iwebkvm.blogg.se

In the early 1990s, Kim Newman (writing as Jack Yeovil) wrote the four-novel "Demon Download cycle" set the the "Dark Futures" Universe.

The gritty, monstrous world and his surreal blend of pop culture references made literature really alive for me, and allowed fiction to be fun again as well as meaningful. Indeed, it was his writing in Krokodil Tears that inspired me to finish my first novel as a child, and its influences can still be seen in my first published novel, Troglodyte Rose. Kim Newman (AKA Jack Yeovil) has a wonderful way with words and has brilliantly imagined the setting he was instrumental in setting up. That said, the pace never lets up, and whilst I wanted more intimations of what the next instalment would reveal and I really craved the Dark Ones' appearance again, I would still recommend this novel. By the end of KT she has become something cold, determined and powerful, but the result in CT is a character who isn't ever really in jeopardy and whom we only empathise with because of the previous book. In this instalment, Krokodil too is a let-down. There was something appealing in Krokodil's struggle against forces much more powerful than her, and in her constant evolution.

The location and world of the novel is very interesting, but Presley serves as a less interesting protagonist than Krokodil, simply because he has less of a journey and the odds aren't quite so stacked against him. He teams up with Krokodil, from the previous novel, in a fight against the Josephites' machinations in the Deep South.

Presley ended up in the military and then as a bounty hunter, languishing in obscurity and dreaming of music again. Comeback Tour's premise is nice: that villain Nguyen Seth, in our timeline, used Presley as a sacrifice to the Dark Ones, but in this one, Presley broke free of his influence and as a result never had the same cultural impact in the West as he should have. Krokodil Tears was my introduction to the Dark Future series, and unfortunately none of the other instalments quite match up in terms of verve, character development or narrative thrust.