Night of the Crabs

Night of the Crabs

by Guy N. Smith

Blurb:

The Welsh coast basks in summer tranquility, then the drownings begin... Not until the monstrous crustaceans crawl ashore, their pincers poised for destruction, does the world understand the threat it faces....

My Reaction:

This was selected for the 372 Pages We'll Never Get Back podcast, and as usual, Donald and I read it together.  

I was expecting this to be a slightly sillier version of Jaws.  (I've never read the book, but I've seen the movie very many times.)  It was even sillier than I'd expected—and surprisingly risqué.  (Perhaps that aspect is less surprising when you read the author's biography and see the other types of "literature" in his bibliography.)  

SPOILERS follow...

The marine biologist/renowned botanist/professor/very "with it" uncle of what's-his-name isn't quite as brilliant as he thinks he is, but then again, everyone in this book is kind of dumb!  

There's an obvious hole in their first big plan to thwart the evil crabs, and everyone is SHOCKED when the plan doesn't work—but then they have another idea that seems so stupid it couldn't possibly work, so of course it does.  

Except... There are no dead crabs under the sea or washing up on shore... And didn't they just go through a time when the crabs were nowhere to be seen... and everyone became complacent... until the crabs resurfaced and killed a whole bunch of people?  Nah, I'm sure it'll be fine this time!  

I don't care for creature-feature monsters that are too impervious to everything that should by rights kill them.  Sure, they're big and armored, but I'm not buying that they're invulnerable to fire or that you can't, you know, aim for their eyes and blind them with good old-fashioned bullets. 

We never do get a satisfying answer as to where they came from—and why only now.   The whole scene with Cliff Davenport (full name, please) spying on the planes at the military base, being shut in "the hole" and then interrogated—leads nowhere!  Very disappointing.  

The only part of the book that actually felt creepy was the poor train engineer (I guess?) who has had a prophetic recurring nightmare about his death that then comes true.  I don't know why, but that gave me a genuine chill.   

Oh well.  The story ends with Cliff Davenport and Pat Benatar Benson heading off to London to marry and live happily ever after (or at least until they learn that the crabs survived, because this is the first of a series of 7—SEVEN!!—books). 

Mars Reborn (Moon People #2)

Mars Reborn (Moon People #2)

by Dale M. Courtney

Blurb:

This Book is based on Earth into a new era of light speed travel thanks to the Powleens from a world called Sybon. And the adventure of 1st Science Officer Commander David Braymer’s journey on board his new ship called the Aurora, ”The Goddess of the Dawn”, Commander Braymer does a successful genesis and Colonization of Mars and resurrects Martians and animals that were frozen 100,000 years with mental powers. With also the war between worlds for control of the Galaxy with Earth and Powleens against the Arcons and the Thracians.

My Reaction:

Donald and I read this together to fill in a gap between books for the 372 Pages We'll Never Get Back podcast.  We read the first one along with the podcast, back in 2022, so when we noticed that the rest of the trilogy was available on Kindle Unlimited, we decided to give it a try.  

This would be another great candidate for the podcast, though I don't know if they'll want to return to the series. Lots of fodder here.  It certainly didn't fail to entertain us, and I wouldn't mind reading the last book in the series, one of these days.  It does take some extra effort to read, what with the lack of quotation marks in a very dialogue-heavy book!  I think the comedy value is worth the trouble, though.

The Legend of Rah & the Muggles

The Legend of Rah & the Muggles

by N.K. Stouffer

Blurb:

In another land far from the shoreline of Aura, war was raging, and Lady Catherine launched a raft with precious cargo aboard, her two infant sons. She wrapped the boys in royal blankets and quilts, and packed a jewel box filled with bright rubies and other gemstones between them. The raft drifted away with no charted destination but the babies' survival.

My Reaction:
Yet another 372-Pages read, shared with Donald, as usual.  

