Discussion: Risen by Jan Strnad (spoilers)
 

ARE YOU SCARED???? Have you been converted? Do you know Seth?

Mooowhahaha.....

Discuss... now!

BOb

I thought this was supposed to start on the 20th, I'm not finished yet :eek:

I thought it was a very good read.

The only thing I was confused about was

Well... close enough... my calendar pinged me so I started it. It is actually the 20th in some time zones right now.

BOb

edbro... it was a bit strange. I think "Seth" was a bit maniacal and wanted to prove he could control people, especially women can they made things interesting. Although, as you notice... peg did not do the deed as she was told too.

I would have like to get a bit more background... who is Seth... how did he get this power, etc. I guess you are just supposed to assume he is some manifestation of "evil"?

I really enjoyed the book... it was good fun and well written... I didn't expect one of the "good guys" to die at the end... that was a bit strange.

BOb

I kind of skipped this month's book. I did pick up a copy, but things got busy and with the others I'm currently reading it just kept floating down my TBR list.

Mee too....again....:o

I didn't finish, I can't finish, I don't know what it is. I don't care about the characters, the way they kind of rise is cool, but there just doesn't seem to be any substance. It's one of the only books I've not been able to finish. I just can't stay awake while reading it. Maybe I'm reading it at the wrong time and will re-visit, I don't know. Maybe I'll just suck it up and read the last 140 pages. But 200 pages is a really long time for me to continue reading.

I did find the death by beetles/cockroaches cool, but thought that it was ill described, I like gory details in horror books I guess.

This book reminds me heavily of the Jonathan Mayberry series, Ghost Road Blues for whatever reason.

I enjoyed the book, thought it was perhaps a little long for too little substance.

Is Seth-worship meant to be a metaphor for religion, pointing out how mindless the followers are, how religion takes over their lives?

I was disappointed that the cliched ending of having the survivors be Peg, Brant, Tom and Annie didn't pan out - yes even though it's a cliche, it's satisfying. How did Cindy survive? She was just a minor player and doesn't fit the formula. I consider Brant's demise a cop out. The main guy should always survive. Or everyone perishes (that's a cop out too but not as much of one) I was so sure he was just pretending conversion so he could save Peg & Tom.

I think Tom & Cindy should have encased Grimm's remains in cement. With him coming to life, struggling, and drowning nightly, he probably won't decompose enough so that his torso will work loose, float to the surface, and resurrect. The chains may eventually rust out though, so in a year or two or ten he'll be alive again.

I read the book over 2 nights (working :D).. When I had finished, I had to go back to the beginning to read the ending.. :rofl:

I was a bit annoyed when the same scenes were described several times from different viewpoints..

Overall I thought it was a good story, but didn't frighten me, as I'd like horror novels to do.

Yes, that caught me by surprise too, and I read that part several times to be sure I had read it correctly.

It didn't frighten me either, not really, but the concept was chilling. It reminded me of Stephen King kind of stories-- they're not always truly frightening, but the concept behind it is.

Yep... but it has to be something that COULD happen... Or believably so... :blink:

Really... I haven't read 1 horror book where I thought it "could" happen. Then again, I don't believe in paranormal stuff exists while others do. But, I love reading about it... I'm a die hard X-Files fan.

BOb

I though it was a good book. Stephen King-ish. But I could have used some more description in certain parts. Maybe I missed it, but what kind of dog did the Kemplers have? I kept trying to picture it but had 1000 breeds running through my head.

I thought it was a very entertaining read. Thanks Jan!

I have a vague complaint that in the middle it bogged down a bit. There was section after the reader knows what's going on, and before things really get going. People are slowly being converted and there are fairly long descriptions of each conversion. I could have done with a few less of those.

Yes, it did... I nearly stopped reading... :D

I like the cement encasing idea!

I wonder if cremation would have been a permanent solution to the Seth problem.

Probably not - given the resurrection of the fiery crash victims (eg Galen). I was hoping for something simple, like the Wicked Witch of the West's water or Superman's Kryptonite.

Question:

In the previous version, Brant and Tom left the kid, Josh, tied up in the house when they steal the car to go rescue Peg. In the revision, I had Brant shoot the kid. Some people feel that killing any child in fiction is crossing a line that shouldn't be crossed. I thought that the killing spoke to Brant's state of mind.

Any thoughts on this?

Unfortunately I did not have time to participate in the group reading this month, so I can only give my opinion in general.

I think that in fiction there should be no lines which cannot be crossed.

Yes, I agree with this, especially since the whole book was about death/awakening...

A lot of other horror fiction have children die one way or another... sometimes gruesomely.. :eek:

The scene was shocking. I didn't think it crossed any uncrossable line, as this child was no longer a "human child" and the action was necessary and understandable.

If you were trying to show that Brant had gone over the edge then it was fine. However, I personally hope that, if the kid was subdued I would have never been able to shoot him... even knowing that he would die once Seth did.

