January & February 2024 Horror Reading Roundup | Horror Book Review
Vložit
- čas přidán 6. 03. 2024
- Each month, I do a Horror Reading Roundup, in which I discuss and review all of the books (mostly horror) I read in the previous month. So here's the edition for January and February of 2024.
Polymath Press (my publishing house--get signed copies of my books): polymathpress.com/
Rocky Mountain Paranormal Research Society: www.rockymountainparanormal.com/
Do You Like Scary Movies podcast: www.doyoulikescarymovies.com/
Bob Lewis Magic: www.boblewismagic.com/
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Relevant Product Links
Disclaimer: This video is not sponsored and all opinions contained herein are my own. However, the links below are affiliate links and I receive a commission from products purchased through these links.
(My Book!) Arithmophobia: An Anthology of Mathematical Horror edited by Robert Lewis: amzn.to/3T329vv
(My Book!) Case Files of the Rocky Mountain Paranormal Research Society Volume 1 by Robert Lewis & Bryan Bonner: amzn.to/3PaVUUe
(My Book!) In the Woods: A Fiction Foundry Anthology edited by Robert Lewis: amzn.to/47WBYgb
In Order to Live by Yeonmi Park: amzn.to/3T8a0I5
While Time Remains by Yeonmi Park: amzn.to/3v02lnb
Let's Go Play at the Adams' by Mendal W. Johnson: amzn.to/3It1myS
The Yan Can Cook Book by Martin Yan: amzn.to/435cbkk
The Lost Art of Pie Making Made Easy by Barbara Swell: amzn.to/4bX2kB0
Benjamin Franklin: An American Life by Walter Isaacson: amzn.to/3uSk8Nc
Among the Living by Tim Lebbon: amzn.to/3wJNRbE
The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri: amzn.to/3IoVkzk
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Intro music written by Chris Hoole. Used with permission (commissioned 2020 for this channel).
End screen music is "Drake Spectre" written and performed by Keith Lewis. Used with permission.
Phobophile title font is Nosferotica, designed in 2006 by Chad Savage. Used under open license.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
If you’re a horror fan, please subscribe to see more horror-related content. - Zábava
I’m just getting back into reading again. I love hearing thoughts on books to give me reading suggestions.
Thank you for the great review of Let's Go Play... There are some things that younger readers may not understand. I was a kid at the time this story would have taken place (1970 give or take.) What was going on? The Cold War with the Soviet Union and especially the Vietnam War. On TV news reports we saw carpet bombing and agent orange being used. The news often listed the casualties on both sides almost like it was a sports score. Such horrors being committed by the US was often seen as a necessary evil. So no wonder the kids could see what was happening with their prank gone wrong as needing just such an expedient solution. And their master strategist general (Dianne 17) came up with what seemed an ideal plan.
I also get mad at he critics who say that the babysitter (Barbara) didn't try hard enough to escape. Younger people are spoiled by the current trope of Marvel/DC super heroes. Barbara was not Black Widow. She might have never trained in any such way. She might have even avoided it because her major was Child Development. (I had martial arts when young and once punched a friend when they surprised me.) Like doctors she probably had the personal credo of "do no harm." Plus Barbara was kept effectively tied up. And there was always at least one kid guarding/watching her. She was out numbered, out gunned (2 of the kids had guns!), and placed on a bread and water diet. She had trouble sleeping because the bindings were tight and painful which likely meant circulation and nerve damage to her hands and feet. Barbara was a kind, gentle, good and idealistic person and didn't even understand what was going or why. Yes, it started as a prank but then went down a slippery slope.
Great take on the LET’S/ADAMS novel! I’m also about halfway through Tim Lebbon’s novel. If you’ve never read his novel DESOLATION, I think you’d add it to your list of favorite endings!
I haven’t read that one yet, but it’s on my list.
Great list again.
One of the best so far this year I'm currently reading is Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson. Glad to see you got to an Isaacson as well. He really knows how to pack his books very densely with a public figure's story!