I'm updating my reading blog after four months or so, and I had almost forgotten this one.  How is that even possible?  

Top three things I remember about this book:

1.  You'll get whiplash from the stylistic changes in the beginning of the book.  It starts by recounting a nuclear war that causes (part of) the human race to mutate into a new species, then it turns into a wanna-be Harlequin romance, and then it morphs into a children's fairy-tale fantasy.  All within the first few chapters, if I recall correctly.  (It wanders off into something else later on, but I'll leave that for others to describe...)

2.  So many elements of the story are left hanging.  Zero payoff.  Highly annoying!  

3.  Do you vaguely remember that someone accused J.K. Rowling of plagiarizing her work with the Harry Potter series?  This is that book/author.  It's all absolute nonsense.  

Bonus thing I remember about this book:  There's a song, complete with lyrics and sheet music (though apparently it's as poorly composed as the rest of the book).  Some listeners recorded themselves playing or singing this song, and it still pops into my head from time to time, several weeks later.  Send help. 

The Silence of Ghosts

The Silence of Ghosts

by Jonathan Aycliffe

(Edited) Blurb:

Those who live in silence hear them best...

After Dominic is severely wounded in service during WWII, his family sends him away from London and the Blitz, to the relative safety of their country home.  His instructions are to look after his partially deaf sister, Octavia, while he comes to terms with his new reality.  The crumbling family estate on the shores of Ullswater is old, neglected, and doesn’t seem a promising place for happiness or recovery.

However, despite his reservations, Dominic's life soon seems to be taking a turn for the better.  He has an attractive and kind new nurse named Rose, and there's hope that Octavia's asthma and hearing might be improving.  But even as Dominic catches his first glimpses of a happy future, there's an eerie darkness creeping at the edges of his consciousness.  Slowly, he realizes that there's something deeply wrong with this house...  Octavia is hearing the voices of children-- voices that no-one else can hear-- and there is worse to come.  Can Dominic solve the mystery of these phantom voices before it's too late?

My Reaction:

I enjoyed a few of the author's earlier works, but unfortunately, this one really didn't work for me.  The biggest problem is that it's a ghost story that inspires very little fear.  Apart from one or two creepy moments, it falls flat.  Most of the efforts at horror are repetitive (the dancing!!!) and not particularly scary, in my opinion.  (I think it's rare that I'll be creeped out by a detailed description of a ghost's old-fashioned clothing, and an author needs to be very clever indeed to make me shiver in fear when a ghost "plain-talks" as much as Sir William's ghost does.)

I found this novel poorly written in other respects, as well, I'm sorry to say.  I realize it was set during WWII, so a mention or two of ration-related difficulties would be fine, but the author got carried away.  The frequent references to rationing and the specifics of what everyone was eating/drinking, morning, noon, and night-- no, thank you!  It's a ghost story, not a cozy mystery or a cookbook!  Similarly, there were just too many references to Hitler and the war for a book that isn't "about" WWII.  

Dominic's parents are such absolute caricatures of Evil Rich People that I laughed out loud.  They were so completely over-the-top!  Also, I wasn't expecting so much romance, and I ended up just skimming those parts of the book. (Well, to be honest, I skimmed a lot of the second half of this novel.  I wouldn't have finished if I hadn't.)  I like a good romance as much as the next person, but this one wasn't for me.  I was cringing over the lovesick, lust-fueled conversations. 

I hate to be so negative when I've enjoyed some of this author's other books, but this one was a big disappointment.  Maybe I was expecting too much, because I enjoyed the other books.  Oh well!  I still haven't read The Talisman, and that one sounds promising.

A Town Like Alice

A Town Like Alice

by Nevil Shute

Blurb:

Nevil Shute's most beloved novel, a tale of love and war, follows its enterprising heroine from the Malayan jungle during World War II to the rugged Australian outback.

