Weapons was an interesting story. The premise behind it (a witch takes control of people and can use them as weapons) is interesting, but what I really enjoyed about the movie was the way the story unfolded and how the story was told. The story has a good mystery component and part of why it is mysterious is that only bits of are revealed as each main character’s story is told. Each primary character has their own chapter in the movie where the movie is shown from their point of view. More of the movie is revealed progressively from these different character perspectives.
In the movie, a classroom full of children disappear one day when they all leave their houses at the same exact time and all run in the same direction. It does get bit wonky here, because the police and FBI are too stupid to properly investigate this case whereas a parent seems to have no problem breaking down the investigation. Mostly this story is logical and doesn’t make me have to suspend disbelief too much. The conclusion is a bit brutal but also well done. With seemingly every major horror release being a sequel, it was nice get a novel movie that can stand on its own without being part of an existing series.
In the third Alex Verus novel, apprentices are going missing, and naturally Alex finds himself in the middle of the situation. He has a greater vested interest in the situation since he now formally has an apprentice in Luna. As usual, there are multiple layers to this story with various potential adversaries and good twists and turns along the way.
The writing in this novel is quite good. Benedict Jacka is a skilled writer who can weave together interesting stories that are fun to read. I would say this novel is not quite as compelling as the first two books in the series. The story itself that was a fun read but a notch below the other two novels I have read from Jacka. I do enjoy how Alex Verus uses his divination skills to his advantage to solve most of his problems. As far as magical abilities go, this is a pretty cool to one to have.
The ending was a little disappointing. It just didn’t seem to have the type of finality where antagonist is killed and protagonist can move on. It was more of a negotiated ending. So, it wasn’t the most satisfying of endings, but overall this was a good read that won’t disappoint readers of the series.
The Institute is a bit of a mixed bag. There was a lot that I liked in this novel, but there were some really serious negatives as well. In this stories, children who display telekinetic or telepathic abilities are kidnapped from their homes and transported to a remote location in Maine where they are first tested and given various stimulus and are later transferred to the “Back Half” portion of the facility, where the children collectively are being used to assassinate people.
I’ll start with the parts of this novel that I liked. The writing, of course, is very good. That’s always a given with Stephen King, as he is a master of his craft and I would expect no less of him. The characterization is also very good. Stephen King is not only a master at writing but his children characters are always so well developed and this novel is no exception. The characters are really strong.
Now to the bad. The logic behind this story is abysmal. Spoilers ahead so beware. So, I’m supposed to believe that an organization that is mostly staffed by ex-military and former law enforcement officials are willing to kill parents and kidnap children where they are used up and eventually die as well. And that they are willing to do this on some vague notion with absolutely no supporting evidence that what they are doing is saving the world. I’m also supposed to believe that this has been going on for roughly six decades and hundreds if not thousands of these children have been kidnapped and their parents murdered, and in all of those cases there was never a single competent detective or police force that couldn’t connect the dots that this was happening repeatedly all over the country and then trace it back to this institute. There are other preposterous leaps in logic and every time the author tried to explain this ridiculousness, he made it worse because it made no sense. Other than that, the novel drags a bit in the middle.
In the end, this was an entertaining novel with some significant holes. If I could give it three and a half stars, that’s how I would rate it. It’s worth reading.
I’ve had the pleasure of reading a number of Jeff Strand novels, and if you are anticipating the generally light-hearted humorous novels that you get out of Strand, Pressure is most certainly not that. This novel is dark. Really dark. Every time I would get to a scene thinking there would be some sort of not so bad outcome for the character, it turned out far worse for them than I would have anticipated. This book is a pretty rough read.
Having said all of that, I enjoyed reading it. Even when I would have liked it to be a bit more cheery and humorous, the novel delivered, just not how I thought it would. The story starts off with Alex Fletcher being sent to a boarding school where he meets Darren Rust, who is a budding psychopath. After an incident involving mutilating a fellow classmate’s dog, they part ways only to be reunited in college. Alex makes the worst possible decision of befriending Darren, which turns out to haunt him both in college and later in life as Darren is hell bent into turning Alex into a fellow psychopathic killer.
The writing is strong as is the characterization. Even after experiencing the worst possible outcomes in his life from his interaction with Darren, he still never succumbs into being what Darren is and shows strength and resiliency, even while still gaining the revenge that he seeks. So, although I would not put this at the top of the Jeff Strand heap of books, it was an enjoyable read that I would recommend.
When all you seem to get these days in terms of big releases that hit the theaters are sequels, prequels, or something that’s tied to an existing platform, it’s refreshing to watch an original movie. Sinners was definitely that. It was a movie that I had high expectations for based on what I had heard about the movie and the strong reviews, and the movie lived up to those expectations.
Set in the 1930’s in Mississippi, the Smoke Stack twins (both played by Michael B Jordan) go back to their homeland after having spent time working for Al Capone in Chicago with a good bit of cash in hand and the intention of creating a night club. They buy and convert an old saw mill, and on the first night are invaded by a trio of vampires who are enthralled by the music wizardry of their nephew, who was playing at the club. This starts a battle between the vampires and the people inside the club as they try to survive the night.
Sinners was a very entertaining movie. Not only was it not some sort of sequel, but it had originality. Besides the time and location setting, what made this movie was the way it incorporated music and dance into it, something you typically get in horror moview. Also what worked well was that the interaction with the vampires didn’t take place until the movie was more than halfway through. The first part of the movie was loaded with character development, so when it came to the time for fighting for their lives against these vampires, it made me care more about the characters. The action and the fighting was also top notch. About the only thing I didn’t care for came after the conclusion of the fighting with the vampire, when the movie went to a story line that had absolutely nothing to do with vampires. Without spoiling, it was gratuitous, over the top, and didn’t fit in with the rest of the movie. Otherwise this was a quality horror movie that I would recommend.
It’s been a few years since I read Fated, the first novel in Benedict Jacka’s Alex Verus series. I thoroughly enjoyed that book so I was eager to read his second novel in the series. It took me a bit of time to refamiliarize myself with the characters and the story world created, but Jacka does a great job of bringing readers up to speed like me who had taken some time off before reading the second novel or even for those who did not read the first book in the series. Even in that case, it wouldn’t be too hard to read this and pick up what was going on.
There are a few different storylines going on in this book, and they all converge, even though at the time I was reading them, it didn’t seem as if they would. First, was the discord between Alex and his apprentice, Luna, as they couldn’t seem to develop a good working relationship. The second being Luna’s sort of new boyfriend getting ahold of a Monkey’s Paw, despite Alex warning him against it. The third was an enchantress showing up at Verus’s store while being attacked by a golem, and Alex having to fight off the golem. The story lines converged on different groups of mages developing a method to extract magical abilities by draining them from magical creatures, something that Alex is desperate to stop, given his close relationships with some of these creatures.
