are supernatural and the characters are victims.  In the film, the dark force is largely Jack.  In the book, Jack is a recovering alcoholic and writer.  In the film, JACK IS FRICKIN' INSANE.  In the book, Danny manages to get through to his father so that he regains 'himself' long enough to allow his family to escape.  In the film, the hotel maze somehow aids Danny and traps his father, who doesn't stop until he's exhausted.  In the book, the previous caretaker Grady and his family are just another part of the hotel's history.  In the film, his tragedy - and his daughters - are a key element.  I could go on...

 

 

I think the worst thing was the way the characters are changed.  I mean, Jack Nicholson is Jack Nicholson (and who doesn't love Jack Nicholson?!), but he in no way comes across as a loving family man, a father and husband, which somewhat diminishes the sense of loss and the terror at his madness.  Magazine writer Frederick Clarke once wrote that "Instead of playing a normal man who becomes insane, Nicholson portrays a crazy man attempting to remain sane."  I couldn't agree more - but then, that's how Kubrick chose to play it.  Shelley Duvall is hideously wooden, like a doll with an annoying accent, and I hate to say it because he seemed like a bit of a jackass, but I think Kubrick was right to be irritated by her.  Little Danny is... well, okay for a kid... but what they did to his 'shining' was fairly unforgiveable given that IT'S THE NAME OF THE FILM.  It's almost an afterthought here, not the focus, and the scene with him crossing the bedroom croaking 'Redrum! Redrum!' was just ridiculous.  I wrote down near the start of the film that the main characters seemed 'more like an antisocial man, a nanny and her completely unrelated charge' than a tight-knit family.  It's hard to feel sad for a family falling apart when they don't feel like a family in the first place!  I also didn't like Dick Hallorann.  As the hotel cook and the man who recognises Danny's 'shine', he is one of my favourite characters in the novel.  He is kindly, strong and reassuring, a figure of comfort and reason and dignified calm.  A beacon in the dark.  He just doesn't have that in the film.

 

Sooo, what did I like?  I thought some of the sound and cinematography was very clever: I particularly liked the scenes where Danny is pedalling around the hotel on his little tricycle, the sound changing dramatically as he rides on and off the rugs laid out on the hard floor.  The 'finger puppet' trick was an interesting way of getting around the 'Tony' thing - Tony being a manifestation of Danny's shining, someone who tells and shows him things - but by the end it just felt a bit embarrassing, to be honest.  The banging noises seemed to fit the book for a while - Jack playing ball against the lobby wall sort of echoed the recurring theme of the roque mallet hitting the corridor walls in the book, for example - but it never came to anything in the end.  The music itself was terrifying - layered and chaotic - but it was so loud in comparison with the general sound level that it was giving me a headache by the end of the film.  Jack Nicholson's dangerous mania was half-frightening, half-sexy, which is usually when he's at his best, let's face it.

 

One of my favourite things about the whole DVD (perhaps sadly) is the half-hour behind-the-scenes documentary, shot by Kubrick's 17 year-old daughter Vivien.  I suppose because she was an 'insider', the actors are that much more relaxed and candid, so it feels like a genuine peek at life on a movie set rather than a staged tour.  We get to see the actors rehearsing their lines, Nicholson cheekily playing to the cameras, Duvall and Kubrick arguing (about how bad her performance is, ha!) and even Duvall's 'breakdown' on set (such a delicate flower...).  There's a mini focus on the huge ballroom scene, and we also get to see the way the maze was built and filmed.  The most impressive thing was watching 'the filming of the filming' - seeing Jack playing Jack.  Seeing him maniacally laughing and threatening Wendy from the inside of the fridge then snapping back to normal the second the cameras stopped rolling...  watching him jumping up and down, limbering up, his voice changing to a furious growl, swinging the axe experimentally, becoming the character, right before the filming of the Here's Johnny scene...  It felt like a bit of a privilege, seeing a real old-fashioned actor at work, a legend in the making!  *Jennifer Lawrence fangirl moment*

 

 

Soooooo, yes.  I can see why King reportedly didn't like the film (at least to begin with), because IT'S NOT HIS BOOK.  I wish I'd seen it before I read the original, because then I might have seen what all the fuss was about instead of being disappointed.  For me, the characters, the plot, the whole feel of the book was changed too far, completely missing that fine balance between the original material and the compromises necessitated by the shift in media.  3 stars, mostly for some clever scenes and for the fact that Jack Nicholson can still make me come over all unnecessary even when he's bat-shit crazy!

Booking by Numbers

This meme was created by Jess at Jess Hearts Books back in September, but since I'd just done the A-Z Book Survey AND my bookcase was almost completely full of spooky novels for the run-up to Halloween, I thought I'd wait a while, until I'd mixed all my books up again, to take part!

The idea behind Booking by Numbers is simple but ingenious.  You take a set bunch of questions, then for each question, you use a random number generator (I used random.org) to pick the book you'll use in your answer.  Not only is it a lot of fun, but it gives your readers a peek at your bookshelves at the same time (and let's face it, we ALL like nosing through other people's books!).  I've used the 79 books currently jumbled up on my new bedroom bookshelf.  It's only a snapshot of my library, and it's heavily biased towards things I've bought recently, but it's easier to count through them on the shelf than to dig through all my overflow book boxes multiple times!  Here we go...


