by Gashweir » Tue Mar 26, 2013 3:53 pm
To IanEye and all: the novel Shadowland, is the novel where the King of the Cats story that IanEye quotes comes from. It is also the "passable fairy tale originally invented for the entertainment of the author's son".
It is the hardback edition of Shadowland that has the glass owl on the cover that IanEye shows in his earlier post. I am not a horror fan in general, but Shadowland and Ghost Story are two of the scariest works of speculative fiction ever written, up there with the best of Lovecraft, Michael Shea, and Robert Chambers (author of The King in Yellow). To quote many other reviewers and fans, Peter Straub transcends the genre.
Have you ever been to his website? He has a section with reviews of his books that were written by a long time friend of his Putny Tyler Ridge, who almost nothing good to say about his books. Below are a few choice bits from Putney's review of Shadowland:
"Those who have attained even the faintest degree of prominence are forever in danger, as they increasingly surrender themselves to illusion, of wandering from those simple principles responsible for their initial success. Self-indulgence takes root, with fatal effect. My old chum Mr. Straub, a once-passable writer of limited but effective powers dwindled into a pathetic but virtuoso case of self-indulgence, has long been an extreme instance of this unhappy process, and the Fifteenth Anniversary edition of Shadowland offers his faithful friend a welcome opportunity to set things straight.
Let us be frank. My misguided former playmate... stuck to the basics in two books only, Julia and If You Could See Me Now. With Ghost Story, so wrongly praised, the rot set in. Shadowland shows him well on the way to the disasters he has since perpetrated... Where we expect a rousing story, we are baffled by the intrusions of a dozen internal narratives, a lamentable archness of style, above all a refusal to get to the point.
The reader of this laborious farrago may take comfort in my determination to return my foolish pal to first principles: begin at the beginning, end at the ending, and no nonsense in between. One night soon, as our wayward author interrupts the guzzling of yet another libation to reach for the peanuts on the bar, I intend to speak these words : tell your story and get out.
To my comments reproduced from the jacket copy of the Gauntlet Publications limited edition of Shadowland I wish only to add these few remarks. This may be the most self-indulgent work of fiction since Tristram Shandy, shamelessly stealing from John Fowles... rocketing backwards and forwards in time and so thoroughly muddling the distinction between what is real and what is not that lengthy passages mean nothing at all. A swamp, a noxious vapor, a will-o-the-wisp...It includes one passable fairy tale originally invented for the entertainment of the author's son. On the whole, the wise reader will avoid this book as if it were a contagious disease."
Very f-ing funny, even if you haven't read the book, and infinitely more amusing if you have
Thankfully Putney Tyson Ridge is not a real person, but he provides a valuable service nonetheless: a very opinionated character from whose perspective Peter Straub can review (read: eviscerate) his own work, and possibly a psychological outlet which helps him exorcise self-doubt about the quality of his work.
End of thread hijack, with apologies to all.