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Cabal
Cabal is the story of Boone, a tortured soul haunted by the conviction that he has committed atrocious crimes. In a necropolis in the wilds of Canada, he seeks refuge and finds the last great creatures of the world - the shape-shifters known as the Nightbreed. They are possessed of unearthly powers-and so is Boone. In the hunt for Boone, they too will be hunted. Now only the courage of this strange human can save them from extinction. And only the undying passion of a woman can save Boone from his own corrupting hell...
268 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1988
610 people are currently reading
16126 people want to read
About the author
Clive Barker
734 books14.9k followersClive Barker was born in Liverpool, England, the son of Joan Rubie (née Revill), a painter and school welfare officer, and Leonard Barker, a personnel director for an industrial relations firm. Educated at Dovedale Primary School and Quarry Bank High School, he studied English and Philosophy at Liverpool University and his picture now hangs in the entrance hallway to the Philosophy Department. It was in Liverpool in 1975 that he met his first partner, John Gregson, with whom he lived until 1986. Barker's second long-term relationship, with photographer David Armstrong, ended in 2009.
In 2003, Clive Barker received The Davidson/Valentini Award at the 15th GLAAD Media Awards. This award is presented "to an openly lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender individual who has made a significant difference in promoting equal rights for any of those communities". While Barker is critical of organized religion, he has stated that he is a believer in both God and the afterlife, and that the Bible influences his work.
Fans have noticed of late that Barker's voice has become gravelly and coarse. He says in a December 2008 online interview that this is due to polyps in his throat which were so severe that a doctor told him he was taking in ten percent of the air he was supposed to have been getting. He has had two surgeries to remove them and believes his resultant voice is an improvement over how it was prior to the surgeries. He said he did not have cancer and has given up cigars. On August 27, 2010, Barker underwent surgery yet again to remove new polyp growths from his throat. In early February 2012 Barker fell into a coma after a dentist visit led to blood poisoning. Barker remained in a coma for eleven days but eventually came out of it. Fans were notified on his Twitter page about some of the experience and that Barker was recovering after the ordeal, but left with many strange visions.
Barker is one of the leading authors of contemporary horror/fantasy, writing in the horror genre early in his career, mostly in the form of short stories (collected in Books of Blood 1 – 6), and the Faustian novel The Damnation Game (1985). Later he moved towards modern-day fantasy and urban fantasy with horror elements in Weaveworld (1987), The Great and Secret Show (1989), the world-spanning Imajica (1991) and Sacrament (1996), bringing in the deeper, richer concepts of reality, the nature of the mind and dreams, and the power of words and memories.
Barker has a keen interest in movie production, although his films have received mixed receptions. He wrote the screenplays for Underworld (aka Transmutations – 1985) and Rawhead Rex (1986), both directed by George Pavlou. Displeased by how his material was handled, he moved to directing with Hellraiser (1987), based on his novella The Hellbound Heart. His early movies, the shorts The Forbidden and Salome, are experimental art movies with surrealist elements, which have been re-released together to moderate critical acclaim. After his film Nightbreed (Cabal), which was widely considered to be a flop, Barker returned to write and direct Lord of Illusions. Barker was an executive producer of the film Gods and Monsters, which received major critical acclaim.
Barker is a prolific visual artist working in a variety of media, often illustrating his own books. His paintings have been seen first on the covers of his official fan club magazine, Dread, published by Fantaco in the early Nineties, as well on the covers of the collections of his plays, Incarnations (1995) and Forms of Heaven (1996), as well as on the second printing of the original UK publications of his Books of Blood series.
A longtime comics fan, Barker achieved his dream of publishing his own superhero books when Marvel Comics launched the Razorline imprint in 1993. Based on detailed premises, titles and lead characters he created specifically for this, the four interrelated titles — set outside the Marvel universe — were Ectokid,
In 2003, Clive Barker received The Davidson/Valentini Award at the 15th GLAAD Media Awards. This award is presented "to an openly lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender individual who has made a significant difference in promoting equal rights for any of those communities". While Barker is critical of organized religion, he has stated that he is a believer in both God and the afterlife, and that the Bible influences his work.
Fans have noticed of late that Barker's voice has become gravelly and coarse. He says in a December 2008 online interview that this is due to polyps in his throat which were so severe that a doctor told him he was taking in ten percent of the air he was supposed to have been getting. He has had two surgeries to remove them and believes his resultant voice is an improvement over how it was prior to the surgeries. He said he did not have cancer and has given up cigars. On August 27, 2010, Barker underwent surgery yet again to remove new polyp growths from his throat. In early February 2012 Barker fell into a coma after a dentist visit led to blood poisoning. Barker remained in a coma for eleven days but eventually came out of it. Fans were notified on his Twitter page about some of the experience and that Barker was recovering after the ordeal, but left with many strange visions.
Barker is one of the leading authors of contemporary horror/fantasy, writing in the horror genre early in his career, mostly in the form of short stories (collected in Books of Blood 1 – 6), and the Faustian novel The Damnation Game (1985). Later he moved towards modern-day fantasy and urban fantasy with horror elements in Weaveworld (1987), The Great and Secret Show (1989), the world-spanning Imajica (1991) and Sacrament (1996), bringing in the deeper, richer concepts of reality, the nature of the mind and dreams, and the power of words and memories.
Barker has a keen interest in movie production, although his films have received mixed receptions. He wrote the screenplays for Underworld (aka Transmutations – 1985) and Rawhead Rex (1986), both directed by George Pavlou. Displeased by how his material was handled, he moved to directing with Hellraiser (1987), based on his novella The Hellbound Heart. His early movies, the shorts The Forbidden and Salome, are experimental art movies with surrealist elements, which have been re-released together to moderate critical acclaim. After his film Nightbreed (Cabal), which was widely considered to be a flop, Barker returned to write and direct Lord of Illusions. Barker was an executive producer of the film Gods and Monsters, which received major critical acclaim.
Barker is a prolific visual artist working in a variety of media, often illustrating his own books. His paintings have been seen first on the covers of his official fan club magazine, Dread, published by Fantaco in the early Nineties, as well on the covers of the collections of his plays, Incarnations (1995) and Forms of Heaven (1996), as well as on the second printing of the original UK publications of his Books of Blood series.
A longtime comics fan, Barker achieved his dream of publishing his own superhero books when Marvel Comics launched the Razorline imprint in 1993. Based on detailed premises, titles and lead characters he created specifically for this, the four interrelated titles — set outside the Marvel universe — were Ectokid,
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 966 reviews
February 27, 2018
"When the sun goes out and there's only night, we'll live on the earth. It'll be ours."
After being convinced by his psychiatrist that he is responsible for a whole host of murders, Boone flees to the semi-fantastical Midian, a crypt inhabited by shape-shifting monsters who call themselves the Nightbreed.
I only needed to read the first couple of paragraphs of Cabal to be reminded why I have fallen for Barker's works - his writing is simply incredible. His ability to present horror and gore in such a beautiful way is a unique skill. With Cabal, I was hooked from the very beginning, although there was a bit of a lull in the middle, but thankfully it picked up again to give us a really exciting finale.
In terms of the plot of Cabal, it's a good one - the Nightbreed are a community of peaceful "monsters" who have moved to Midian as a consequence of the fear they instilled in those who didn't understand what they were. A group of people or "monsters" who are persecuted for their unconventional lifestyle. It becomes even more poignant when the humans in the story turn out to be more evil and destructive than the actual monsters themselves.
My only real negative about Cabal is that I would have liked more backstory about the Nightbreed - we only really get a taster, and while it certainly whets the appetite, I just want to know MORE. The monsters that we do get to know are intriguing and colourful, and I wish this was a world that Barker delved into more - as far as I'm aware, there is no further expansion of this world. OH and how could I almost forget about Barker's tendency to write incredibly detailed sex scenes! I was reading one particular scene while on a plane and I was pretty much trying to read it with the book closed as I had a fear of the stranger beside me glancing over to read some bookish porn. AWKWARD. Thanks, Clive! :D
Overall, Cabal is a really solid book, a nice blend of horror and fantasy with a pinch of romance thrown in. Thoroughly enjoyable and now I look forward to watching the movie as I LOVE Craig Sheffer in One Tree Hill!! This one gets 4 stars.
