Horns: 08/10/10

Ignatius Perrish went on a bender, did a whole bunch of bad things and woke in the morning with horns growing out of his head. To complicate matters his horns seem to bring out worst thoughts and impulses in people. That's the promising start of Horns by Joe Hill.

The first sixty five pages of the book are wonderful. They're full of people behaving terribly, Ig being horrified at his new power over people and his reluctance to give into his new potentially demonic powers.

Then just as things are gearing up, the mayhem stops for an extended, supper sappy flashback about how Ig and his girl friend met. Part of the premise of the book is that her death prompted Ig's downfall but the flashback completely killed the tone of the book. Before the flashback it had been a dark comedy. The flashback goes for pure schmaltz and I hated every last word of it.

I skipped to the end to see if ever got its opening grove back. The ending was so completely a field of what it could have been that I left the book unfinished.

Comments (4)

Comment #1: Wednesday, August, 11, 2010 at 17:42:37

Book Quoter

wow, I almost borrowed this book. thanks for the heads up!!

Comment #2: Friday, August 13, 2010 at 19:34:47

Pussreboots

I really want to like his books. They always start off with a great twisted sense of humor and then they go on a tangent and lose me.

Comment #3: Wednesday, August, 11, 2010 at 20:37:31

Jo

I also thought this book had a really strong start and a weak finish. I read it through to the end and was completely disappointed.

Comment #4: Friday, August 13, 2010 at 19:37:03

Pussreboots

I skipped to the end to read the last sixty or so pages. Then I went back and skipped around in the middle. I decided to move onto something else.