I'm
seriously impressed that we've been able to continue this
#3booksamonth challenge going since the spring of 2018 – but here
we are, and Happy New Year to everyone! My first book of December
seems so long ago it could've been months ago. It was Peter Straub's
brilliant and deeply insightful serial killer novel “Koko”, and
for those of you who think
you
may know Straub's name, I urge you to think about “The Talisman”,
his famous collaboration with Stephen King. But “Koko” is one of
the best horror novels I've read in a long, long time. It's a very
rich book for the horror genre, but the picture it ultimately paints
is vast as well as deep, weaving the mystery of the killer and those
who attempt to find him or her with or without the help of the
police, with the backdrop of the horrors of the Vietnam war, bot on
and off the battlefield. It's complex and brilliant. Following that,
I took a trip back to Dean Koontz land with his old
horror/sci-fi/suspense novel “Lightning”, which I found at a
Value Village while
searching for a different book entirely.
“Lightning” is exciting and satisfying, as with most of Koontz'
early genre works, it's entire out-of-reach in terms of identifiable
protagonists, but you do love his good guys, regardless, they're just
so perfectly perfect. Like how fudge is sweeteningly sweet. But,
hell, who doesn't like fudge, right? A novel like “Lightening” is
what happens when a movie like “The Terminator” inspires a
time-travel scenario in another creative writer.
The
third book (of four this month for me, all just barely squeezed in by
New Year's Day) is actually an amazing, inspiring self-help book
titled “You Are a Badass at Making Money”, which was recommended
to me by Nicki, who said, “You're almost there, sweetie, I think
you need to read this”. Whether you think you need to read
something like this or not, it is a good, inspiring read by an
inspired author. I closed the year out with the 1926 short novel
“Dream Story” (aka “Traumnovelle”) by author Arthur
Schnitzler, which was the basis for one of my go-to Christmas films,
Eyes
Wide Shut,
by Stanley Kubrick. In the closing credits of Eyes
Wide Shut it
states that Kubrick's film was “Inspired by” the book... No, it
was wholly based on Schnitzler's material, even using dialogue lifted
directly from the book for the film version. All books this month are
highly recommended (as usual).
--V.