After being convinced by his psychiatrist that he is responsible for a whole host of murders, Boone flees to the semi-fantastical Midian, a crypt inhabited by shape-shifting monsters who call themselves the Nightbreed.
I only needed to read the first couple of paragraphs of Cabal to be reminded why I have fallen for Barker's works - his writing is simply incredible. His ability to present horror and gore in such a beautiful way is a unique skill. With Cabal, I was hooked from the very beginning, although there was a bit of a lull in the middle, but thankfully it picked up again to give us a really exciting finale.
In terms of the plot of Cabal, it's a good one - the Nightbreed are a community of peaceful "monsters" who have moved to Midian as a consequence of the fear they instilled in those who didn't understand what they were. A group of people or "monsters" who are persecuted for their unconventional lifestyle. It becomes even more poignant when the humans in the story turn out to be more evil and destructive than the actual monsters themselves.
My only real negative about Cabal is that I would have liked more backstory about the Nightbreed - we only really get a taster, and while it certainly whets the appetite, I just want to know MORE. The monsters that we do get to know are intriguing and colourful, and I wish this was a world that Barker delved into more - as far as I'm aware, there is no further expansion of this world. OH and how could I almost forget about Barker's tendency to write incredibly detailed sex scenes! I was reading one particular scene while on a plane and I was pretty much trying to read it with the book closed as I had a fear of the stranger beside me glancing over to read some bookish porn. AWKWARD. Thanks, Clive! :D
Overall, Cabal is a really solid book, a nice blend of horror and fantasy with a pinch of romance thrown in. Thoroughly enjoyable and now I look forward to watching the movie as I LOVE Craig Sheffer in One Tree Hill!! This one gets 4 stars.
April 8, 2020
”They were with him still, perfectly remembered. Eleven rooms and eleven bodies, fixed in his mind’s eye. The wall Decker had taken five years to build had been brought down in as many minutes, and by its architect. Boone was at the mercy of his madness again. He heard it whine in his head, coming from eleven slit windpipes, from eleven punctured bellies. Breath and bowel gas, singing the old mad songs.”
Aaron Boone has been under the care of the psychologist Philip Decker for years. The goal is to curb the impulses he seems to have to kill people, but Decker drops a bombshell on Boone that the therapy hasn’t been working at all and eleven families have been viciously murdered. The killer seems to despise...breeders.
Boone realizes that he has to take extreme measures to stop himself. His girlfriend Lori, who is frankly the beyond perfect girlfriend, wants to be with him no matter what. Serial killer, dead or undead, or whatever, she wants nothing more than to spend the rest of her life with him.
This is one of those books that is almost impossible to discuss without spoiling the plot, but I will say that Boone ends up in a bizarre cemetery in the middle of nowhere called Midian, and the cemetery is populated in underground caverns by creatures called the Nightbreed. ”They didn’t belong to hell, nor yet to heaven. They were what the species he’d once belonged to could not bear to be. The un-people, the anti-tribe, humanity’s sack unpicked and sewn together again with the moon inside.” Clive Barker has always had a gift for creating and describing bizarre, heinous creatures that have created millions of shivers down the backs of his readers. I am no exception. The plot of this novella is tight, without a single paragraph that doesn’t contribute to advancing the plot. The characters are deftly drawn, and he even forces the reader to accept that these unsettlingly ugly creatures, the Nightbreed, are not rabid killers, but actually refugees in search of a place to live peacefully.
Boone soons finds himself standing between the Nightbreed and an army of redneck cops. Is that Decker I see in the background...still stirring the pot?
Clive Barker directed the 1990 film version named Nightbreed, which is actually a better title for the novel than Cabal. The movie has become a cult classic, and it is certainly worth seeing Barker’s cinematic vision of his book. As a big bonus, David Cronenberg plays the role of Dr. Philip Decker. He has played several small roles in several of his own movies and had a role in the movie Into the Night, a movie that several directors were asked to play small parts, but this is the first time that Cronenberg takes a major role in a movie. A little trivia for your next Hollywood cocktail party.
The other four short stories collected with Cabal are also really good, and each is very different from the others.
The Life of Death
A young woman becomes obsessed with the opening of a previously buried mausoleum and meets a strange man who has the same obsession. ”’You should laugh,’ he told her. ‘It suits you.’ Then added, ‘You have beautiful teeth.’” America is the land of beautiful teeth. In fact, you would be hard pressed to find a set of teeth that doesn’t look the same as every other set of teeth. We’ve made teeth boring, but for a guy overly interested in graves and skeletons...maybe complimenting your teeth is decidedly weird, even if it is meant as a major compliment from a man used to looking at teeth in their final repose.
How Spoilers Bleed
”The Jungle concealed murder so easily; it almost seemed, in its cryptic fashion, to condone the crime.” A group of European investors has bought some jungle acreage and wishes to develop it for profit, but a small band of natives stand in their way and refuse to leave. Greed, mayhem, and native curses simmer into a stew of trouble that will leave everyone scrambling to survive.
Twilight at the Towers
”The men who stared through at him had the faces of fools. Slack, and stupefied with shock---seeing the way he was wrought. Seeing the snout of him, the hair of him, the golden eye and the yellow tooth of him. Their horror elated him.” Desperate Cold War experiments have gone horribly wrong. A man named Ballard has to figure out what is going on and who he is in the process of finding out the truth.
The Last Illusion
When The Great Pretender, an illusionist named Swann is impaled, Harry D'Amour, a detective of strange and unusual occurrences, is called in to sit with the corpse. Normally, he would be asked to investigate, but in this case, he gets more than he bargained for, just sitting. ”Even as his feet left the ground, that ground faded to nothing, and for a terrifying moment he hung over the Gulfs, his hands seeking the lip of the casket. His right hand caught hold of one of the handles, and closed thankfully around it. His arm was almost jerked from its socket as it took his body weight, but he flung his other arm up and found the casket edge. Using it as purchase, he hauled himself up like a half-drowned sailor. It was a strange lifeboat, but then this was a strange sea. Infinitely deep, infinitely terrible.” And this is not the strangest thing that is going to happen to D’Amour as he tries to figure out exactly what forces are at work.
This is a very satisfying collection that kept me riveted as I enjoyed strolling, for a few hours, through the dark nightmares that plague Barker’s mind.
If you wish to see more of my most recent book and movie reviews, visit http://www.jeffreykeeten.com
I also have a Facebook blogger page at:https://www.facebook.com/JeffreyKeeten and an Instagram account https://www.instagram.com/jeffreykeeten/
Aaron Boone has been under the care of the psychologist Philip Decker for years. The goal is to curb the impulses he seems to have to kill people, but Decker drops a bombshell on Boone that the therapy hasn’t been working at all and eleven families have been viciously murdered. The killer seems to despise...breeders.
Boone realizes that he has to take extreme measures to stop himself. His girlfriend Lori, who is frankly the beyond perfect girlfriend, wants to be with him no matter what. Serial killer, dead or undead, or whatever, she wants nothing more than to spend the rest of her life with him.
This is one of those books that is almost impossible to discuss without spoiling the plot, but I will say that Boone ends up in a bizarre cemetery in the middle of nowhere called Midian, and the cemetery is populated in underground caverns by creatures called the Nightbreed. ”They didn’t belong to hell, nor yet to heaven. They were what the species he’d once belonged to could not bear to be. The un-people, the anti-tribe, humanity’s sack unpicked and sewn together again with the moon inside.” Clive Barker has always had a gift for creating and describing bizarre, heinous creatures that have created millions of shivers down the backs of his readers. I am no exception. The plot of this novella is tight, without a single paragraph that doesn’t contribute to advancing the plot. The characters are deftly drawn, and he even forces the reader to accept that these unsettlingly ugly creatures, the Nightbreed, are not rabid killers, but actually refugees in search of a place to live peacefully.
