Currently reading
Horns
by Joe Hill
This is certainly an original concept and I found the progression of the story very interesting, although some of the twisted thoughts of the bad guy in the story started getting under my skin in the latter part. The writing is mostly good, but the author frequently does one thing that absolutely drives me buggy; writing in partial sentences after a comma. It's something I found more and more distracting as the story went on.
Examples:
"The sardine tin made a sharp metal cracking sound as he popped it open and the tom flitted back into the corn, was gone."
"They weren't farmers, weren't even inclined to garden."
Yeah, that drives me crazy.
Despite that, there was never any question that I would finish the story. I had to see what happened in the end! It was just too fascinating to see what would happen to Ig next as he went through his bizarre series of changes and discoveries of his new effect on people.
I thought the real killer was revealed a little early in the story, but as I neared the end I realized that a few surprises had been saved back and we had to know so that the full twisted mentality of the killer could be developed to full effect. Hill writes creepy very effectively indeed!
The end was just a little too surreal for me and sometimes I was confused from one reality to the other with frequent changes. Overall I think most of the loose ends were tied up, but I thought Hill/Ig was a little callous about hurting snakes!
I wish I could have loved it as much as several of my friends did, but the half sentences came too frequently for me to want to read this author again.