I got the Musk biography for Christmas but haven’t had a chance to read it yet. Looking forward to it, though. He’s certainly an interesting character.
@@Phobophile he very much is! Love him or hate him you can't deny his accomplishments
I'm on my 41st of the year, Hitchhiker's Guide will be 42nd
Here's the horror
-Salvation Day by Kali Wallace 2☆
-Red Hood by Elana K Arnold 3.5
-Ararat by Christopher Golden 2.25
-At the Mountains of Madness by H.P Lovecraft 4.5
-Wntertide by Ruthanna Emrys 3.75 (cold wat lovecraftian spy novel)
-Stolen Tongues by Felix Blackwell 3.75
-Come Closer by Sara Gran 2
-Nothing but Blackened Teeth by Cassandra Khaw 4
-Shadow Puppets by Carver Pike 3.75
-The Invocations By Krystal Southerland 3.5
-No Gods No Monsters by Cadwell Turnbull 4.25
-Ring Shout by P Djeli Clark 2
-The Crane Husband by Kelly Barnhill 3.5
Not horror but it belilongs here
-Lord of the Flies by William Golding 4.5
-The Story of O by Pauline Reage 4 (wierd French bdsm book from 1955)
-Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See 4.5 (a lot about foot binding in 19th century China, worse than most things in horror)
Good Lord! I’ve got some catching up to do!
@@Phobophile I did a near fatal 7,000 page challenge in January (I don't recommend and I won't be doing that ahain)
@@zachreads sounds like fun…but I’ve been working 100 hour weeks, so that just ain’t gonna happen
Also as far as the LGPatA goes there was a psychology at Stanford Univ. in 1971 where a prison environment was simulated and some college students were divided into prisoners and guards. The experiment was ended early when some of the guards were abusing the prisoners. Now these were college students. Imagine what younger kids would do. I wonder if the author drew upon this in writing his story. And there was another infamous 1961 Univ. Psychology experiment the Milgram where the researchers were surprised how many subjects would inflict what they thought were harmful shocks on someone when told to do so by a lab coat wearing authority figure. In LGPatA the two older teenagers would have been the authorities and the younger 3 basically did what they were told. So there is a basis for motive there.
Very true. I’ve read a lot about those studies (and some similar ones), and that’s why I think this book gets the psychology so right. Whether he studied or just had an intuitive understanding, he wrote a book that rings horrifyingly true.
@@Phobophile I disagree with those readers who complain that the story is not realistic. I think it is all too plausible and realistic.
At least for the 1970s time period. And now with cell phones it would be near impossible to keep the traveling parents from directly talking to the babysitter.
@@henrytjernlund that’s true. The invention of cell phones may have been the single greatest disruption to horror tropes ever. I suppose one could still question why they wouldn’t check in on a landline but by the same token, parents of the past weren’t as obsessively protective (or even overprotective) as they are today.
Yet another comment, sorry. About the political allegory I got the impression that the adults were the ruling class and the kids were the working class. The babysitter was neither being a sort of intellectual/academia class that was sort of in between the first two classes. Another book that was compared to LGPatA is The Collector (1963) by John Fowles where a shy man wins a lottery and buys a house in the country. He collects butterflies and develops an obsession with a pretty art student whom he kidnaps and keeps, in a sense, as a part of his collection. Maybe similar political allegory applies where the lottery win has propelled the man from the working class to the ruling class and the art student is in that middle intellectual class. LGPatA has multiple layers to it. Political, psychological, and even philosophical and why there is so much which can be unpacked.
I've now seen information about the interview with Mendal Johnson where de does state that the adult/parents are the conservative class and the babysitter is in the liberal (academic, intellectual) class. I guess the kids are the mixed political working class and not happy with either of the other classes. The conservative class is well protected but the liberal class is not so the academic case babysitter gets the brunt of the kids (working class) displeasure. The interview goes to to MJ wanting to have saved the babysitter but couldn't figure out how without loosing the powerful message(s) of the story. And this is why the story is not just torture-porn and has much more depth to it. Like Lord of the Flies.