Book number: 37  Book: The Library Book by various contributing authors
Q1)  Have you read this book?  If so, what did you think of it?
I haven't read it yet!  Hanna bought it for my birthday this year - right when I was in the depths of depression - and it put a smile on my face just for being so cute and little and cheerful-looking.  It's a collection of short essays about libraries, by all kinds of authors and other bookish people, and I NEARLY took it on holiday with me but I didn't want to accidentally get it wet or something, it's so nice.  I'm thinking it'll make a gorgeous read for the depths of winter - books about books really do seem to WORK when it's cold outside and all you want to do is curl up and read!


Book number: 31  Book: The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller
Q2)  Why did you buy this book?  Was it recommended to you?  Or was it a random purchase?
For some reason I keep thinking Charlotte sent it to me - probably because she recommended it so heartily after she read it earlier this year -  but actually I received it for October 2012's RAK.  I'd sent a copy of Mary Roach's Bonk to another participant, Beth, and she returned the surprise later that month with this book!  I was already dying to read it, and I'd nearly picked it up from the hotel lounge on holiday the previous month, so I was well chuffed to have a shiny new copy instead of a battered one that had been bashed about in someone's beach bag all week!


Book number: 57  Book: Amelia Grey's Fireside Dream by Abby Clements
Q3)  Based on what you know about this book, which other book blogger would you recommend it to?
I think one of the first places I saw the author's debut novel, Meet Me Under the Mistletoe, was over at Books, Biscuits and Tea.  Vicky read and reviewed the book late last year, and also did this gorgeous nail art to match the book cover, so maybe I'd recommend it to her, if she hasn't got it yet?  I know that several other book bloggers I read regularly already have this one lined up on their autumn TBR piles, so I'm fairly sure a lot of my potential recommendations would be redundant anyway!

Book number: 39  Book: The Accidental Billionaires: Sex, Money, Betrayal and the Founding of Facebook by Ben Mezrich
Q4)  What are this book's bookshelf neighbours?
As you can see from the picture above, this one is currently sandwiched in between my Penguin Modern Classics edition of Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita and Dave Cullen's non-fiction Columbine.  My books are pretty mixed up at the moment, because I basically only have this one bookcase and currently own a good... 700 books?  Maybe more?  When we first moved I filled the bookcase with stuff that might make good Halloween reading - horror, crime and paranormal novels, mostly - but on Tuesday I took a lot of those off and replaced them with a mixture of books that I want to read over the next couple of months.  Having them jumbled up makes it more fun picking my next one!

Book number: 73  Book: Redshirts by John Scalzi

Q5)  How many books have you read by this book’s author?
This will be my first John Scalzi book.  I'm ashamed to say that I thought maybe he was a debut novelist, but it turns out he's already a hugely successful blogger and science fiction writer with a range of projects and books to his name, AND he's done a fair bit of fundraising for various charities as well.  If Redshirts is as fantastic as Katie says it is (which is why I bought it - no pressure, or anything!) then I'm sure it won't be my last Scalzi reading experience...  Some of his other books sound interesting, and I might check out his blog too!

Book number: 36  Book: A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
Q6)  Do you have any special memories attached to this book?
Sort of, yes.  The first time I read A Christmas Carol, a few years ago I think, I read an old Dover Thrift paperback - one of those super-skinny ones with the naff covers and cheap paper.  Then this copy arrived in some books donated to the shop a couple of years ago by a family friend, Richard, and his wife Ruth.  Although we aren't religious, my dad plays the organ and when we were little he used to help out playing at services at a nearby village church.  Richard, a local choirmaster and school Head of Music, also ran the choir there, and as such was a big part of our childhood; he and Ruth, and their friends, sort-of took us under their wing and looked out for us when we went along with Dad on Sunday mornings.  This edition of the book is already beautiful - old, small, with gorgeous illustrations - but now has added meaning because last year Richard died after a very short and vicious battle with a brain tumour.  Now when I dig it out at Christmas I'll think fondly of him alongside my inspiring festive reading... 


Book number: 19  Book: And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie
Q7)  Is this book part of a series?  If so, are you up to date with the series?
Nope, I don't think this one is part of a series.  It's actually been YEARS since I read an Agatha Christie novel, but I'd heard that this one was super-brilliant and (to my delight) was sent a copy by another blogger.  If it was you, let me know - I thought it came as part of the bookish Random Acts of Kindness project, but I might be completely wrong...  Maybe I won it in a competition?  Anyway, it'll be nice to return to ol' Agatha again, and maybe I'll pick up some Marple or Poirot books after that!


Book number: 66  Book: Sex Sleep Eat Drink Dream: A Day in the Life of Your Body by Jennifer Ackerman
Q8)  Is this book something you’d typically read, or is it out of your comfort zone?
I don't read biology books a LOT, but it's definitely not out of my comfort zone either.  I actually really like to pick up interesting non-fiction from pretty much any category when I get chance.  It's much harder to read them at the shop because you really have to concentrate to get your head round things sometimes - which is probably why I tend to read denser non-fiction mostly in winter, when we have more time off and the shop is very quiet anyway!  My sister read this one already this year and apparently it's not too hard going, so I'm looking forward to maybe reading it this autumn.


Book number: 7  Book: World War Z by Max Brooks
Q9)  Have you reviewed this book?  If yes, share the link!
Haha, no, another 'not yet' I'm afraid!  The books currently on my bookcase are mostly unread, which is why they're out and within reach rather than still tucked away in a box somewhere from our move.  There ARE one or two old favourites on there that are ripe for a reread, but everything else is new for me!  I've had this one for years now and I dig it out every time Hallowe'en comes around, but every year it's somehow missed making it to the top of the pile...  I've heard it's amazing though!  Maybe I'll have to bite the bullet soon and read it *gasps* NOT AT HALLOWE'EN.  It'll save it gracing my autumn reading pile a third year in a row, at least!