Boone soons finds himself standing between the Nightbreed and an army of redneck cops. Is that Decker I see in the background...still stirring the pot?
Clive Barker directed the 1990 film version named Nightbreed, which is actually a better title for the novel than Cabal. The movie has become a cult classic, and it is certainly worth seeing Barker’s cinematic vision of his book. As a big bonus, David Cronenberg plays the role of Dr. Philip Decker. He has played several small roles in several of his own movies and had a role in the movie Into the Night, a movie that several directors were asked to play small parts, but this is the first time that Cronenberg takes a major role in a movie. A little trivia for your next Hollywood cocktail party.
The other four short stories collected with Cabal are also really good, and each is very different from the others.
The Life of Death
A young woman becomes obsessed with the opening of a previously buried mausoleum and meets a strange man who has the same obsession. ”’You should laugh,’ he told her. ‘It suits you.’ Then added, ‘You have beautiful teeth.’” America is the land of beautiful teeth. In fact, you would be hard pressed to find a set of teeth that doesn’t look the same as every other set of teeth. We’ve made teeth boring, but for a guy overly interested in graves and skeletons...maybe complimenting your teeth is decidedly weird, even if it is meant as a major compliment from a man used to looking at teeth in their final repose.
How Spoilers Bleed
”The Jungle concealed murder so easily; it almost seemed, in its cryptic fashion, to condone the crime.” A group of European investors has bought some jungle acreage and wishes to develop it for profit, but a small band of natives stand in their way and refuse to leave. Greed, mayhem, and native curses simmer into a stew of trouble that will leave everyone scrambling to survive.
Twilight at the Towers
”The men who stared through at him had the faces of fools. Slack, and stupefied with shock---seeing the way he was wrought. Seeing the snout of him, the hair of him, the golden eye and the yellow tooth of him. Their horror elated him.” Desperate Cold War experiments have gone horribly wrong. A man named Ballard has to figure out what is going on and who he is in the process of finding out the truth.
The Last Illusion
When The Great Pretender, an illusionist named Swann is impaled, Harry D'Amour, a detective of strange and unusual occurrences, is called in to sit with the corpse. Normally, he would be asked to investigate, but in this case, he gets more than he bargained for, just sitting. ”Even as his feet left the ground, that ground faded to nothing, and for a terrifying moment he hung over the Gulfs, his hands seeking the lip of the casket. His right hand caught hold of one of the handles, and closed thankfully around it. His arm was almost jerked from its socket as it took his body weight, but he flung his other arm up and found the casket edge. Using it as purchase, he hauled himself up like a half-drowned sailor. It was a strange lifeboat, but then this was a strange sea. Infinitely deep, infinitely terrible.” And this is not the strangest thing that is going to happen to D’Amour as he tries to figure out exactly what forces are at work.
This is a very satisfying collection that kept me riveted as I enjoyed strolling, for a few hours, through the dark nightmares that plague Barker’s mind.
If you wish to see more of my most recent book and movie reviews, visit http://www.jeffreykeeten.com
I also have a Facebook blogger page at:https://www.facebook.com/JeffreyKeeten and an Instagram account https://www.instagram.com/jeffreykeeten/
March 9, 2021
4.5*
"Era inútil esperar otra cosa, inútil esperar que de algún modo, el mundo te deparase algo bueno. Cualquier cosa de valor, cualquier cosa a la que te aferrases por tu salud, se consumiría o te sería arrebatada a largo plazo, y el abismo se abriría tras de ti"
Aaron Boone es una persona perturbada y confundida, y a su vez vulnerable y manipulable. Esta bajo tratamiento psiquiátrico para afrontar sus problemas. Pero su psiquiatra, Decker ,no solo no tiene intenciones de ayudarlo, si no que jugara con su mente y su cordura.
Boone, atormentado, decide escaparse. Escucho hablar de una ciudad oculta "Midian" y allí se dirige. Esta ciudad,resulta ser un santuario en las catacumbas, donde habitan ocultos seres de apariencia monstruosa. Estos seres podrían tener mas en común con el de lo que supondría. Porque en definitiva los verdaderos monstruos habitan en la superficie, tienen apariencia "normal"(dicotomía recurrente en la obra de Barker), e irán detrás de el y de la única persona que realmente lo ama y lucha por el, su novia Lori.
Parecería ser el típico camino del héroe/elegido, pero definitivamente no lo es. Tiene varios matices y contrastes por fuera de los arquetipos . Tiene una balance perfecto entre fantasía y thriller con tintes terroríficos. Con una atmósfera lúgubre y gótica que lo recubre .
Creo que el mayor poder de la obra radica en el retorcido antagonista con su respectivo Alter ego. En la mitología que logra alrededor de Midian y sus habitantes.
La lucha personal que lleva Boone contra la locura y la depresión. Y posteriormente su búsqueda de identidad. Y a su vez el camino propio de Lorie. Su lucha totalmente incondicional y a cualquier precio.
“Nada es justo, excepto lo que sientes y conoces”
*tiene su adaptación fílmica"NIGHTBREED"(1990). Guionada y dirigida por Barker.
De la cual es aconsejable ver la versión extendida .
y que cuenta con la curiosa actuación de David Cronemberg(conocido por su labor como director en películas como "La Mosca")
"Era inútil esperar otra cosa, inútil esperar que de algún modo, el mundo te deparase algo bueno. Cualquier cosa de valor, cualquier cosa a la que te aferrases por tu salud, se consumiría o te sería arrebatada a largo plazo, y el abismo se abriría tras de ti"
Aaron Boone es una persona perturbada y confundida, y a su vez vulnerable y manipulable. Esta bajo tratamiento psiquiátrico para afrontar sus problemas. Pero su psiquiatra, Decker ,no solo no tiene intenciones de ayudarlo, si no que jugara con su mente y su cordura.
Boone, atormentado, decide escaparse. Escucho hablar de una ciudad oculta "Midian" y allí se dirige. Esta ciudad,resulta ser un santuario en las catacumbas, donde habitan ocultos seres de apariencia monstruosa. Estos seres podrían tener mas en común con el de lo que supondría. Porque en definitiva los verdaderos monstruos habitan en la superficie, tienen apariencia "normal"(dicotomía recurrente en la obra de Barker), e irán detrás de el y de la única persona que realmente lo ama y lucha por el, su novia Lori.
Parecería ser el típico camino del héroe/elegido, pero definitivamente no lo es. Tiene varios matices y contrastes por fuera de los arquetipos . Tiene una balance perfecto entre fantasía y thriller con tintes terroríficos. Con una atmósfera lúgubre y gótica que lo recubre .
Creo que el mayor poder de la obra radica en el retorcido antagonista con su respectivo Alter ego. En la mitología que logra alrededor de Midian y sus habitantes.
La lucha personal que lleva Boone contra la locura y la depresión. Y posteriormente su búsqueda de identidad. Y a su vez el camino propio de Lorie. Su lucha totalmente incondicional y a cualquier precio.
“Nada es justo, excepto lo que sientes y conoces”
*tiene su adaptación fílmica"NIGHTBREED"(1990). Guionada y dirigida por Barker.
De la cual es aconsejable ver la versión extendida .
y que cuenta con la curiosa actuación de David Cronemberg(conocido por su labor como director en películas como "La Mosca")
April 3, 2020
I'm abandoning the much cherished dark fantasy novel Cabal by Clive Barker at the 118 page mark. My father was a big fan of Barker's in the '80s; I remember him mentioning Books of Blood which as a 14-year-old Texas boy, sounded like something I'd like. I'm not above giving this novel another try when the events outside my window aren't scarier than the ones a horror novelist conjured, but this was one of those books I started rewriting in my head while reading it: terrific theme and some solid prose undone by feeble characters, inane plotting and storytelling that never took off for me.
