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shadowlands

by Alan Steven Kessler

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215,214,938 (4)None
"This is a coming-of-age story about a young boy who endures abuse by creating a world of shadows where he can escape beatings and the dead. His journey is across a unique internal landscape where there is no borderland between sanity and madness, only a compelling, sometimes horrific blending of the two into a power strong enough to summon love and extract revenge. The novel is psychological horror. In the story the protagonist, Steve Goldblatt, asks that before judging evil we first live with those who made it and taste, as he did, what they put into their witches' brew. Haunting us from his past, Mr. Goldblatt is not someone the reader will easily forget."--Page 4 of cover.… (more)
Recently added byChaosCaitlin, TammyDewhirst
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If something is your every day from an early age, does it become normal? If abuse is a regular part of life, does it become affection? Certainly in the case of Steve Goldblatt, cruelty is love. There’s brilliance on the part of Kessler to make the story first person because had we had that omniscient view, the story would have just been too difficult to read. Reading the story from Steve’s point of view just softens the impact and cruelty of the story line. True tragedy comes in the realization that Steve is not anti-social and the cycle of “love” will continue.

Kessler’s writing style is very strong. He’s telling a story on which the main character reflects. Despite it’s 396 page length, “Shadowlands” is a fairly quick read thanks to the fluid nature of the writing. We go through key moments in Steve’s life and his impressions of his adults and contemporaries. He calls his twin sisters “things” through to their adulthood. There’s no distinction between the girls in Steve’s mind. No connection. They are his mother’s Greek Chorus. Most of Kessler’s characters are well fleshed out and all are a product of their environments. Tom, a key friend, dreams of great things and saving his mother from her poverty but when time unfolds life is a struggle and his wife is the second coming of his mother. Likely to suffer the same fate.

“Shadowlands” is a thought provoking work of speculative fiction. If psychological horror is what you like to read, you might like this novel. I gave this novel 4 stars because though its not what I might choose to read on my own it is a good example of the genre and quite well written. ( )
  TammyDewhirst | Oct 24, 2013 |
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"This is a coming-of-age story about a young boy who endures abuse by creating a world of shadows where he can escape beatings and the dead. His journey is across a unique internal landscape where there is no borderland between sanity and madness, only a compelling, sometimes horrific blending of the two into a power strong enough to summon love and extract revenge. The novel is psychological horror. In the story the protagonist, Steve Goldblatt, asks that before judging evil we first live with those who made it and taste, as he did, what they put into their witches' brew. Haunting us from his past, Mr. Goldblatt is not someone the reader will easily forget."--Page 4 of cover.

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