Moon - James Herbert

I’ve got to be honest about this one and say its not one of my favourite James Herbert novels, this doesn’t mean it wont appeal to other James Herbert fans. That all depends on which elements of his work you prefer, myself I enjoy the more macabre elements or a really strong story line. Although this does have these to a certain degree it didn’t “scare” me or entertain me in the same way as some of his other pieces, ...
...it put you off.

Although the story itself is not too bad (more later) the “scary” bits in it didn’t really work for me and I found the ending a little bit of an anti climax

I am probably being a little hard on the book if truth be known because as far as horror stories go it is better than most other authors work and if it was the first Herbert book I’d read I would have more than likely enjoyed ... more

I’ve got to be honest about this one and say its not one of my favourite James Herbert novels, this doesn’t mean it wont appeal to other James Herbert fans. That all depends on which elements of his work you prefer, myself I enjoy the more macabre elements or a really strong story line. Although this does have these to a certain degree it didn’t “scare” me or entertain me in the same way as some of his other pieces, again though this is only my opinion so don’t let it put you off.

Although the story itself is not too bad (more later) the “scary” bits in it didn’t really work for me and I found the ending a little bit of an anti climax

I am probably being a little hard on the book if truth be known because as far as horror stories go it is better than most other authors work and if it was the first Herbert book I’d read I would have more than likely enjoyed it more. However, some of his other work leaves this one standing.

The story itself centres around one man – Johnathon Childes, who experienced vivid physiological links with a child murderer, he was himself responsible for identifying the murderer via a telepathic link and as such helped the police track him down. The ensuing effect in the form of negative publicity led him to flee to an island to escape the aftermath.

For a while he lived his life in peace on the island, working as and when he wanted in several schools and even finding a new love. However, things didn’t remain that way as he once again began to have “sightings”, after initially ignoring these it got to a stage where he couldn’t any longer and the story escalates from there.

As I say above the book does get moving a bit in the final stages, the most exciting bit being the fire in the school, even this though seems to be a bit of an anti climax as you get the feeling you know exactly how its going to turn out.

Even though I have not painted a very good picture of the book I wont spoil the ending for you just in case you do decide to read it, however, I will say that it is not as good an ending as it possibly could have been. The story itself maybe gave James Herbert an opportunity to produce a really thrilling final scene that might have rescued the book (if truth be known the only reason I finished reading it was because I was curious as to whether this was the case) , however, I finished reading it and felt a little cheated.

As I said earlier it didn’t grip me in the way other stories have and I found it quite easy to detach myself when it was time to put the book down. Others however have different opinions and some describe it as “un put downable”, as I said, we each have our own opinions.

Read it and see.
 

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