Published in 1988, I'll offer that thirty years of psycho killer movies and television haven't made Barker's premise fresh. Aaron Boone, a young psychiatric patient, is convinced by his trusted psychiatrist Dr. Decker that he's responsible for a series of grisly murders around Calgary. Boone attempts suicide but only ends up in the psych ward with a nutter who mentions a fabled land called Midian that Boone has often heard whispered among the desperate and down and out. Escaping the pokey, Boone wanders interior Canada until he stumbles onto Midian, where he's attacked and bitten by a strange creature.
Before he can enter Midian, Boone is found by Dr. Decker, who reveals that he is the psycho killer Button Face and has set Boone up. The cops then proceed to shoot the boy to death. The story picks up with Boone's gal with a heart of gold, Lori, who does not receive well the news that her lover's body has up and disappeared from the morgue. She goes on a field trip to Boone's last stand, followed by Decker, who wants to find Boone before he can reveal the doc's secret. They discover that Boone lives and has been adopted by the Nightbreed, a cabal of monsters, society's rejects, who live under a rural cemetery.
It's plain to see why the novel is popular among horror fans. The freaks are the good guys, while the institutions are the bad guys. I love Barker's fantasy names: Midian, Nightbreed. But I felt like I was reading a rough draft. The characters have no depth and are incredibly bland. I never cared about Boone or Lori. The ease with which Decker convinces Boone that he's a psycho killer and Boone locates Midian are ridiculous. There was too much routine Psycho Killer stuff (Barker may not have read them, but Thomas Harris' Hannibal Lecter books predate this novel) in the first 100 pages and barely any Midian. Moving on.
Barker wrote and directed a cursed film version titled Nightbreed in 1990 that producers hacked into a roughly 100 minute B-movie from Barker's two and a half hour rough cut (a Director's Cut running 120 minutes arrived on Blu Ray in 2014). I saw it when it came out and haven't bothered with any version again. While as different as Bela Lugosi's Dracula and Christopher Lee's Dracula, another fantasy film from 1990 called Edward Scissorhands made a greater impression on me. I appreciate the Tim Burton film for its imagination, humor, weirdness, cohesion and A-movie cast. Danny Elfman composed the music for both.
Published in 1988, I'll offer that thirty years of psycho killer movies and television haven't made Barker's premise fresh. Aaron Boone, a young psychiatric patient, is convinced by his trusted psychiatrist Dr. Decker that he's responsible for a series of grisly murders around Calgary. Boone attempts suicide but only ends up in the psych ward with a nutter who mentions a fabled land called Midian that Boone has often heard whispered among the desperate and down and out. Escaping the pokey, Boone wanders interior Canada until he stumbles onto Midian, where he's attacked and bitten by a strange creature.
Before he can enter Midian, Boone is found by Dr. Decker, who reveals that he is the psycho killer Button Face and has set Boone up. The cops then proceed to shoot the boy to death. The story picks up with Boone's gal with a heart of gold, Lori, who does not receive well the news that her lover's body has up and disappeared from the morgue. She goes on a field trip to Boone's last stand, followed by Decker, who wants to find Boone before he can reveal the doc's secret. They discover that Boone lives and has been adopted by the Nightbreed, a cabal of monsters, society's rejects, who live under a rural cemetery.
It's plain to see why the novel is popular among horror fans. The freaks are the good guys, while the institutions are the bad guys. I love Barker's fantasy names: Midian, Nightbreed. But I felt like I was reading a rough draft. The characters have no depth and are incredibly bland. I never cared about Boone or Lori. The ease with which Decker convinces Boone that he's a psycho killer and Boone locates Midian are ridiculous. There was too much routine Psycho Killer stuff (Barker may not have read them, but Thomas Harris' Hannibal Lecter books predate this novel) in the first 100 pages and barely any Midian. Moving on.
Barker wrote and directed a cursed film version titled Nightbreed in 1990 that producers hacked into a roughly 100 minute B-movie from Barker's two and a half hour rough cut (a Director's Cut running 120 minutes arrived on Blu Ray in 2014). I saw it when it came out and haven't bothered with any version again. While as different as Bela Lugosi's Dracula and Christopher Lee's Dracula, another fantasy film from 1990 called Edward Scissorhands made a greater impression on me. I appreciate the Tim Burton film for its imagination, humor, weirdness, cohesion and A-movie cast. Danny Elfman composed the music for both.
September 6, 2022
¡Qué historia tan espeluznante y entretenida! Clive nunca defrauda 😉
.
What a creepy and entertaining story! Clive never disappoints 😉
.
What a creepy and entertaining story! Clive never disappoints 😉
June 26, 2018
“Midian. He’d heard the name of that place spoken maybe half a dozen times by people he’d met on the way through, usually those whose strength was all burned up. When they called on Midian it was as a place of refuge; a place to be carried away to. And more: a place where whatever sins they’d committed– real or imagined– would be forgiven them.”
Cabal is the story of a town called Midian and its monstrous residents, the Nightbreed. It is a story of humanity vs monsters, nothing unusual in that until it becomes evident that the humans are more monstrous than the monsters. Cabal was adapted into a movie called Nightbreed released in 1990, and directed by the author, Clive Barker himself. It is something of a cult classic among horror aficionados.
Boone is a psychologically disturbed man who is being treated by Dr. Decker, his psychiatrist. Unbeknown to poor Boone, his shrink is a mentally deranged serial killer, and very clever one. In order to retain his liberty, Dr. Decker uses his sessions with Boone to gradually, through psychological manipulation, convince the latter that the violent murders were committed by Boone under some kind of fugue state episodes.
Dr. Decker (as portrayed by the great David Cronenberg*).
Boone is half convinced that he is the serial killer and goes to Midian, a place he has heard about, where the likes of him may find the truth about themselves and their place in the world. There he is bitten by a Nightbreed, a supernatural creature and infected. Dr. Decker follows him to Midian and shoots him full of holes “in self-defense”. This is the beginning of Boone’s second life.
Click image to embiggen.
Cabal is a clearly a horror novel but it has an epic dark fantasy styling with a lot of world building and a cool mythology. On a thematic level, it is a story of a people persecuted for their unconventional way of life. However, the Nightbreed are not cuddly gentle people, many of them look horrifying and they eat human flesh when they can get it (but the narrative does not depict them hunting human beings for food). Dr. Decker, on the other hand, is shown to be much more destructive, cruel and evil than any Nightbreed creature.
The appalling side of humanity is not limited to the psychopathic doctor, Eigerman, the police chief of Shere Neck, Midian’s neighboring town, is another shameful specimen of humanity. Eigerman is only interested in fame and fortune, if it takes the genocide of a town full of strange beings, whose only crime is their weirdness, that is fine by him. The novel is full of colorful, strange and vivid characters, it is also very well written by the genre’s standard, with Barker’s trademark “arty” surrealistic touches cropping up from time to time. While it is very violent and graphic at times, it is also quite romantic at heart; with an ending that is tragic but ultimately hopeful. In spite of the short length (around 300 pages) the world of Cabal has a lot of potential for further stories. Unfortunately the movie Nightbreed was not commercially successful and Barker never returned to the book’s universe and mythology. If you are interested to read horror with a dark fantasy aesthetic, some depth and world building, then don’t miss Cabal.
* David Cronenberg is better known as a director of brilliantly bizarre horror films earlier in his career, later on he branched out into more mainstream movies like Eastern Promises.
Update June, 26, 2018: Clive Barker Is Rebooting ‘Nightbreed’ For Syfy.
Quotes:
“Of all the rash and midnight promises made in the name of love none, Boone now knew, was more certain to be broken than: ‘I’ll never leave you’. What time didn’t steal from under your nose, circumstance did. It was useless to hope otherwise; useless to dream that the world somehow meant you good.”
