Five Star Science Fiction/Fantasy - Deep Blue

By David Niall Wilson

Book Overview

Brandt is a down-and-out guitarist and vocalist who believes his life has hit rock bottom. He can barely make the rent on his apartment, he drinks so much he can barely make it to the crappy gig that... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1594141428
• ISBN13: 9781594141423
• Release Date: May 2004
• Publisher: Five Star Trade
• Length: 325 Pages
• Weight: 1.20 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.5" x 1.3" x 6.0"

Customer Reviews

Hot Licks from One of the Best Writers of Modern Horror

I have long been a fan of Mr. Wilson's finely crafted works of fiction (This is my Blood, Dark Ages Clan Vampire novel Lasombra, and many more), and you will become a fan, too, when you read his latest, Deep Blue, a complex and lyrical blues riff about agony and spiritual redemption. When a soul-dead, burned-out blues guitarist/singer named Brandt encounters a homeless black man whose heart-wrenching harmonica music rises from the depths of true agony, he begs the old man to teach him how to play that way. The old man warns Brandt that it is the pain, not the technique, that produces the sound. Brandt insists upon taking the burden of the old man's pain into himself so that he can play the blues with the same aching quality, but soon discovers that his new gift is also a curse. Brandt's music becomes imbued with sad, otherworldly beauty, but he finds he must play and play and play, lest the burden of the pain he's invited into his soul overwhelm him. Brandt and his band embark upon a spiritual quest to keep the restless spirits that surround them at bay and to fight the demonic force that feeds and grows powerful upon the world's pain. This is an exquisite meditation upon the nature of pain and redemption written with a blues sensibility that rolls through the mind like bleak, resounding chords of dark music. The perfect novel for a hot, sultry night.

Spectacular

Brandt defines the down and out musician. When he's not soused in Jose Cuervo he plays rhythm guitar for an unremarkable band in a hole-in-the-wall bar. Until one night he hears a lone harmonica playing music so deep, so pure, so full of pain he wanders the empty streets driven by the desire to play it. One by one the music transforms the other members. They feel pain so sharp and piercing it could only be the pain of the entire world straining for release. The band sells all to follow Brandt and seek out that one song. The one song behind it all. The one perfect pattern that blends each piece in harmony. Deep Blue is that song. It lives in the words, bleeds off the page, and seeps into your being. Mood, story, emotion bound together and layered on top of rich, rhythmical cadences that thrust the reader forward in wave after unrelenting wave. Deep Blue left this reader with something to ponder. Deep Blue left this writer with something to aspire to. David Niall Wilson's Deep Blue is simply the best novel I've read this year.

Play away the pain

Brandt and the rest of the makeshift band he plays with on occasion have lost touch with their music. Brandt wears Harlequin make-up that separates him from the others and makes him look like "a dead clown," and lead guitarist Shaver "only [lives] for the solo." Their individual pain is so great, it gets in the way of making good music together. One night, Brandt, after getting so drunk he leaves his apartment keys behind, is drawn by the soulful sound of a harmonica into the presence of its source: an old black man named Wally with the secret to the basis of rock and roll: the blues. Brandt wants to learn to play like that, but the only way is to channel the pain of the world through his guitar. "No way outta the pain 'cept t'rough da music," Wally says. The catch is that he cannot choose when to play; he is at the mercy and whim of the world's pain. The next night, Brandt plays the concert of his life, going into a semi-trance and stunning his bandmates with his skill. Soon, similar events affect the other band members in ways they don't totally understand, but that manages to bring them back together to find a way to be a true band once again. That author David Niall Wilson (My Eyes Are Nailed, But Still I See) knows music inside and out is evident in Deep Blue. He knows the mathematics, the history, and the emotion. His story of a band that has lost its core is often disturbing, but always touching. The relationships that form the core of the band are dealt with deeply and admirably. Wilson obviously also knows a thing or two about band dynamics. I would have liked a little more consistency in transitions (it's impossible to predict whether a new chapter will change the point of view or continue the previous one), and sometimes it seems that the story itself doesn't quite know where it is headed, taking a good number of forked paths along the way (including a subplot that offers another perspective on the sineater), but everything eventually comes together again into a natural conclusion. In any case, the scenes with the music are what will keep you reading. Wilson paints liquid rainbows when he describes each band member's experience behind his or her newly-rediscovered instruments and skills, and if this were all that the book were about, it would be enough. But there's plenty more going on in Deep Blue to satisfy the author's fans (who are used to him not sticking to genre conventions) and to draw in plenty of new ones.

Wilson shines through Deep Blue

Deep Blue is one of those exceptional works of horror fiction that is able transcend genre. Rarely bloody but often unsettling, Wilson's language is poetic, his imagery surreal, and the overall impression is that the reader has stepped into a world that is similar--but not exactly the same--as the one we live in. One of the greatest strengths of the novel are Wilson's characters, each one unique, each with a secret that drives the plot home. Down and out guitarist Brandt is given center stage at the opening, but by the end of the book the drummer Dexter, with his ability to recognize patterns and shapes in the randomness of life, has become one of its most important players. Like the novelist himself pulling plot strings, Dexter is the one who pulls them together at the end, fitting the pieces into a whole that is much greater than the sum of its parts. Beginning in a city full of restless ghosts, ending in a rural backwoods setting complete with an electrifying mountain legend called the Sineater, Wilson's Deep Blue is a masterful work of fiction, and one of the most unique and thought-provoking novels you will read this year.

5 Stars for "DEEP BLUE"

In my opinion David Niall Wilson shines brightest when writing about hidden folkways and arcane religious images. In Deep Blue, Wilson creates imagery that is both original, and at the same time reminiscent of Manly Wade Wellman. Deep Blue contains passages that will take you, the reader, out of yourself and into a world you will be glad to return from in one piece. David Wilson weaves a tapestry of music, suspense, and horror that grips the reader and pulls them along for a great ride. This has been my favorite David N. Wilson work yet. This book is a must read for Wilson's established fan base, and a great first time read for those unfamiliar with his work. Bravo ! Mr. Wilson, Bravo !