Deep in the Darkness
by Michael Laimo
List Price:
Our Price: $4.99
You Save: $2.00 (29%)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Buy Used: from $0.01 (click here)
Category: Book
See more book details and other editions
Book Summary Information
Author: Michael LaimoEdition: Mass Market Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2004-02
ISBN: 0843953144
Number of pages: 369
Publisher: Leisure Books
Book Reviews of Deep in the Darkness
Book Review: Waste of money, time and braincells
Summary: 1 Stars
This is the second time I am writing a review for this atrocity masquerading as a book; my first review seems to have magically disappeared.
I'm not going to rewrite everything again so I'll give you the basics. Deep in the Darkness is the perfect example of an astonishingly bad book.
1) It's badly written (all the characters sound exactly the same -to name just one of countless examples-). To give you an idea: the main character who is a doctor and his new neighbor out in the country have identical dialogue. And it's annoying dialogue at that. Who even says "the burbs" anymore instead of suburbs? Apparently in Laimo's world it's common for doctors and "farmers" alike. Example:
Farmer: "You from the burbs?"
Doctor: "Yeah I'm from the burbs."
Farmer: "I used to live in the burbs."
Doctor: "Oh yeah? Me too."
2)It's predictable (I knew everything that would happen long before it did -not to be confused with foreshadowing-). If you don't know what's going to happen in each scene as soon as it starts it's probably because you had a lobotomy and are unable to see past your nose. I mean seriously now . . . man hears strange noises at night; man investigates; man finds a dead animal locked from the inside in his shed; man leaves to get some tools and supplies to bury it; man comes back and . . .I'll give you three guesses to figure out what happens next. Ding ding you win if you said animal is mysteriously missing. If you didn't get it on the first try you should buy this book because you'll probably enjoy it. But don't be too surprised when you see that Chapter 2 comes after Chapter 1 (I know . . . who would have thought!?). Basically every time a scene started I knew exactly how it would progress and end and not once was I wrong.
3)It's comically cliched. Remember those old horror movies from the 1980s where the crazed serial killer chased down a big breasted naked woman? Remember how the killer had a car and she was on foot running down the middle of the road? Remember thinking "why does she keep running down the road when she could easily go left or right and escape?" All of his characters react by "running down the middle of the road" throughout the entire book. In fact the story depends on that level of character stupidity or else there would be no story.
4)It's unoriginal (you will immediately recognize 'The Blair Witch Project,' and 'Rosemary's Baby' gone wrong -he even plagiarized some elements from 'Fight Club.' In fact the entire story is one big unoriginal mess. If you have any experience with Horror novels you'll find yourself wondering if you're reading some piss-poor retelling of at least a dozen different books you've read before. Maybe Laimo thinks that because the books are older people have forgotten about them.
5)Laimo is not human. Ok, I'm not serious about that but this is what I mean: when an author wants to write about a topic he/she knows nothing about it's customary to do some research on the matter. But Laimo apparently needs to do research on human beings and their jobs just to get that right. The main character is a doctor who is so poorly written I wonder if Laimo has ever even met a doctor or seen one on television. His version of a doctor can't even clean a wound properly. At first I thought this was meant as a character insight (that he's an incompetent doctor) but later on you see that he's meant to be the opposite (in Laimo's mind his character is a pretty good doctor).
6)The writing . . . oh dear God the writing! I wish I hadn't destroyed my copy so I could give you a word-by-word example from the book. You wouldn't believe the nonsense. Instead I'll give you my own example to make my point. You know how writers often use metaphors and similes to get their point across? For example: the samurai's sword cut through his enemy like he was made of warm butter (I know, I know, too big of a cliche but you get the idea). In Laimo's mind his descriptions don't even have to make sense to exist. What would you think of a book that said "John heard his muffler sputter like a green rainbow filled with daisies. He looked at his truck like it was a frosted cupcake on top of a three-legged dog with bad breath. He kicked the tires which looked like a moth heading towards an open flame. The sound they made was like the sky was raining hair." All of that is absurd and yet that's the kind of stuff you will find in this book. It's laughable!
Finally, if you are wondering why then this book would make it as a finalist in the Bram Stoker awards the answer is simple. Those awards aren't always indicative of quality. It's like a presidential campaign: The more you put your name out there the more people will know you the more votes you will get. Michael Laimo simply advertised himself and the book on the Bram Stoker website nonstop and relentlessly. He made his book a 'household name' within that community and that carried this poor excuse for literature he wrote to the finals.