“A woman, sprawled on a sofa, her upper body and her lower twisted in a fashion life would have forbidden. Though she was presumably not a relation of the first victim the butcher had created a vile resemblance. Here was the same liplessness, the same eyelessness. Born from different parents, they were siblings in death, destroyed by the same hand. And am I their father? ”
‘Where d’you hear about Midian?’ ‘Same place you did,’ Boone said. ‘Same place anyone hears. From others. People in pain.’
“Every moment she wasted saying No to what she knew, was a moment lost to comprehension. That her world-view couldn’t contain such a mystery without shattering was its liability, and a problem for another day.”
“For Eigerman bright ideas and excretion were inextricably linked; he did all his best thinking with his trousers around his ankles.”
Cabal is the story of a town called Midian and its monstrous residents, the Nightbreed. It is a story of humanity vs monsters, nothing unusual in that until it becomes evident that the humans are more monstrous than the monsters. Cabal was adapted into a movie called Nightbreed released in 1990, and directed by the author, Clive Barker himself. It is something of a cult classic among horror aficionados.
Boone is a psychologically disturbed man who is being treated by Dr. Decker, his psychiatrist. Unbeknown to poor Boone, his shrink is a mentally deranged serial killer, and very clever one. In order to retain his liberty, Dr. Decker uses his sessions with Boone to gradually, through psychological manipulation, convince the latter that the violent murders were committed by Boone under some kind of fugue state episodes.
Dr. Decker (as portrayed by the great David Cronenberg*).
Boone is half convinced that he is the serial killer and goes to Midian, a place he has heard about, where the likes of him may find the truth about themselves and their place in the world. There he is bitten by a Nightbreed, a supernatural creature and infected. Dr. Decker follows him to Midian and shoots him full of holes “in self-defense”. This is the beginning of Boone’s second life.
Click image to embiggen.
Cabal is a clearly a horror novel but it has an epic dark fantasy styling with a lot of world building and a cool mythology. On a thematic level, it is a story of a people persecuted for their unconventional way of life. However, the Nightbreed are not cuddly gentle people, many of them look horrifying and they eat human flesh when they can get it (but the narrative does not depict them hunting human beings for food). Dr. Decker, on the other hand, is shown to be much more destructive, cruel and evil than any Nightbreed creature.
The appalling side of humanity is not limited to the psychopathic doctor, Eigerman, the police chief of Shere Neck, Midian’s neighboring town, is another shameful specimen of humanity. Eigerman is only interested in fame and fortune, if it takes the genocide of a town full of strange beings, whose only crime is their weirdness, that is fine by him. The novel is full of colorful, strange and vivid characters, it is also very well written by the genre’s standard, with Barker’s trademark “arty” surrealistic touches cropping up from time to time. While it is very violent and graphic at times, it is also quite romantic at heart; with an ending that is tragic but ultimately hopeful. In spite of the short length (around 300 pages) the world of Cabal has a lot of potential for further stories. Unfortunately the movie Nightbreed was not commercially successful and Barker never returned to the book’s universe and mythology. If you are interested to read horror with a dark fantasy aesthetic, some depth and world building, then don’t miss Cabal.
* David Cronenberg is better known as a director of brilliantly bizarre horror films earlier in his career, later on he branched out into more mainstream movies like Eastern Promises.
Update June, 26, 2018: Clive Barker Is Rebooting ‘Nightbreed’ For Syfy.
Quotes:
“Of all the rash and midnight promises made in the name of love none, Boone now knew, was more certain to be broken than: ‘I’ll never leave you’. What time didn’t steal from under your nose, circumstance did. It was useless to hope otherwise; useless to dream that the world somehow meant you good.”
“A woman, sprawled on a sofa, her upper body and her lower twisted in a fashion life would have forbidden. Though she was presumably not a relation of the first victim the butcher had created a vile resemblance. Here was the same liplessness, the same eyelessness. Born from different parents, they were siblings in death, destroyed by the same hand. And am I their father? ”
‘Where d’you hear about Midian?’ ‘Same place you did,’ Boone said. ‘Same place anyone hears. From others. People in pain.’
“Every moment she wasted saying No to what she knew, was a moment lost to comprehension. That her world-view couldn’t contain such a mystery without shattering was its liability, and a problem for another day.”
“For Eigerman bright ideas and excretion were inextricably linked; he did all his best thinking with his trousers around his ankles.”
December 28, 2015
I listened to the audio of Cabal by Clive Barker which comes in at fifteen minutes shy of seven hours and follows the disturbed protagonist Aaron Boone. Boone is a troubled man and is manipulated by his psychiatrist into thinking he's a serial killer. This modern day witch doctor, Decker, doesn't want to kill him with drugs he wants Boone to be his scapegoat.
Through rumour and heresy he finds himself heading for the fabled Midian, where monsters take refugee, hot on his heels is his jilted girlfriend and Decker, with his Button Face killer mask and persona close at hand. Boone thinks himself a monster, he seeks them and when he arrives in Median, he's bitten by a true monster of the Nightbreed and this is where the story gets interesting.
Horrifically imaginative, you occasionally see echoes of Clive Barkers intense and vivid imagery in modern fiction, I could name several pieces I've read in the last couple of years influenced by ideas in Cabal. The concept of Midian is fascinating, as is the Nightbreed but unfortunately detail was scant, just enough to whet the appetite, there was an almost purposeful lack of history or exploration of the place and the monsters contained within. Which in my view could have been easily fitted in, half a page here, half a page there, perfection could have been that bit closer with more thought on the world building.
Deckers Button Face mask was something I wasn't really a hundred percent certain with, a human monster with all the other things running round, was it needed? Could we have got away with just a normal knife welding psychopath, I think in the end it worked and usually I like the old killer mask philosophy. So yeah I enjoyed Cabal , some brilliant ideas, fluid writing and thoughtful prose, just needed more. Good stuff all told.
Also posted at http://paulnelson.booklikes.com/post/...
Through rumour and heresy he finds himself heading for the fabled Midian, where monsters take refugee, hot on his heels is his jilted girlfriend and Decker, with his Button Face killer mask and persona close at hand. Boone thinks himself a monster, he seeks them and when he arrives in Median, he's bitten by a true monster of the Nightbreed and this is where the story gets interesting.
Horrifically imaginative, you occasionally see echoes of Clive Barkers intense and vivid imagery in modern fiction, I could name several pieces I've read in the last couple of years influenced by ideas in Cabal. The concept of Midian is fascinating, as is the Nightbreed but unfortunately detail was scant, just enough to whet the appetite, there was an almost purposeful lack of history or exploration of the place and the monsters contained within. Which in my view could have been easily fitted in, half a page here, half a page there, perfection could have been that bit closer with more thought on the world building.
Deckers Button Face mask was something I wasn't really a hundred percent certain with, a human monster with all the other things running round, was it needed? Could we have got away with just a normal knife welding psychopath, I think in the end it worked and usually I like the old killer mask philosophy. So yeah I enjoyed Cabal , some brilliant ideas, fluid writing and thoughtful prose, just needed more. Good stuff all told.
Also posted at http://paulnelson.booklikes.com/post/...
Read
October 21, 2022Source of book: Bought by me
Relevant disclaimers: None
Please note: This review may not be reproduced or quoted, in whole or in part, without explicit consent from the author.
And remember: I am not here to judge your drag, I mean your book. Books are art and art is subjective. These are just my personal thoughts. They are not meant to be taken as broader commentary on the general quality of the work. Believe me, I have not enjoyed many an excellent book, and my individual lack of enjoyment has not made any of those books less excellent or (more relevantly) less successful.
Further disclaimer: Readers, please stop accusing me of trying to take down “my competition” because I wrote a review you didn’t like. This is complete nonsense. Firstly, writing isn’t a competitive sport. Secondly, I only publish reviews of books in the subgenre where I’m best known (queer romcom) if they’re glowing. And finally: taking time out of my life to read an entire book, then write a detailed review about it that some people on GR will look at would be a profoundly inefficient and ineffective way to damage the careers of other authors. If you can’t credit me with simply being a person who loves books and likes talking about them, at least credit me with enough common sense to be a better villain.
