Chuckles Mini Reviews Catchup

I review everything I read, on my blog and on Goodreads. Most reviews are of a decent length but sometimes you don't have much to say about the book because of its length or you DNFed it or various other reasons. In cases like that it makes sense to write a few mini reviews in one post and clear them out your way! So lets catch up with some reviews from September and October!

1) Alan Clark-Diaries 1972-1982
INTO POLITICS begins in 1973 with Clark's selection as Tory candidate for Nancy Astor's old seat in Plymouth (rival candidates included future Conservative luminaries Michael Howard and Norman Fowler). Alan Clark describes his election to the Commons in the 1974 general election; his years as a backbencher coincide with Edward Heath as PM, his downfall and the arrival of Margaret Thatcher. This volume ends with the inside story of the Falklands War. In his private life Alan and his wife Jane and their two young sons take over Saltwood Castle, previously the home of his father Kenneth (Civilisation) Clark. His enthusiasms for the estate, skiing, fast cars and girls are never far away.  

People have raved about him being the greatest diary writer ever so I was expecting something really great from the diaries. I knew that there would be things about his personal life in them as it says that the diaries are published as they were and not heavily edited to take out anything embarrassing and contraversial. But I did expect him to talk more about the major political events that were going on. I found myself greatly disappointed. I know that we talk about ourselves in diaries but Alan takes this to a whole new level of self obsession. He goes on about all the women he is sleeping with, how upset his wife gets about it but it doesn't stop him, his fancy home and chalet in Switzerland, his cars, his gambling addiction, his debts, his kids, women he meets and tries to pull, and moaning on about every fatal illness he is sure he is suffering from (he is a confessed hypochondriac). In one year's entries he thinks he has latent salmonella, terminal blood poisoning, oncoming paralysis, malignant conditions-being his doctor was certainly a challenge. 

What bugged me most was that there was so little detail on his political career-we get him complaining about his career going nowhere, which is because he has a habit of insulting people and saying dumb shit including some shocking pro-Nazi stuff that offends people. His string of women also upsets people, gbearing in mind the different views on behaviour in this time period. He praises Hitler, agrees that the way forward is a genetic need for racial purity and supports Nazi ideals, which makes him vile in my book. His mentions about politics tends to be when he is talking about himself-ie his speaking out for the Falklands War is about how many TV appearances he notches up and how it can boost his career but nothing about the main events of the war or the soldiers who died. He was also going on about collusion between Britain and Argentina to allow the invasion which really annoyed me. He leaves out things like the leadership contest that sacks Ted Heath, details on General Election campaigns and most of the big political topics. These are personal diaries that hardly mention politics so I found them very dull to read and not what I expected them to be. I don't recommend them.

Read October 2019
1 star.  

2) Ezekiel Boone-The Hatching
Deep in the jungle of Peru, where so much remains unknown, a black, skittering mass devours an American tourist whole. Thousands of miles away, an FBI agent investigates a fatal plane crash in Minneapolis and makes a gruesome discovery. Unusual seismic patterns register in a Kanpur, India earthquake lab, confounding the scientists there. During the same week, the Chinese government “accidentally” drops a nuclear bomb in an isolated region of its own country. As these incidents begin to sweep the globe, a mysterious package from South America arrives at a Washington, D.C. laboratory. Something wants out.

The world is on the brink of an apocalyptic disaster. An ancient species, long dormant, is now very much awake.

I think most of my blogger friends loved this one so I went into it with pretty high hopes but I was really disappointed with it. Bookstooge wrote a review that put me on alert about the book so I decided to make it priority to get it out of the way and I'm glad I did. Firstly I didn't like any of the characters. None of them. I particularly disliked foul mouthed Mike who can't seem to get through a simple sentence without a multitude of swearing and he was a pretty poor cop too. He is mad at his ex wife and gets out of his car at the stakeout wearing badge and vest to talk to her on the phone in private, blowing the stakeout and getting his partner shot. Total Muppet. Melanie is a complete bitch who only seems to think about sex with her grad student. The President is banging her chief-of-staff behind the back of the husband she married to boost her career and seems bored by the job, the tour guide wants to cheat on his girlfriend because she might be cheating on him. These people are all complete morons who are running around like horny teenagers and I WANT the spiders to eat them all.

Oh yes the spiders! In amongst all the sex shennanigans we do get the odd appearance of the spiders. They eat the tour group and bring down a plane with the survivor on it. They seem to be a bit of an afterthought to the relationship and fertility issues that the characters were having and I got bored with that and the swearing. The author seemed to prefer the swearing than trying to write clever dialogue. I just got so bored with it.

Read October 2019
DNF 1 star.

3) Robert Boren-Horror Road
Written by the author of Bug Out!, this series starts where the Bug Out! series left off, at an isolated RV Park in Kansas. There is an evil presense at the RV Park. It has awakened due to the presence of powerful psychics Jake and Frankie, and now it threatens them with possession. Related paranormal activity begins at two other locations, resulting in gruesome deaths.

Jake and Frankie can see what is happening as the evil presence reveals itself to them. Can they stop it? Ghosts become more active as the spirit's plans take shape.

Jake and Frankie know that they must join forces with another group of psychics to battle the pure evil which is tormenting them, but they are over a thousand miles away. A powerful medium has awakened, ready to do battle, but so have new minions of the ancient evil. It's a race against time and space.

This literally starts where the original Bug Out series ends with the survivors going their own ways. It is assumed that you read that series first before starting this book and that you know the history of this RV park, the murders that took place, Frankie's psychic past and who the other characters are from the war. If you haven't read Bug Out you won't know any of this and the author doesn't really elaborate in detail so you might get a bit lost with the story and the layout of the RV park that is described. That is not a critical comment to the author as I did read Bug Out, I'm just pointing it out to other readers. Jake and Frankie have stayed at the park but with everyone gone they both become aware of an ancient spirit, the one that inspired the previous massacres and wants to encourage another one. Jake and Frankie discover that her old psychic friend and her new group are experiencing similar issues connected to a dead murderer and as the spirits get more aggressive they need to join forces to fight it. 
 
Firstly there is nothing at all wrong with this book. The author knows how to tell a story and how to make you care about the characters and it was great to see Jake and Frankie again. The issue I really had with it is the slow burn nature of the plot and the repetitive nature of the spirit. When we are with Frankie, she gets temporarily gets taken over, passes out, wakes up, wants sex and has amnesia. Rinse and Repeat. She and Jake seem to wander from the trailer to the barn to the kitchen to the clubhouse somewhat aimlessly, switching the TV on and off as they go but not really doing anything but talk about the latest incident which the reader has already witnessed when it happened. Their plot was a bit dull. Sandy and Herb go with their friends to an event/seance concerning a dead murderer. Despite getting annoyed with the skeptic on the panel I did find the whole murder background more interesting. I didn't care much for the teenagers in the wood side plot. Like I said it just didn't turn out to be my thing as I'm not a huge fan of ghosts and spirits and only tried it as it was a spin off from Bug Out. Those interested in the psychic side of ghosts will enjoy this much more.

Read October 2019
DNF 2 stars.