Book number: 23  Book: It's Not Me, It's You! by Jon Richardson
Q10)  Where did you buy this book?
I first bought this one for my Kindle, back when it was shiny and new and I was buying lots of e-books thinking that this was going to be the start of a wonderful friendship.  I read half of it and sadly, although I was loving the book, I was HATING The Machine, as it came to be known.  So when I spotted a paper copy in The Works for an almost-insulting £1.99, I picked it up immediately!  It was one of those "Why is that book here?!" moments that are happening with increasing regularity in remainder shops these days, and I wasn't going to say no, because Jon Richardson is my spirit animal.


Book number: 8  Book: Rosemary's Baby by Ira Levin
Q11)  Roughly how long have you owned this book?
Not very long at all!  First I dug out The Stepford Wives as a potential Halloween read (I've since read AND reviewed that one).  Then I found A Kiss Before Dying in The Works while I was shopping with my sister a few weeks ago.  Aaaand then for some reason everyone was suddenly talking about Ira Levin and Rosemary's Baby and how awesome it is.  So I bought it, in the smart Corsair edition, because I'm independent like that.  In fact, if I consult Amazon, it will tell me that I bought it on... *checks*... 18 September.  So exactly a month ago.  NEXT QUESTION.

Book number: 35  Book: The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins
Q12)  Share the first sentence of this book.
"I address these lines - written in India - to my relatives in England."  A rather unassuming opening sentence for the novel widely believed to be the first detective novel written in the English language...  My stepdad read this one very recently and loved it; I'm still debating whether or not to join Ellie's readalong in November, or whether to save it for over the worst of the winter months!  I have two editions right now - a cute little Oxford hardback or this bog-standard Popular Classics copy - so I should probably pick one and discard the other at some point, right?
 

Book number: 41  Book: Garlic and Sapphires: The Secret Life of a Food Critic by Ruth Reichl
Q13)  What's your opinion of this book’s cover?
I love it!  Between this cover and Ruth Reichl's gorgeously evocative Twitter feed, every time I spot this book on my shelf I feel a little bit warmer.  I think it captures the kind of welcoming 'bright spot in a dark day' atmosphere that the best bars, diners and cafes seem to exude - the kind that draws you in with a happy sigh.  You can almost hear the gentle clatter of crockery and catch the scents of food and coffee on the air.  In some ways it reminds me a bit of Edward Hopper's painting, Nighthawks, which I love because it spotlights a place that offers a welcome to anyone, anytime.  I'm hoping it'll be a fantastic winter read!

Book number: 22  Book: Agorafabulous! Dispatches from My Bedroom by Sara Benincasa
Q14)  In a few sentences, describe this book in your own words.
Sara Benincasa is a comedian and writer.  This book is about her descent into - and struggle out of - agoraphobia, or the fear of being away from a safe space.  In Benincasa's case, this safe space grew smaller and smaller until she couldn't even leave her bedroom - hence the title.  All I really know about the book is that it's apparently very funny, very wise, and at some point she has to pee in cereal bowls because she can't even get as far as the bathroom.  As a pretty much recovered agoraphobic (I didn't leave my flat for well over a year and had to slowly work my way outwards from there), I'm super looking forward to FINALLY reading this! 

Aaaaaand that's my Booking by Numbers! 

 

REVIEW: The Stepford Wives, by Ira Levin (3.5*)

(Corsair, 2011)

"That's what she was, Joanna felt suddenly.  That's what they all were, all the Stepford wives: actresses in commercials, pleased with detergents and floor wax, with cleansers, shampoos, and deodorants.  Pretty actresses, big in the bosom but small in the talent, playing suburban housewives unconvincingly, too nicey-nice to be real."

Okay, so I mentioned before I went on holiday that I was still owing a review of The Stepford Wives.  I had a template all ready to go, and had even picked the quote I was planning to use to head up my post... and then Laura reviewed it while I was away.  Not only did she say ALL THE THINGS, but she also picked THE SAME QUOTE (which, let's be honest, is a superb summary of the book's major theme) and now I'm not ENTIRELY sure why I'm not just standing here with a neon arrow stuck on a hat wafting all of you over there to read her post instead.  BUT NO.  I SHALL TRY TO SAY A FEW THINGS.  EVEN IF THEY ARE THE SAME. 

I wasn't THAT impressed by the book, I have to say.  I mean, I enjoyed it and all, but I imagine I'd have enjoyed it a lot more if I didn't already know the plot and the twist and everything else that makes it so interesting.  And unlike Psycho, which I reviewed last month, I really DID know the plot, because I already shamelessly adore the Nicole Kidman movie.  Of course, the movie is very different - the ending has been changed, the oddness of the women is far more evident, it's funnier, and the whole thing has been brought right up to date - but the basic plot and characters are still the same...

Sooooo, it's about a fiercely independent feminist and photographer called Joanna Eberhart, who moves to idyllic Stepford with her husband Walter and their two children.  Unfortunately for Joanna, most of the beautiful local women seem to be interested in nothing but waxing their floors and cleaning their windows, while their husbands spend their evenings up at the imposing Men's Association.  It's quite a relief when she meets earthy, wisecracking fellow newbie Bobbie.  As the pair try to stir some kind of interest in women's affairs amongst their bland neighbours, and Joanna delves deeper into the town's past, they begin to suspect that there's something very wrong with the Stepford wives... 