*******************************************
Now this is more like it. I’d say Cabal is slightly closer in genre to dark, very dark, fantasy than horror. But it also has some fairly intense horror moments so who knows? Does it even matter? As a fantasy novel, however, especially since a lot of Barker’s other works of fantasy are absolute doorstoppers, it’s intriguingly slight. I normally end up feeling quite ambiguous about novellas and short stories, trying to figure out to what extent they actually needed to be longer or whether I just felt that way because I greedily always want more of things I like. With Cabal, though, I think its length is almost perfect. There’s enough here to sustain a longer story, certainly, but that just creates an impression of depth—like there’s layers to the world you only partially get to see—and I found the breakneck pacing pretty exhilarating.
Also, readers of my previous Barker reviews will surely be pleased to learn there are no boastful plums or fur divides herein. Cabal is very much a “call a genital a genital” book, which I appreciated.
Anyway, the book opens with the protagonist Boone, a deeply unhappy man suffering from an undisclosed mental illness, in the process of being convinced by his therapist—a slick fellow called Decker—that he’s murdered eleven people in a fugue state. Having cut off contact with his lover, Loris, Boone initially intends to turn himself in, but a suicide attempt gone awry leads him to hospital instead, where he counters an equally unwell man called Narcisse who reminds of a place called Midian, where those who do not belong—who are not quite human—are rumoured to find sanctuary. Boone turns up at Midian, gets bitten by a monster, then killed by the police, who are working under Decker’s auspices, and finally arises as one of the Nightbreed: one of the flesh-devour, sunlight-avoidant denizens Midian was originally established to shelter. And that’s only the first fifty pages. From here, we get Boone’s lover, Lori, searching from him in Midian, despite the news of his death, the not-really-revelation that Decker was the serial killer all along, a prophecy of destruction and rebirth from the agonised pieces of god suspended in flame, and the routing of the Nightbreed by the local police force.
It’s … it’s a lot. But in a good way that, to me, never felt too much. The characters felt slightly more dimensioned after The Hellbound Heart, although to be fair it’s a longer and more sophisticated book. While Lori, like Julia and Kirsty before his, is mostly motivated by what’s going on with her man, she gets a lot more agency within that narrative arc—particularly as she somewhat fills a reader-substitute type role, firstly trying to figure out what’s happening and then trying to figure out how she feels about it all. Boone, by contrast, is a little bit of a damaged blank but seeing him through Lori’s eyes makes him perhaps more intriguing than he might otherwise want:
I mean, hashtag relatable, amirite. (No, seriously, wanting people to belong to me in all their beauty and wretchedness is a big mood for me). Although I will just add that Boone slightly suffers from what is an on-going issue with male Barker protagonists, which is that they end up on this path of chosen oneness almost entirely centred around the fact that they fucked everything up in the first place (I’m looking at you Gentle). But the flipside of this is that Barker’s work has a kind of inherent instability to it that I’ve always appreciated. One of the things that can frustrate me about fantasy as a genre is a tendency towards setting up great changes to the world state and those changes never really coming or, if they do, circling us back to the status quo. At least with Barker, he’s never afraid to rip things apart and break them down: in fact, the inevitable of change, destructive or otherwise, is kind of one of his major themes.
Speaking of change, at the heart of Cabal lies conflict between modes of horror. The Nightbreed hark back to the monsters of Victorian gothic, defined as much by their outcast status as their monstrousness. Decker, by contrast, is a thoroughly twentieth century creation: a serial killer who poses as a psychiatrist and covers his own weakness with a mask. And then there is the local police force who Decker, attempting to cover his own crimes, incites against the Nightbreed. There is an inescapable (and deliberate) banality to the antagonists: Decker is a generic psychopath and the police chief is an unimaginative bigot. By contrast the Nightbreed are frightening and fascinating, each a unique individual (for all that we do not meet many and the ones we do are mere glimpses). Though I should add that Barker is careful to avoid a straightforward oppressed versus the oppressors narrative, and—while I think the Nightbreed appeal to the alienated and the othered parts of us—they are not offered as stand-ins for marginalised people. While none of them kill on page except for survival, they do eat the meat of humans.
In any case, this has been my favourite so far of my Barker re-visitings. With its sweeping story, its exploration of monstrousness and otherness, its embrace of both cynicism and beauty, its genre-slipperiness, encompassing as it does aspects of the gothic, fantasy, horror and romance, I can very much see why it meant so much to teenage me. And, given present day me was made from teenage me, why it continues to mean something to me now.
Relevant disclaimers: None
Please note: This review may not be reproduced or quoted, in whole or in part, without explicit consent from the author.
And remember: I am not here to judge your drag, I mean your book. Books are art and art is subjective. These are just my personal thoughts. They are not meant to be taken as broader commentary on the general quality of the work. Believe me, I have not enjoyed many an excellent book, and my individual lack of enjoyment has not made any of those books less excellent or (more relevantly) less successful.
Further disclaimer: Readers, please stop accusing me of trying to take down “my competition” because I wrote a review you didn’t like. This is complete nonsense. Firstly, writing isn’t a competitive sport. Secondly, I only publish reviews of books in the subgenre where I’m best known (queer romcom) if they’re glowing. And finally: taking time out of my life to read an entire book, then write a detailed review about it that some people on GR will look at would be a profoundly inefficient and ineffective way to damage the careers of other authors. If you can’t credit me with simply being a person who loves books and likes talking about them, at least credit me with enough common sense to be a better villain.
*******************************************
Now this is more like it. I’d say Cabal is slightly closer in genre to dark, very dark, fantasy than horror. But it also has some fairly intense horror moments so who knows? Does it even matter? As a fantasy novel, however, especially since a lot of Barker’s other works of fantasy are absolute doorstoppers, it’s intriguingly slight. I normally end up feeling quite ambiguous about novellas and short stories, trying to figure out to what extent they actually needed to be longer or whether I just felt that way because I greedily always want more of things I like. With Cabal, though, I think its length is almost perfect. There’s enough here to sustain a longer story, certainly, but that just creates an impression of depth—like there’s layers to the world you only partially get to see—and I found the breakneck pacing pretty exhilarating.
Also, readers of my previous Barker reviews will surely be pleased to learn there are no boastful plums or fur divides herein. Cabal is very much a “call a genital a genital” book, which I appreciated.
Anyway, the book opens with the protagonist Boone, a deeply unhappy man suffering from an undisclosed mental illness, in the process of being convinced by his therapist—a slick fellow called Decker—that he’s murdered eleven people in a fugue state. Having cut off contact with his lover, Loris, Boone initially intends to turn himself in, but a suicide attempt gone awry leads him to hospital instead, where he counters an equally unwell man called Narcisse who reminds of a place called Midian, where those who do not belong—who are not quite human—are rumoured to find sanctuary. Boone turns up at Midian, gets bitten by a monster, then killed by the police, who are working under Decker’s auspices, and finally arises as one of the Nightbreed: one of the flesh-devour, sunlight-avoidant denizens Midian was originally established to shelter. And that’s only the first fifty pages. From here, we get Boone’s lover, Lori, searching from him in Midian, despite the news of his death, the not-really-revelation that Decker was the serial killer all along, a prophecy of destruction and rebirth from the agonised pieces of god suspended in flame, and the routing of the Nightbreed by the local police force.