BOb

Killing a child just just for shocking people is a weak thing to do.
But if it felt right when you write this scene, you shouldn't fear 'hurting' people feelings (IMHO).

It's an horror novel, not teletubbies after all ! :D

And the kid was already dead so ... :rifle:

I just finished it! I enjoyed it. As others have said it does have a Stephen King flair to it (Seth is kind of like Randall Flagg). I liked getting to know the characters in some depth because it made me care more about the outcome.

One thing I noticed was that this was a low tech book. Aside from Brant's laptop. There was no searching for "Eloise" online or trying to contact help by cell phone.

I was also of the same mind on cremating Seth. His ashes would then be placed in a very small urn which would then be encased on concrete and thrown into either a volcano or the ocean (whichever was handiest). ;)

Heck, George R R Martin had his Fevre Dream vampires kill and feed on a baby, so shooting a kid who was already dead seems tame in comparison, and I'm sure there's far worse out there. I think having him shoot the kid reflected Brant's state of mind at the time well.

I enjoyed the book, and found the inclusion of the shorts at the end of the book a nice little bonus.

There are a lot of well-worn tropes in this book, but I enjoyed it because the characters had just enough depth to keep it interesting. I also liked the puzzle - how do you defeat a god? He's underwater now, but where will he be in 100 years.

I also like stories that make me think about just how far I can push my own sense of morality. Could I kill my child to bring it back to life? Is it then, still my child? If not, can I kill it again?

The book isn't great literature, but it was a good entertainment.

I just found this thread. I was expecting it to be announced on the home page like the voting was.

At any rate, I thoroughly enjoyed Risen, and will be coming back for some more Strnad in the future. I especially enjoyed the short stories, which I read before reading the novel.

For anyone interested in seeing how Jan Strnad operates in another medium, may I recommend the graphic novel, The Sword of the Atom. It's published by DC, and can be ordered at Amazon. The story opens with Ray Palmer (the Atom) catching his wife in a compromising position with another man and ends in a South American rain forest where he has encountered a hidden society of six-inch tall humanoid descendants of aliens who crash landed on Earth in the distant past. Will he return to his wife, Jean, or will he find a new life and love among the aliens? It was a very enjoyable and suspenseful book.

No question; dump that cheating @#!$. Enjoy some good alien lovin'. Once you go alien you won't go back!

Sorry... I haven't been front paging the discussion threads... perhaps I should.

BOb

One thing that surprised me in the the final disposition of Brant Kettering. I was surprised to see a character that I deemed so central to the story end up like he did. I was hoping that he, Peg Culler, and Tom would come out at least physically unscathed, although with a crisis of that magnitude, I suppose such hopes were unrealistic.

I too was waiting for the thread and did not see it until now. The 'show all new posts' browser does not always pick up everything. I would definitely be in favour of announcements on the front page.

I think it was appropriate that Peg did not survive---she can join Annie in whatever afterlife---but I was very disappointed Brant did not. I know it's cliche, but he was the hero and I was disappointed with such a grim ending for him. Plus I thought Tom was kind of a brat, so if I had to choose among the two of them to be the sacrificial half of the hero duo, it would have been Tom. I think it would have been a cool ending too if Annie's illness had somehow deux ex'd her out of dying for good when Seth was killed and if she and Brant had been the lone survivors. If Peg had turned herself to save Annie and then died in the end, that would have been interesting.

I don't think there are lines that should not be crossed in fiction, but I see where you are coming from on that. I wrote a fanfic once where a main character describes a past event of a bad guy hurting his dog, and I got more feedback on that than anything else I had written for that story. People were very affected by dog :) Kids are like that for many people. My stepmom will not read stories involving child abuse.

I kind of expected Brant and Peg to come out at the end. I was anticipating that Tom would put him self between his sister and his mom when sis tried to "convert" mom. Of course the Epilog would be that Brant was found and killed by the mob after they caught up with him which would turn him into the next "seth" for a sequel.

BOb

Peg did survive....

Yes.. I recall...

I meant.. I expected Peg and Brant to survive it rather than Peg and Tom.

(why does peg always get to live though, I'm not sure. ;) )

BOb

Sorry, I should have made it more clear I was responding to ficbot, who was wondering why Peg did not survive. Can't see the quote button at work and am far too lazy to do it manually :p.

I was hoping they would all survive to become a family. I was rather dismayed at Brant's death. I was also hoping that Annie's coma would somehow thwart Seth's influence and she would awaken and be able to carry on with her young life. I really got caught up in these characters and wanted to see the best outcome for them. Although we never got the chance to really know Annie, I wanted to see her survive for her mother's sake.

@Quake - you could just do the twitteresque @ sign and name thing.

BOb

Yes, I know she did. I was saying that to me it would have been a better ending to get Annie instead of Peg.