The Night Land Volume 2

The imagery and atmosphere of part I of this novel is a little difficult to get through at times due to the (apparently deliberate?) archaic wordiness, but worth the effort for the sheer imagination on display.
Part II of the novel is just the journey in reverse, all over again, in an incredibly repetitive way. It was unreadable - I skipped to the last chapter to see how it ended, then put it down.
I might reread Part I many times. Part II I will never touch again. Gods this was painful.

Is it science fiction? Is it fantasy? Is it romance? Is it written in a weird fake archaic English? Is it unreadable? It's all this and more...

Seriously, The Night Land is a marvelous but flawed apocalyptic novel, flawed through its over-reliance on repetitious and dated romantic sequences and its quasi-archaic language (you get used to it after awhile). It also will offend those who cannot put aside its treatment of women.

It is truly very weird and creepy in parts particularly during the "outward" half of the book (volume 1). It shows a unique perspective and and imagination on a post-apocalyptic world. The protagonist is engaging although tends to be repetitive.

It is a pioneer and points in a direction that the horror genre would go.

Text edited by Lin Carter