It’s … it’s a lot. But in a good way that, to me, never felt too much. The characters felt slightly more dimensioned after The Hellbound Heart, although to be fair it’s a longer and more sophisticated book. While Lori, like Julia and Kirsty before his, is mostly motivated by what’s going on with her man, she gets a lot more agency within that narrative arc—particularly as she somewhat fills a reader-substitute type role, firstly trying to figure out what’s happening and then trying to figure out how she feels about it all. Boone, by contrast, is a little bit of a damaged blank but seeing him through Lori’s eyes makes him perhaps more intriguing than he might otherwise want:
She dreamt of him often though, scenarios that were unequivocally sexual. No symbolism here. Just she and Boone in bare rooms, fucking. Sometimes there were people beating on the doors to get in and see, but they never did. He belonged to her completely, in all his beauty and his wretchedness
I mean, hashtag relatable, amirite. (No, seriously, wanting people to belong to me in all their beauty and wretchedness is a big mood for me). Although I will just add that Boone slightly suffers from what is an on-going issue with male Barker protagonists, which is that they end up on this path of chosen oneness almost entirely centred around the fact that they fucked everything up in the first place (I’m looking at you Gentle). But the flipside of this is that Barker’s work has a kind of inherent instability to it that I’ve always appreciated. One of the things that can frustrate me about fantasy as a genre is a tendency towards setting up great changes to the world state and those changes never really coming or, if they do, circling us back to the status quo. At least with Barker, he’s never afraid to rip things apart and break them down: in fact, the inevitable of change, destructive or otherwise, is kind of one of his major themes.
Speaking of change, at the heart of Cabal lies conflict between modes of horror. The Nightbreed hark back to the monsters of Victorian gothic, defined as much by their outcast status as their monstrousness. Decker, by contrast, is a thoroughly twentieth century creation: a serial killer who poses as a psychiatrist and covers his own weakness with a mask. And then there is the local police force who Decker, attempting to cover his own crimes, incites against the Nightbreed. There is an inescapable (and deliberate) banality to the antagonists: Decker is a generic psychopath and the police chief is an unimaginative bigot. By contrast the Nightbreed are frightening and fascinating, each a unique individual (for all that we do not meet many and the ones we do are mere glimpses). Though I should add that Barker is careful to avoid a straightforward oppressed versus the oppressors narrative, and—while I think the Nightbreed appeal to the alienated and the othered parts of us—they are not offered as stand-ins for marginalised people. While none of them kill on page except for survival, they do eat the meat of humans.
He had no way to describe the breed that were not the old ways. They didn’t belong to hell, nor yet to heaven. They were what the species he’d once belonged to could not bear to be. The un-people, the anti-tribe, humanity’s sack unpicked and sewn together again with the moon inside.
In any case, this has been my favourite so far of my Barker re-visitings. With its sweeping story, its exploration of monstrousness and otherness, its embrace of both cynicism and beauty, its genre-slipperiness, encompassing as it does aspects of the gothic, fantasy, horror and romance, I can very much see why it meant so much to teenage me. And, given present day me was made from teenage me, why it continues to mean something to me now.
February 11, 2023
Pinchi libro todo precioso.
Amo a Clive Barker, nunca me decepciona. Si no hubiera crecido consumiendo contenido de terror, estoy segura de que no podría dormir por las noches pensando en las criaturas repugnantes que crea este sujeto.
Swag y yo acabamos de descubrir cómo poner imágenes, lo que significa que todos mis futuros comentarios breves (no mis reseñas) tendrán un meme. Me hacen muy feliz los pequeños logros :)
Amo a Clive Barker, nunca me decepciona. Si no hubiera crecido consumiendo contenido de terror, estoy segura de que no podría dormir por las noches pensando en las criaturas repugnantes que crea este sujeto.
Swag y yo acabamos de descubrir cómo poner imágenes, lo que significa que todos mis futuros comentarios breves (no mis reseñas) tendrán un meme. Me hacen muy feliz los pequeños logros :)
July 8, 2024
First off I just want to say that I think the 2nd story in this Novella/ Short Story collection of Clive Barker’s 6th Volume in legendary Books Of Blood series contains my favorite short story ever. The Life Of Death which is an updated version of Poe’s classic, Murder’s In The Rue Morgue.
The Life Of Death follows a lady named Elaine Rider, after undergoing a hysterectomy she wanders the streets in a depressed state and stumbles upon the cryptic All Saints Church. She runs into a mysterious character named Kavanaugh who has an obsession with death and Elaine soon develops the same morbid fascination. This is the most malevolent, and darkest 30+ pages I’ve ever read. Carcasses included and that Barker skinless gore we are all akin too, this one slays!!
Nightbreed, well just skip the movie and go into this 200+ page novella asap. It has the best mask in the history of horror, and the monsters here all have purpose and character. Just these 2 alone garner the 5 star rating!!
The Life Of Death follows a lady named Elaine Rider, after undergoing a hysterectomy she wanders the streets in a depressed state and stumbles upon the cryptic All Saints Church. She runs into a mysterious character named Kavanaugh who has an obsession with death and Elaine soon develops the same morbid fascination. This is the most malevolent, and darkest 30+ pages I’ve ever read. Carcasses included and that Barker skinless gore we are all akin too, this one slays!!
Nightbreed, well just skip the movie and go into this 200+ page novella asap. It has the best mask in the history of horror, and the monsters here all have purpose and character. Just these 2 alone garner the 5 star rating!!
November 3, 2022
Cabal is the story of Boone, a tortured soul haunted by the conviction that he has committed atrocious crimes. In a necropolis in the wilds of Canada, he seeks refuge and finds the last great creatures of the world - the shape-shifters known as the Nightbreed. They are possessed of unearthly powers-and so is Boone. In the hunt for Boone, they too will be hunted. Now only the courage of this strange human can save them from extinction. And only the undying passion of a woman can save Boone from his own corrupting hell.
A superhero origin story with a brutal, lovecraftian coat of paint. The troubled antihero is manipulated and brainwashed by a twisted doctor named Decker. There's an evil city where eldritch beings lurk in the dark. A monstrous transformation leads to a superhuman conflict between two freaks of nature. It has all the makings of a superhero comic and all the wacky, gross-out explosiveness that makes 1980's horror so bloody fun (pun definitely intended.)
Fun fact: I decided to read this book after learning that it was the inspiration behind Cradle of Filth's album called Midian. To this day, Dusk and Her Embrace and Cruelty and the Beast which are also by Cradle of Filth remain to be two of my all time favorite metal albums.
My rating: 3.5/5
A superhero origin story with a brutal, lovecraftian coat of paint. The troubled antihero is manipulated and brainwashed by a twisted doctor named Decker. There's an evil city where eldritch beings lurk in the dark. A monstrous transformation leads to a superhuman conflict between two freaks of nature. It has all the makings of a superhero comic and all the wacky, gross-out explosiveness that makes 1980's horror so bloody fun (pun definitely intended.)
Fun fact: I decided to read this book after learning that it was the inspiration behind Cradle of Filth's album called Midian. To this day, Dusk and Her Embrace and Cruelty and the Beast which are also by Cradle of Filth remain to be two of my all time favorite metal albums.
My rating: 3.5/5
August 3, 2021
3.5 rounded up.
I’ll keep this short and sweet. Cabal has an interesting, imaginative premise, though I really wish Barker had shown us a lot more of Midian. He barely scratched the surface, and that is a big shame, because I was dying to know more. Also, the characters were extremely thin and not nearly as developed as I would have preferred.
So why the 3.5 rating (rounded up to 4)? Simple. I’m a massive sucker for a great villain, and Cabal’s is top-notch; so much so that he completely elevates the entire book. I was riveted every single time Decker showed up. He reminded me of a Batman villain, only way more R rated and especially sadistic.
So that’s all I have to say, really. Worth a read if you are looking for a short, well-paced horror with an excellent villain, but just know going in that it feels underdeveloped in a number of ways.
I’ll keep this short and sweet. Cabal has an interesting, imaginative premise, though I really wish Barker had shown us a lot more of Midian. He barely scratched the surface, and that is a big shame, because I was dying to know more. Also, the characters were extremely thin and not nearly as developed as I would have preferred.
So why the 3.5 rating (rounded up to 4)? Simple. I’m a massive sucker for a great villain, and Cabal’s is top-notch; so much so that he completely elevates the entire book. I was riveted every single time Decker showed up. He reminded me of a Batman villain, only way more R rated and especially sadistic.