The novel definitely raises big questions about feminism, male backlash, the role of a wife and mother and even pokes itself into the issue of scientific ethics - but it didn't really feel as powerful as I expected.  It didn't help that it was so short - flattening the characters somewhat - and that I was actually quite irritated by Joanna a fair amount of the time.  What WAS a delight was finding that Bobbie was just as smirk-inducingly funny in the book as in the new movie, even if her sharp wit is slightly less rude in the original!  I'm glad I finally read it, just because it's another one of those books that has ingratiated itself into popular culture and vocabulary so completely, but I don't think I'd read it again.  I want to watch the movie again now though, and the original film too!

Bonus points:  for the introduction by Chuck Palahniuk, in which he points out that while feminism was at its height in the 70s when this book was written, these days voluntary Stepford Wives are everywhere - painted and crimped on magazine pages, exulting their inner domestic goddess on cookery programmes, and harbouring ambitions to marry a rich footballer.  These days women are more likely to read about how to please men and dress well in Cosmo than they are to read news and politics.  He discusses the way older women are now more of a threat to young women than men, citing The Devil Wears Prada and the remake of The Stepford Wives as examples in popular culture.  His conclusion probably said more to me as a modern woman than the rest of the book:

"Now everyplace is Stepford, but it's okay.  It's fine.  This is what the modern politically aware, fully awake, enlightened, assertive woman really, really, really wants: a manicure.  We can't say Ira Levin didn't warn us."

Source: I bought this book from Amazon UK, nearly a year ago.  That's actually not bad time-wise, for me!

DOUBLE REVIEW: Psycho, by Robert Bloch (4*)

 

~ The Book ~

by Robert Bloch (Robert Hale, 2013)
My rating: 4 stars

"You're a Mamma's Boy.  That's what they called you, and that's what you were.  Were, are, and always will be.  A big, fat, overgrown Mamma's Boy!"

I didn't even know Psycho was originally a novel until very recently, but since I wanted to watch the film this year around Halloween I thought maybe I should bite the bullet and read the book as well!

By now most people know the basics - Norman Bates, lonely motel, a girl murdered in the shower, a psychotic mother - but it was interesting for me to go back to the original and fill in the gaps before I watched the now-iconic Hitchcock movie.  The rest of the story was new to me!  It opens with Mary Crane stealing forty thousand dollars and taking off, with the intention of passing it off as inheritance money and giving it to her fiance Sam, who has refused to get married until he has finish paying off his late father's debts.  Losing her way en route to Sam's town, she ends up at the Bates Motel, where she meets overweight, bookish Norman, who runs the motel and cares for his sick elderly mother despite her constant venomous nagging.  That night the supposedly infirm old woman, jealous of Norman's attraction to their pretty guest, kills Mary, sparking off a chain of events that will pull Norman deeper and deeper into darkness and put everyone Mary loves in danger too...

It's actually quite a gripping little novel despite its age - it was first published in 1959 - and if the twist wasn't now so famous it would have been even more effective as a thriller.  Of course, the film has now eclipsed it almost entirely, and in my mind I read the whole thing in that half-English-sounding posh movie-star American accent that is so ubiquitous in old black and white movies.  The psychology behind the villainy is quite fascinating - Norman seems to know quite a bit about it already - and Norman's inner monologues have a kind of intoxicating, brutal poetry to them as he rattles through his conflicting thoughts and emotions.  It was a quick read, but I'll definitely be keeping hold of it to reread again in the future.

Notable Quotables:

• "Cold-blooded murder is one thing, but sickness is another.  You aren't really a murderer when you're sick in the head.  Anybody knows that."
• ""It's all right," he said, wondering at the same time why there were no better words, why there never are any better words to answer fear and grief and loneliness."
• "Funny, Sam told himself, how we take it for granted that we know all there is to know about another person just because we see them frequently or because of some strong emotional tie."
• "I can't even hate Bates for what he did.  He must have suffered more than any of us.  In a way I can almost understand.  We're all not quite as sane as we pretend to be."

Source:  I ordered this book from Amazon UK.



 

~ The Film ~

Directed by Alfred Hitchcock,  starring Anthony Perkins and Janet Leigh (1960)
My rating: 4.5 stars

I actually did a paper on Psycho at school for a creative writing practice exam... but I'd never seen it.  I watched it during my first week at university... but my friend talked all the way through it.  So really, I was coming to this first 'real' viewing of the movie as a kind of half-knowledgeable half-new spectator.  Which was probably the best way to be, because I knew what to look for but couldn't quite remember all the details!

So, let's start with Norman Bates.  In the book, he's in his thirties or early forties, overweight and homely, and in my head I imagined him as a kind of cross between Comic Book Guy from The Simpsons and Chris from Family Guy.

 

Not all that attractive, shall we say.  Aaaaand then there was the movie.  In the movie, Norman Bates is famously played by Anthony Perkins, who looks like this:

 

 

Yup, Norman Bates is cute.  I read that Hitchcock deliberately made the choice to cast a handsome guy in his twenties rather than stick to the description in the book, because he wanted viewers to genuinely sympathise with Norman and see him as a boy-next-door type.  I remember watching Psycho the first time (over the top of my friend's chatter, obviously), not knowing the storyline or the twist at all, and thinking Norman was a sweetheart.  This time, knowing about the murderous Mother and about Norman's psychosis, I STILL thought he was a sweetheart - even more so than the book, where he was a little more aggressive and kind of sad.  Aaaaaaand then this happened:

 

Yeah, that was the moment I stopped watching the film as a proper horror movie and I fell in love with Norman Bates.  Possibly this makes me as psychotic as he is.  :)

