The Doll Who Ate His Mother

by Ramsey Campbell

Book Overview

No Synopsis Available.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0712611568
• ISBN13: 9780712611565
• Release Date: January 1976
• Publisher: Century Hutchinson Ltd
• Weight: 0.83 lbs.

Customer Reviews

Ice, Ice Baby!

The previous reader is correct - this novel is as cold as ice. This is one of the reasons why it works so beautifully as horror. I re-read this book shortly after reading Whitley Strieber's `The Hunger' and the comparison was stark. `The Hunger' was all over-heated prose, melodrama, tortuous explanations, and in your face - "Lookee here!". Strieber tried to get inside the head of all four main characters and, as a result, we didn't really get inside anyone at all. Campbell, on the other hand, knows that a whisper is much more sinister than a foghorn. His prose is more surgical and precise. He gives us just enough of what we need, and lets our imaginations do the rest. And he evokes Liverpool, in its shadowy "sodium glow", absolutely perfectly. Dark and creepy. Lovely!

One of his earlies and best.

I believe that this was Campbell's first novel, after writing short fiction. It's nothing short of masterful- he writes some of the dreamiest imagery you'll find anywhere, and coupled with his disconnected narration, makes for one hell of a read. Stephen King considers this along with Campbell's short story "The Companion," to be one of the greatest works in the horror genre. Speaking of King, the review mentioning icy prose and unsympathetic characterizations- both true- was lifted from King's "Danse Macabre," a series of essays on horror also well worth checking out.

Weird and Wonderful

Campbell's style is extremely strange; his prose is cool, almost icy, and his characterizations unsympathetic in the extreme. All this, however, makes this novel somehow more affecting and horrifying than a more dramatic approach would have. This grisly tale of an evil child (told with overtones of Satanism and Black Magic) set against the somewhat drab and mundane backround of modern Liverpool, sets your teeth on edge from the first page and holds you spellbound. The undramatic way Campbell handles his tabloid-style subject matter lends an extra chill to the book that engulfs the reader as well.

A fine tale of urban despair

Ramsey Campbell;s debut novel is perhaps one of the most important pieces of modern British horror. It's use of the urban landscape to explore fears of alienation,the supernatural and the evil of children has been unsurpassed in the field.