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Title: The Hellbound Heart
Author: Clive Barker
Published: London: HarperVoyager, 2008 (1986)
Rating: 3 of 5
Page Count: 128
Total Page Count: 94,824
Text Number: 273
Read Because: interest in the premise and in giving Barker another chance after reading Books of Blood, purchased used at a local bookstore
Review: Bored by the meager offerings of human life, Frank turns to a puzzle box which, when opened, promises to deliver him to a new world of extraordinary sensation. And so it does—but rather than heaven, Frank discovers hell, and only the sacrifice of human blood can bring him back. This premise is an intriguing one, but the novella's actual plot is something of a bait and switch: rather than following Frank in his journey to the Cenobites's realm of extreme sadomasochistic sensation, the story sticks to our world, following Julia, Frank's sister-in-law, as she attempts to bring him back. The glimpses of the Cenobites are original, horrific, and fascinating, and that we only see glimpses preserves their mystery and awe, but it's still a disappointment that the bulk of the story stays in the banal, if evil, human world. The Cenobites beg further exploration, and such a short volume could support that exploration without rendering them mundane—it's a pity that Barker doesn't try.
That, however, is not the novella's real drawback. The fascination of the Cenobites counteracts the disappointment of their brief appearances, and so The Hellbound Heart remains compelling. The real drawback is the novella's painfully overwrought prose. To a certain extent, the intended lushness and copious hyperbole of the prose are at home here, given the extreme, otherworldy premise and the near-apocalyptic events of the conclusion—but the prose is so tortured, so unrepentantly purple, that it is often irritating and sometimes humorous. However well intended, for want of an editor the style simply cripples the text. Short and intriguing, The Hellbound Heart is worth picking up for two hours of interesting reading, but it fails to be the book that it could be. I recommend it only moderately.
Review posted here on Amazon.com.
To illustrate that tortured prose, I give you this spoiler-free, almost entirely unrelated, painfully representative excerpt:
Author: Clive Barker
Published: London: HarperVoyager, 2008 (1986)
Rating: 3 of 5
Page Count: 128
Total Page Count: 94,824
Text Number: 273
Read Because: interest in the premise and in giving Barker another chance after reading Books of Blood, purchased used at a local bookstore
Review: Bored by the meager offerings of human life, Frank turns to a puzzle box which, when opened, promises to deliver him to a new world of extraordinary sensation. And so it does—but rather than heaven, Frank discovers hell, and only the sacrifice of human blood can bring him back. This premise is an intriguing one, but the novella's actual plot is something of a bait and switch: rather than following Frank in his journey to the Cenobites's realm of extreme sadomasochistic sensation, the story sticks to our world, following Julia, Frank's sister-in-law, as she attempts to bring him back. The glimpses of the Cenobites are original, horrific, and fascinating, and that we only see glimpses preserves their mystery and awe, but it's still a disappointment that the bulk of the story stays in the banal, if evil, human world. The Cenobites beg further exploration, and such a short volume could support that exploration without rendering them mundane—it's a pity that Barker doesn't try.
That, however, is not the novella's real drawback. The fascination of the Cenobites counteracts the disappointment of their brief appearances, and so The Hellbound Heart remains compelling. The real drawback is the novella's painfully overwrought prose. To a certain extent, the intended lushness and copious hyperbole of the prose are at home here, given the extreme, otherworldy premise and the near-apocalyptic events of the conclusion—but the prose is so tortured, so unrepentantly purple, that it is often irritating and sometimes humorous. However well intended, for want of an editor the style simply cripples the text. Short and intriguing, The Hellbound Heart is worth picking up for two hours of interesting reading, but it fails to be the book that it could be. I recommend it only moderately.
Review posted here on Amazon.com.
To illustrate that tortured prose, I give you this spoiler-free, almost entirely unrelated, painfully representative excerpt:
The seasons long for each other, like men and women, in order that they may be cured of their excesses.
Spring, if it lingers more than a week beyond its span, starts to hunger for summer to end the days of perpetual promise. Summer in its turn soon begins to sweat for something to quench its heat, and the mellowist of autumns will tire of gentility at last, and ache for a quick sharp frost to kill its fruitfulness.
Even winter—the hardest season, the most implacable—dreams, as February creeps on, of the flame that will presently melt it away. Everything tires with time, and starts to seek some opposition, to save it from itself.
So August gave way to September and there were few complaints.
—The Hellbound Heart, Clive Barker, 25