Of course, crushes aside, this is a GREAT film.  There are other changes besides the boyish charms of Anthony Perkins, but for me they only added to the movie.  Mary Crane becomes the now-famous Marian (a tiny and fairly pointless change, admittedly), and she gets more attention in the adaptation.  Her part in the story is lengthened and fleshed out, and in turn, the investigation being conducted by her sister Lila, fiance Sam and a private detective after her disappearance is shortened and sharpened (which not only keeps the pace up, but also renders Lila feistier and less whiny).  Hitchcock, though daring for his time, does actually tone down the violence of the book, in which Mary is beheaded, not just stabbed, but he keeps Norman's horrified response at a high pitch to retain the same suspense.  And Perkins IS fantastic, playing a much more sympathetic Norman Bates than the one Bloch wrote: a sweet shy man-boy whose mother has him well and truly under her thumb - in more ways than one.

What I really liked was the ending.  Lila's exploration of the house, particularly the slow panning around Norman's little room, with its small bed, gramophone and childhood toys - that of a boy who was never allowed to become a man - struck a sad note that helped set the tone for the revelations to come.  The famous 'Mrs Bates in the fruit cellar' moment was just as awful and just as tense in the film, even though I knew it was coming (and I DEFINITELY remembered that image from my previous semi-viewing), and Norman's frenzied arrival was that much more 'psychotic' and that much less 'weird guy who needs to get out more'.  The psychiatrist's concise explanation of everything that's happened (no spoilers, just in case!) has greater clarity than in the book, giving it more impact than Bloch's original.

Of course, this is pure Hitchcock, so there's plenty to appreciate in terms of the cinematography.  The camera zooms in through a window at giddy speed; the scenes in which Mother attacks her victims are shot in innovative and interesting ways; tense moments are lit creatively to add to the dramatic feel.  Admittedly, the now-famous 'Arbogast falling down the stairs' moment, then a pioneering piece of filmmaking, actually made me laugh out loud, it was so hilariously awful - but at the time, it would have been the height of special effects!  And the penultimate scene, with Mother's voiceover and Norman wrapped in his blanket, is made utterly memorable by the death's head imposed over his devious smile.  He may have been weird, but Hitchcock was a genius!

Happily I still have the three later Psycho films (NOT with the same director, but apparently still pretty good), plus two more Hitchcock movies (The Birds and my old favourite Rebecca) waiting on my R.I.P. shelf for October, so the fun isn't over yet!

~ The Verdict ~

To read or to watch?  That age-old book-lover's question.  Personally, I'd hedge my bets with this one and recommend that you just do both.  The book only took me about a day to read and does fill in some of Norman's internal confusion via those intriguing flights of thought - but the film is pure Hitchcock magic, beautifully made and with his own distinctive flavour apparent in every camera trick and lighting angle.  Also, the film has that smile, so... *scrolls back up for another look*  Yeah, both.  Do both.

REVIEW: Vivien's Heavenly Ice Cream Shop, by Abby Clements (5*)

(Quercus, 2013)

Having read and enjoyed Meet Me Under the Mistletoe last Christmas, and being a fan of foodie novels like Jenny Colgan's Meet Me at the Cupcake Cafe, I was well chuffed when Katie offered to send me her copy of Vivien's Heavenly Ice Cream Shop over the summer.  The cover is GORGEOUS - very much like the Jenny Colgan ones, in fact - and happily the contents were delectable as well!

It's about two chalk 'n' cheese sisters, homebird Anna and eager traveller Imogen, who unexpectedly inherit their grandmother Vivien's ice cream shop on the Brighton seafront when she passes away.  With Vivien's legacy to inspire them - though it's been a while since the shop did more than break even - they take the plunge and try to make a go of things.  After revamping the interior and renaming it after its feisty late owner, food lover Anna flies out to Italy to learn the art of professional ice cream and sorbet-making while Imogen takes the reins at home in Brighton.  Of course, all is not smooth sailing.  Mishaps and crises ensue, both girls' love lives get dragged across the rocks, family tensions are at an all-time high, and Imogen is still feeling the tug to return abroad to continue following her passion for underwater photography.  Meanwhile someone in Brighton seems to be out to sabotage their efforts before Vivien's can even get off the ground...

To be honest, I wasn't expecting much more than some fluffy entertainment to pass a day or two - but I absolutely LOVED this book.  I think the various settings helped: Vivien's is on the seafront in Brighton, Anna travels to Florence for her course, Imogen has been living on a Thai island, and later she goes to the Glastonbury festival as well.  All the different flavours of summer and holidays and the beach and music and sunshine, all rolled into one!  Between the interesting locations, the ice cream and the budding romances, I closed the book with a happy sigh on my lips, feeling all sunny and contented.

The only thing I noticed that annoyed me a bit was the fact that the characters do a lot of 'recalling' - not just 'remembering' or 'thinking about' - which sounds very awkward and feels like a bit of a lazy way of filling in back story.  It's been a while since I read Meet Me Under the Mistletoe but I think Clements did the same thing in that one.  It's less jarring here, but I still noticed it!  I also noticed a couple of editorial errors - at one point Clements mixes up the Italian names of Anna's landlady and her course tutor, and later she mentions Vivien's husband Joseph when previously she'd called him Stanley.  Those mistakes were glaringly obvious and really should have been spotted during the editing process - but likewise, they can be easily fixed. 