It's the first book (out of countless that I have read) that I felt a compulsive urge to destroy as soon as I was done with it (and I did). If ever the book burning clubs needed an example to further their belief that some books need to be burned, Michael Laimo wrote it.
Summary of Deep in the Darkness
Michael Cayle, PhD, moves his family into their new home in Ashborough, NH. But Ashbourough has a deep, dark secret . . . and it's living in the woods behind his home. "One of the best and most refreshing horror novels you're likely to read this year." --Gary A. BraunbeckHorror Books
Book Subjects
- Arts & Photography
- Biographies & Memoirs
- Business & Investing
- Children's Books
- Comics & Graphic Novels
- Computers & Internet
- Cooking, Food & Wine
- Entertainment
- Gay & Lesbian
- Health, Mind & Body
- History
- Home & Garden
- Horror
- Law
- Literature & Fiction
- Mystery & Thrillers
- Nonfiction
- Outdoors & Nature
- Parenting & Families
- Professional & Technical
- Reference
- Religion & Spirituality
- Romance
- Science
- Science Fiction & Fantasy
- Sports
- Teens
- Travel
Most talked about in Horror Books
Let the Right One In: A Novelby John Ajvide Lindqvist
St. Martin's Griffin; Published: 2008-10-28; Paperback; Book
Best price: $5.99
Price in other shops:
Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus: The 1818 Textby Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
University Of Chicago Press; Published: 1982-03-15; Paperback; Book
Best price: $11.00
Price in other shops:
Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (Oxford Bookworms S, Stage 4)by Robert Louis Stevenson
Oxford Univ Pr (Sd); Published: 1991-06; Paperback; Book
Best price: $2.79
Price in other shops:
The Oxford Book of Gothic Tales (Oxford Books of Prose)Oxford University Press, USA; Published: 2001-11-19; Paperback; Book
Best price: $50.00
The Waste Lands (The Dark Tower, Book 3)by Stephen King
Penguin Audio; Published: 2003-08-26; Audio CD; Book
Best price: $149.99
![Thinner [UNABRIDGED] Image](/images/Thinner-UNABRIDGED-0140862668-X.jpg){kind=small}
Thinner [UNABRIDGED]by Stephen King
Penguin Audio; Published: 1996-09-01; Audio Cassette; Book
Best price: $8.00
Price in other shops:
The Crow: Temple of Nightby S P. Somtow
Harper Paperbacks; Published: 1999-11-03; Paperback; Book
Best price: $4.99
Price in other shops:
Brains: A Zombie Memoirby Robin Becker
Eos; Published: 2010-05-25; Paperback; Book
Best price: $0.23
Price in other shops:
The Strain LP: Book One of The Strain Trilogyby Guillermo Del Toro, Chuck Hogan
HarperLuxe; Published: 2009-06-02; Paperback; Book
Best price: $14.45
Price in other shops:
Prince of Darknessby Barbara Michaels
HarperTorch; Published: 2005-04-26; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $3.58
Price in other shops:
Similar Books and other products
Redby Jack Ketchum
Leisure Books; Published: 2002-08; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $1.95
Price in other shops:
The Cellarby Richard Laymon
Leisure Books; Published: 2006-10; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $11.31
Within the Shadowsby Brandon Massey
Dafina; Published: 2007-01-01; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $19.94
A Gathering of Crowsby Brian Keene
Leisure Books; Published: 2010-08; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $1.99
Price in other shops:
The Pines (Leisure Fiction)by Robert Dunbar
Leisure Books; Published: 2008-11; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $1.99
Price in other shops:
Snowby Ronald Malfi
Leisure Books; Published: 2010-03; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $1.34
Price in other shops:
Atmosphereby Michael Laimo
Leisure Books; Published: 2002-09; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $1.07
Price in other shops:
Fires Rising (Leisure Fiction)by Michael Laimo
Leisure Books; Published: 2008-03; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $1.99
Price in other shops:
Nightmare Houseby Douglas Clegg
Leisure Books; Published: 2004-05; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $4.83
Price in other shops:
Dead Soulsby Michael Laimo
Dorchester Publishing Company; Published: 2007-02; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $1.39
Price in other shops: