A Great Plot & Gripping Story

I’ve really enjoyed listening to this audiobook. It’s Graham Masterton at his best.

A clever plot with a few twists and turns. It has all the elements you expect from one of Grahams novels. So be prepared for blood and guts as well as his usual sexual references. If that’s not your thing then I’d steer clear as this audiobook has more than usual.

I also enjoyed the narrator. He did an excellent job of bringing all the characters to life.

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Very outdated

I have nothing negative to say about Russell Bentley's narration, and certainly I'm used to reading novels from a variety of eras. But for a book published in the early 80s, I was surprised by how casually placed, latent racism was woven into the telling of this story.

From the protagonist/hero, Ed, referring to his penchant for idyllic plantation living with 'darkies' (obviously black American *slaves*) as part of the backdrop, to the repeated references to 'black' looters, it seemed Masterton didn't want us to forget for a minute that he has no respect for black Americans and considers them second class citizens.

I've read loads of Stephen King novels from the 70s and 80s and never once have I read such biased references to people of colour from him... or anyone else for that matter. To make matters worse, Masterton isn't even American, so I'd at least expect him to have put in a bit of research to make sure the references he was making to a whole culture of people wouldn't be rife with unnecessary stereotyping. The story was ok, if not surely old fashioned otherwise, but Masterton's overt bias really took away from the story and made his protagonist a lot less relatable. What a shame.

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2 people found this helpful