As a business owner (technically) I really appreciated the realistic business side of this particular book - something I had a slight issue with in Meet Me at the Cupcake Cafe.  Anna and Imogen have some money from their grandmother to help them with their start-up costs, but they soon get through it and unlike Issy's cupcake cafe, they don't seem magically able to invest in expensive events and hire extra staff within months.  They have to do the hard graft themselves, and have a real struggle on their hands to get the shop off the ground and onto the radar of locals and visitors alike - perhaps that was what helped make the story so compelling.  It was a much more honest look at the experience of opening a shop, and although of course Vivien's flourishes by the end of the novel, I really appreciated the fact that Clements didn't make things too easy for her characters!

All in all, this was a really sunny, bright and delicious slice of summer fiction that MIGHT even have toppled Sophie Kinsella's The Undomestic Goddess off its top spot as my go-to book when I need to bury myself in something lively, inspiring and generally fuelled by sugar and spice and all things nice.  Five stars, and I'll definitely be keeping it - along with Katie's Penguin postcard - ready for next time I need cheering up!

BONUS POINTS: for the now-standard recipes in the back of the book, which include a classic vanilla ice cream and a delicious-sounding salted caramel that I'm determined to make my stepdad try out sometime!

Source: Katie very kindly sent me her copy of this book after she read it for Once Upon a Readathon over the summer.

REVIEW: Ashfall, by Mike Mullin (4.5*)

(Tanglewood, 2011)

"The ash looked almost white in the dim light, giving us a ghostly aspect.  Maybe we were ghosts of a sort, spirits from the world that had died when the volcano erupted.  Now we haunted a changed land.  Would there be any place for us in this new, post-volcanic world?"

I don't know why I'm struggling to write reviews at the moment - except that I'm reading like a maniac instead! - but I'm determined to get a few done this week even if they're a bit rubbish.  I want to be a little more up to date by the time we go on holiday at the start of October, especially given how much reading I'm hoping to do while I'm there.  I'll be even further behind if I don't get a crack on! 

So, Ashfall.  I can't remember where I first heard about it, but it immediately grabbed my interest and I ordered a copy the same day.  It's basically an environmental-apocalypse-type dystopian novel, for older YA readers, hypothesising about what would happen if the supervolcano squatting under Yellowstone actually erupted.  Within the first few pages Alex, a teenager left alone in Cedar Falls while his parents and sister head off to visit his uncle a couple of hours' drive away, has seen his house destroyed by a falling chunk of burning debris.  Escaping to the safety of his neighbours' house, the relentless deafening booming of the eruption, happening 900 miles away, is the next thing to hit, continuing for several days.  When it finally stops, all that's left is darkness, and rumbling thunder, and the ashfall, drifting grey...

Once this set-up is complete, the survival story takes over.  It actually reminded me a tiny bit of The Hunger Games in that respect, as every possible extreme of human behaviour is brought to the surface by the ongoing catastrophe.  Leaving his neighbourhood behind, Alex sets out for Warren, where he hopes he'll find his family safe at his uncle's farm.  En route he meets Darla, an earthy farm girl with some of the practical knowledge he'll need to stay alive, and she falls in with him on his journey.  On the way they have to balance their own needs - defending themselves and their property, and finding food where they can - with retaining their humanity, helping people they meet on the road and aiding community survival efforts as they pass through.

I was quite impressed by how thoroughly Mullin had thought everything through, working in every imaginable consequence of an environmental disaster in a scarily realistic way.  He covers the ongoing need for food and shelter, the lack of water and power, the scarcity of available medical help, and the collapse of authority.  He explores the possibilities for corruption and panic, and the way that while most people will instinctively come together and work hard to keep life going, others will allow their most brutal impulses to come to the fore and exploit the vulnerability of others, out of need or just for kicks.  It's amazing how quickly a civilisation can fall apart once people realise the fragility of the social boundaries we all live by.

Overall I was genuinely impressed by this novel, particularly given the rather cheap feel of the cover design and the book itself, which did ring alarm bells a bit when I first bought it!  I was completely gripped by the end of the first chapter, and remained hooked through every twist and turn, every tentative encounter and dangerous confrontation, that Alex (and later, Darla) encountered on the road to Warren.  There were some truly horrific moments (hence the Hunger Games comparison), including one early on which I felt might have been a bit TOO gratuitous - I have a strong stomach these days but this particular incident made me feel a bit queasy - and if you can't read any scenes of animals being harmed then you might want to skip this one.  After all, the aim is survival, and food is food...  Blood and gore aside, however, I thought it was superbly written and emotionally astute (yes, I cried at least once), and I can't wait to read the next installment of Alex and Darla's adventures in the second book, Ashen Winter.

Bonus points: for the extras at the back.  Mullin includes a few pages of information about the Yellowstone supervolcano - and others like it - along with some suggested further reading, which I've duly scribbled down for later.  He also has an amusing 'about the author' page, in which he mentions that he's a black belt in Songahm Taekwondo (something he shares with his young protagonist, who naturally finds it rather helpful on his journey!) and lists some of his crappiest jobs to date, wryly noting that "he's really hoping this writing thing works out."  I hope so too...


Source:  I preordered this book from Amazon UK... then didn't read it.  Naturally.

A-Z Bookish Survey

This meme has been floating around for a while (Jamie always makes the best ones!), and loads of my favourite bloggers have already done it, including Katie, Hanna, Bex, Alley, Sarah and Laura.  Now it's my turn!  You know I can't resist a bookish survey...

Author you've read the most books from:  Probably Enid Blyton, as a little girl.  I read everything I could get my hands on of hers, including her short stories for younger children, Noddy, The Magic Faraway Tree, The Wishing Chair, through The Secret Seven and The Adventurous Four to The Famous Five, St. Clares, Malory Towers...  My favourites were the Cherry Tree Farm and Willow Farm books, which taught me a lot about woodland wildlife and farm animals.  So many series featuring picnics and ginger beer, so little time!

Best sequel ever:  Ummmm.  Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets?  That basilisk was bloody terrifying, zooming around in the pipes hissing about killing people, and Gilderoy Lockhart is just FABULOUS.  Seizure, the second book in the Virals series by Kathy Reichs, was excellent too - all Indiana Jones-style underground adventures and pirate treasure!

I can't even look at this GIF without laughing!

Currently reading:  Psycho by Robert Bloch.  Yes, THAT Psycho.  There's a new 2013 edition with a suitably freaky cover, and I bought the four Psycho movies in a box set to go with it.  It's great so far, but it definitely preys on the mind a bit.  Nothing says 'autumn reading' like a sudden urge to give myself nightmares...  :)

Aaaaah, Norman's so sweet...  Shame about the mother thing, really.

Drink of choice while reading:  Usually either coffee (normal at work, decaff before bed) or Twinings chai tea with milk and a little blob of honey.  In winter I sometimes have Ovaltine or hot chocolate instead.  Anything to keep warm in our cold shop!

Ereader or physical book:  I tried a Kindle, but I hated it and sold it on again for a fraction of what I paid for it.  Total waste of good book money!  I hated not being able to see the cover, I hated not being able to flick backwards and forwards easily, I hated the nasty generic type on the page, I hated not having the 'spatial awareness' of knowing roughly where I saw something ("about a quarter of the way through, on the left hand page"), I hated not feeling the physicality of the book in my hand, I hated not being able to peek at the top of my book to see how far my bookmark had progressed over the day...  Maybe I should have known better, running a second-hand bookshop and all, but I'm now firmly back in the paper camp and there I intend to stay.

Fictional character that you probably would have dated in high school:  They would probably never have dated my pudgy teenage nerd-self, but I always liked boys who were dark, clever and a little bit different.  Off the top of my head, my crushes could have included Ben Blue from the Virals series, Lochan from Forbidden, Dash from Dash and Lily's Book of Dares, and Jacob Black.  I'd definitely have crushed on Kevin Khatchadourian (yes, THAT Kevin - he's described as handsome, smokily exotic, smart and enigmatic, after all), but I'd probably have ended up shot full of arrows for my impertinence.

Glad you gave this book a chance:  In Cold Blood by Truman Capote.  I'd never had much interest in it, thinking it'd be dry and not my sort of thing at all, but I picked it up from the library and gave it a go.  It turned out to be my favourite book of 2012 and one of the best, most immersive and compelling books I've ever read!

Hidden gem book:  Eating for England: The Delights and Eccentricities of the British at Table by Nigel Slater.  People love his cookery books, and his memoir Toast is pretty well-known, but nobody really seems to have heard of this one.  It's structured a bit like Toast, in little mini-essays about different food-related topics, but it's more of a charming and whimsical celebration of British food and food culture.  Also, the cover has colourful rock on it, which makes me immediately think of summer and sunshine and donkey rides on the beach!  A fantastically nostalgic read.

Important moment in your reading life:  I suppose, going back to basics, the biggest moment was when I was reading The Wishing Chair as a little girl and the whole 'reading silently' concept suddenly made sense.  In that instant my reading changed completely because I didn't have to talk aloud any more and could read more quickly.  I remember it just suddenly working, like a jigsaw piece had slotted into place!

Just finished:  We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver.  It's been a long time since I read a book whose characters and situations were so very real to me - I've been boring my poor mum to tears all week, bending her ear about bad parents and damaged children and the school shooting culture...  Fascinating, compelling, thought-provoking and a pleasure to read.  It's the best book I've read this year - and when I can finally get my thoughts together, there's a five star review on the way!

Kind of books you won't read:  Ummm.  Mostly I live by a 'never say never' rule with books - but I won't read Christian fiction or books about living the Christian Way.  I have it rubbed in my face enough, being an atheist in a rather conservative church-centred town, so I don't need to read about it too.

Longest book you read:  The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas.  Not that it felt like 1200 pages, it was absolutely gripping!  It was also the first book I ever reviewed on this blog, which means I have a bit of a soft spot for it anyway...

Major book hangover because of:  Lord of the Rings.  I read straight through The Hobbit and all three LOTR books, so I was completely emotionally invested by the end and had been mentally inhabiting Middle Earth for several weeks.  I'd also seen the first LOTR movie in the middle of all this, immersing myself even MORE.  I think when I finally came to the end and closed the book, I didn't read anything else for a good week or more, just because I knew full well that nothing could top that.

Post LOTR-feels: I haz them.

Number of bookcases you own:  Just one, in the new house.  I used to have at least four, plus extras in piles and boxes, so the downsize has been quite dramatic!  Of course, that doesn't mean I've done away with all my books - it just means they're staying in their plastic storage boxes for now, half in my bedroom, half in my dad's spare room a few minutes away.  If I read and release one from the shelf, another one moves up out of a box to take its place!

One book you've read multiple times:  The Cat Who Came In From the Cold by Deric Longden, the first in his series of funny cat-based autobiographies about life up north with his wife (the writer Aileen Armitage) and an ever-shifting crew of feline friends.  My mum bought me this one when I was about eleven and they've been some of my favourite comfort reads ever since!

