Thursday, January 13, 2011

The DEAD PATH by Stephen M. Irwin ****

Very suspenseful novel. At first it seems a little like someone put a bunch of scenarios into a hat and pulled out: ghosts, spiders, witches, Pan, medieval sorcery and was dared into combining it into one novel. Ta-Dah!

There were scenes in the beginning (up to 25 pages of it) that were difficult to fathom where we are; in recovery? A plane? Is he a child, an adult? What? Too many transitions too short of time. Are we in the past, the present the future? He sees ghosts or doesn't? Lot of telling not showing until somewhere just left of the middle the story starts to have action and somewhat unfolds. How blades of grass become animated life forms tho - got no clue.

Why are spiders here? Who got them into this land of weirdness? Why are some giants? Why does he only "hallucinate" after some wild strawberries but then everyone else hallucinates spiders, witches, scary faces in the trees and not eating strawberries? How can there be woods no one can walk thru? K, I never saw woods that were so thick with trees you couldn't walk between them.

If you read this story to a child it would probably be very scary but for an adult it's a little outre. A child would be too scared to ask the whys.

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