Jean Paget, a young Englishwoman living in Malaya, is captured by the invading Japanese and forced on a brutal seven-month death march with dozens of other women and children. A few years after the war, Jean is back in England, the nightmare behind her. However, an unexpected inheritance inspires her to return to Malaya to give something back to the villagers who saved her life. Jean's travels leads her to a desolate Australian outpost called Willstown, where she finds a challenge that will draw on all the resourcefulness and spirit that carried her through her war-time ordeals. 

My Reaction:

I went into this book knowing little about it.  I knew it was famous and thought it had something to do about digging a well in Australia, with maybe some romance thrown in.  It turned out to be quite a ride, and on the whole, I enjoyed it-- but with a few caveats.  

Positives:

-- The main characters are all admirable, though toward the end I did find Jean almost annoyingly perfect.

-- The part of the book dealing with Jean's wartime experiences were gripping.  (However, at a certain point the repetition of the march became tedious, and I was ready for something different!)

-- The romance was sweet for a very brief while.  And then... Well, see the "Not Positives" list below. 

-- I actually found the story of the building of "a town like Alice" rather interesting, for a time.  I'm not sure it would be quite as easy as the book seems to suggest, but... Still interesting.  I like reading about people doing things, accomplishing things, building things.  

-- I enjoyed learning a little about the Australian outback, during this time period. 

Not Positives:

-- The format... It does lend the tale a sense of authenticity, but at the same time, it loses immediacy when one character's direct experience is filtered through another person's mind and voice.  Particularly as regards the romantic aspects of the book, this format was an odd choice. Did the author do this because he was better at writing in a more dry, factual tone than with the emotion that you might expect to find if it all came directly from Jean's perspective?  (Not that she seems very emotionally expressive, if it comes to that!)  

I don't know... I just didn't love Noel's contribution to the tale, if I'm honest.  It didn't appeal to me, at all, and I found it very odd and uncomfortable that he was writing about Jean's first romantic encounter with Joe.  What are we supposed to think?  Surely she didn't tell him all about that in such personal detail, so where did he get his information?  What are we meant to think?  Is he supposed to have just fantasized about it?  Gross!

-- I think it's probably a reflection of the times, with no ill will intended, but once Jean is in Australia, some of the references to the Aborigines are awkward, from a modern perspective.  

One instance that stands out in my mind is her reaction to a "sensitive, intelligent" white man who was married to a young Aboriginal woman who was "inarticulate" (which I took to mean that she stayed mostly silent in public) and always brought along a kitten or puppy on their visits to "town".  Does it not occur to Jean that this woman might behave differently in the privacy of her home?  Maybe she isn't comfortable speaking in this place where she may feel under the microscope.  And why bring up the pets at all?  Is it meant to indicate that she's very young/immature-- or that she's somehow mentally deficient or inferior, because she needs what we might today call an emotional support animal?  It left a bad taste in my mouth, honestly.  This woman hasn't done anything wrong, and Jean seems to be pitying the poor "sensitive, intelligent" man for having been driven by desperation to marry what Jean deems his inferior.  It's unpleasant.  

-- The bruises incident.  Yuck.  I don't get it.  Joe seems like a very nice man who wouldn't leave bruises on a woman.  And Jean, she's perfectly healthy, in her prime; she shouldn't bruise so easily.  How in the heck did she end up with so many bruises after a passionate make-out session?  What was Joe doing?  I don't believe that kind of bruising from a little "romance" is normal.  Even more disgusting is Jean's repeated flirtatious references to her bruises.  It reminded me of some stupid teenager bragging about a hickey and showing it off to her friends.  Gross, gross, gross!

-- The level of detail might lend a feeling of realism, but it can be overdone, and I think it was, in this case.  I don't actually need this much (boring, inconsequential) detail.  It made the book longer than it needed to be.  

Well, as I said, on the whole, I liked the book.  It won't be one I'll want to read again, most likely, but I might try to see a TV/movie adaptation, sometime.