Preferred place to read:  The first thing I did in my new room was set up a little reading corner for myself.  Well, it's not quite a corner yet - the ACTUAL corner is still full of yet-to-be-unpacked crap - but I'll keep shuffling it backwards until it gets there!  It's under the main light, so it's nice and bright (I might put a lamp behind it once the corner's cleared), and I have a comfy wicker chair (when Domino isn't hogging it) and a Myakka table of solid wood, shaped like a stack of books!  Perfect for reading with a cuppa and a snack in peace and quiet...

Quote that inspires you:  "Books are mirrors: you only see in them what you already have inside you." - From The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón.  I think it's a beautiful way of explaining how an individual reader brings his own life, his own memories and values and even deep inner secrets, to the table when reading a book.  A person sat next to him reading the same book won't have the same reading experience; if he rereads that book years down the line, he'll have changed and his response will differ yet again.

Reading regret:  Ummm, I don't know!  The only thing I can think of is starting a duff book on holiday last year and wasting three days of luxury reading time pressing through about 20 pages.  Poolside holidays are all about reading and good food and sunshine for me, so I was a bit annoyed with myself for not switching books faster and moving on!

Series you started that you need to finish:  I have to pick just one?!  Haha, I'm so bad with this.  Unfinished series I'm currently hoarding include The Southern Vampire Mysteries by Charlaine Harris, the Percy Jackson series by Rick Riordan, the Lords of the Underworld series by Gena Showalter and even The Hunger Games trilogy - I read the first book and never carried on, for some reason...  A lot of the series I've stalled on are kinda fluffy reads - mostly YA and paranormal novels - so they're good for idle days off, readathons and holidays.  I WILL finish them eventually!

Three of your all-time favourite books:  Okay, I tried really hard, but I could only narrow it down to four: The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde, Books, Baguettes and Bedbugs by Jeremy Mercer, Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë and The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett.  All favourites of mine that I've read and reread, and will continue to reread over the years to come!

Unapologetic fangirl for:  Chuck Palahniuk.  Rant completely blew me away, and Snuff was pretty daring too.  I've been steadily collecting more of his books ever since (Fight Club being the most famous, of course), because they're exactly the sort of twisted, depraved, darkly funny, rather provocative novels I love.  I'd pay good money to hear Palahniuk talk, I hear he's a fantastic speaker and a pretty amusing interviewee!

Very excited for this release:  I'm looking forward to the Hyperbole and a Half book that's coming out at the end of October.  Allie Brosh's website is hilariously funny and very insightful, so hopefully the book will be fantastic too!  I've preordered it already.  As a devoted fan of The Secret History I'm also looking forward to Donna Tartt's The Goldfinch, though I'll probably wait for the paperback edition next year.

Worst bookish habit:  Buying too many books!  I can buy as many books in a week as I'll read in three months, which is inevitably either going to wind up with Mount TBR collapsing in a giant avalanche and killing me (what a way to go!), or having to cull a ton of books unread years down the line, which is a total waste of money.  BUT I JUST CAN'T HELP MYSELF!

X marks the spot! Start at the top left of your shelf and pick the 27th book:  I've got all my potential Halloween-y reads on my bookcase at the moment, so that I don't have to go delving through boxes looking for suitably freaky books every five minutes.  The 27th book, counting left to right from the top, is Shutter Island by Dennis Lehane.  I've heard such good things about this one!

Your last bookish purchase:  This morning I found a copy of Hester Browne's brand new shiny book, The Runaway Princess, on the market for £2.99.  I couldn't believe it - I looked for it in Waterstones the other day and couldn't find it, yet there it was, already going cheap with a remainder sticker on it...  The nice lady gave it me for £2.50, because I'm the crazy girl who runs a bookshop round the corner yet still stops by her stall every other week to say hello and look through the new stock!

Zzz-snatcher. Which book kept you up way too late?  Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier had me absolutely glued to the pages into the wee hours of the morning - quite a surprise, given that I'd expected it to be a bit dull!  I was also reading The Shadow of the Wind for most of the night - finally closing it as dawn broke, just as Daniel finished reading HIS copy of The Shadow of the Wind at sunrise IN The Shadow of the Wind.  Very meta!

I feel your pain, Joan... *world's smallest violin etc etc*

REVIEW: The Rats 2 - Lair, by James Herbert (3.5*)

(New English Library, 1988)

First ... we brought you RATS IN THE CITY... now... there are RATS IN THE FOREST!*  The second book in the Rats trilogy (read my review of the first one HERE), this novel is set four years after the mass cull of the mutant black rats that caused such terror and carnage in London.  Now, a few miles away in Epping Forest, it seems that the survivors of the cull - and their hideous new leader - have bred and multiplied to such an extent that their fear of humans has become secondary to their overwhelming strength in numbers... and their renewed taste for human flesh.  Now it's up to Ratkill investigator Lucas Pender to contain the problem, working with the local farmers, conservation workers and the military to find the rats' new lair before they can take over again. 

A cracking sequel that I sped through as quickly as the first - I particularly liked the addition of short Jaws 2-esque** insights into the existence of the rats.  The only thing that really pissed me off is how spoilerific the cover art is - it gave away the location of the rats' hideout by the time I got a quarter of the way through the book!  Anyway, one more ratty horrorfest to go - and I think the final one, Domain, is RATS IN A DYSTOPIAN FUTURE LONDON, which should be interesting!

*  To be read in a 'movie trailer voiceover guy' voice.  OBVIOUSLY.
** Seriously, Jaws 2 by Hank Searls is a great book.  Vastly superior to the movie, from what I gather!  He uses the same technique - short sections in italics - to let us into the 'mind' of his female great white shark.

Source:  I nabbed this one from the shop shelves just as I was finishing the first book, The Rats.