So that’s all I have to say, really. Worth a read if you are looking for a short, well-paced horror with an excellent villain, but just know going in that it feels underdeveloped in a number of ways.
November 3, 2022
- Cabal (Romanzo, Cabal, 1988) ✰✰✰✰✰
"Naturalmente puoi sempre incolpare Boone," le stava suggerendo la Maschera. "Puoi dire alla polizia che è stato lui."
"Che cosa sai tu di Boone?" l'apostrofò lei. Sheryl le aveva giurato che avrebbe tenuto acqua in bocca.
"Sai dov'è?" le domandò la Maschera.
"È morto."
La faccia di pupazzo non accettò la sua risposta.
Aaron Boone, un uomo tormentato che crede di essere un mostro, manipolato dal suo psichiatra fino al punto di confessare delitti atroci di cui in realtà non si è mai macchiato, fugge fino ad arrivare alla mitica necropoli di Midian, laggiù dove dimorano i veri mostri, senza sapere che quanto rimane della sua vita passata lo sta inseguendo, e che quando lo raggiungerà porterà con sé morte e distruzione, causando infine la nascita di un nuovo ed indimenticabile eroe delle tenebre.
- La vita della morte (Racconto lungo, The Life of Death) ✰✰✰
Dunque quella era la Morte. Non c'era niente di artistico o di affascinante da vedere, non c'era niente che assomigliasse vagamente alle fantasie di Kavanagh, non c'era la serena bellezza di salme avvolte nei sudari su fresche lastre di marmo, non c'erano preziosi reliquiari, non c'erano aforismi sulla natura della fragilità umana, non c'erano nemmeno nomi o date.
L’incontro di una giovane donna ossessionata dalla riapertura di un antico mausoleo con uno strano tizio che soffre della stessa ossessione porterà a tragiche conseguenze per lei e per quanti la circondano.
- Il sangue dei predatori (Racconto lungo, How Spoilers Bleed) ✰✰✰✰
Aveva fatto i suoi conti: se fosse stata battaglia, avevano scarse probabilità di sopravvivere. Eppure, davanti al nemico che se ne andava, ancora non notava alcun segno di reazione da parte degli indios. Il silenzio metteva in risalto le prove dell'orrore commesso: il cadaverino per terra, la canna del fucile ancora calda.
Una banda di mercenari che vuole impadronirsi della terra abitata da una tribù di nativi dell’Amazzonia, si spinge troppo oltre in un macabro e raccapricciante racconto di avidità, violenza, maledizioni e morte.
- Torri all'imbrunire (Racconto lungo, Twilight at the Towers) ✰✰✰
La gola nera del vicolo era debolmente rischiarata da un barlume isolato, il lume stentato di una finestra dai piani superiori. Gli fu sufficiente comunque, per vedere la sagoma del forestiero riversa al suolo. Le terrificanti mutilazioni che aveva subito facevano pensare a un tentativo di rovesciarlo come un guanto.
Cospirazioni e tradimenti in un delirante racconto a base di guerra fredda e lupi mannari.
- L'ultima illusione (Romanzo breve, The Last Illusion) ✰✰✰✰
Valentin fugò quasi immediatamente il suo infondato ottimismo, prendendolo per un
braccio e bisbigliandogli all'orecchio: "Sono qui."
Non era il momento più opportuno per mettersi a chiedere a Valentin come lo sapesse, in ogni caso Harry prese mentalmente nota di accertarsene quando, o per meglio dire se, fossero usciti dalla casa avendo ancora la lingua ben saldamente ancorata al fondo della bocca.
Quando Harry D'Amour, investigatore dell’incubo dal torbido passato, viene assunto per vegliare sulla salma di un famoso illusionista, morto in circostanze a dir poco insolite, scoprirà che quello che lo attende è decisamente molto più strano ed inquietante di quanto si aspettasse.
Cominciò a comporre la combinazione che apriva la valigetta. All'interno la Maschera cominciò a dare segni di agitazione.
Presto, altrimenti la perdiamo.
Le dita frettolose sbagliarono ad allineare le cifre.
Sbrigati, dannazione.
Azzeccò finalmente la combinazione. La serratura scattò.
Mai Faccione gli era sembrato tanto bello.
Ho adorato alla follia Cabal di Clive Barker quando lo comprai e lessi per la prima volta tutto d'un fiato nei primi anni ‘90, subito dopo aver letto e riletto fino alla nausea la serie a fumetti basata su di esso, uscita all’epoca nella collana antologica Hellraiser pubblicata dalla storica Play Press, ed essere rimasto traumatizzato dal trailer dell’omonimo film, che però recuperai e vidi solo in seguito, splendido adattamento cinematografico diretto dallo stesso Barker, con un mefistofelico ed indimenticabile David Cronenberg nel ruolo della Maschera (Faccione), serial killer dagli occhi di bottone che non ha nulla da invidiare ad altri famigerati e più conosciuti suoi colleghi.
""Ho versato sangue..." mormorò Boone. "Ho ucciso undici persone."
Gli occhi azzurri lo osservarono attentamente. Erano divertiti.
"Io non credo," replicò Peloquin.
"Non spetta a noi," interloquì Jackie. "Tu non lo puoi giudicare."
"Ho un paio d'occhi nella testa, no?" sbottò Peloquin.
"So riconoscere un uomo pulito quando ne vedo uno."
Da sempre uno dei miei romanzi e film preferiti, al punto che quasi ogni anno mi rivedo almeno una volta con piacere la Director’s Cut di Cabal (Nightbreed - 1990) e, anche se più raramente, mi lascio sempre sedurre volentieri dall’oscuro richiamo di Midian e dei suoi occupanti e torno a perdermi tra le pagine di questo splendido volume pubblicato all’epoca dalla Sonzogno.
Purtroppo lo stesso non posso dire per gli altri racconti contenuti al suo interno, alcuni dei quali a mio parere decisamente tra i meno memorabili dell’autore britannico, di cui rimuovo dalla mia memoria quasi ogni traccia ad ogni ennesima rilettura.
Agitò un dito sotto il naso di Boone. "Tu non sei un Notturno," lo accusò, "tu sei carne. Ecco che cosa sei. Carne per la bestia."
Mentre parlava l'ironia si dileguò dalla sua espressione e si trasformò in fame."
Perfino il visionario e piacevole L'ultima illusione, del quale esiste un adattamento cinematografico a cura dello stesso Barker (Il signore delle illusioni - 1995) che avevo visto una volta anni fa a casa di amici, di cui ricordo davvero poco e niente e che prima o poi devo finalmente decidermi a recuperare, alla fine non mi ha lasciato molto a parte un paio di scene piuttosto disturbanti che già iniziano a sbiadirsi dalla mia memoria mentre scrivo questa recensione.
"Alzati," gli ordinò Boone.
"Se vuoi uccidermi, fallo subito," pregò Ashbery. "Che sia finita."
"Perché dovrei ucciderti?"
"Io sono un prete."
"E allora?"
"Tu sei un mostro."
"E tu no?"
Ashbery alzò gli occhi verso di lui.
Poco male, vorrà dire semplicemente che tra qualche anno o meno li leggerò volentieri di nuovo come se fosse la prima volta.
Quattro stelle inzuppate di sangue.
"Naturalmente puoi sempre incolpare Boone," le stava suggerendo la Maschera. "Puoi dire alla polizia che è stato lui."
"Che cosa sai tu di Boone?" l'apostrofò lei. Sheryl le aveva giurato che avrebbe tenuto acqua in bocca.
"Sai dov'è?" le domandò la Maschera.
"È morto."
La faccia di pupazzo non accettò la sua risposta.
Aaron Boone, un uomo tormentato che crede di essere un mostro, manipolato dal suo psichiatra fino al punto di confessare delitti atroci di cui in realtà non si è mai macchiato, fugge fino ad arrivare alla mitica necropoli di Midian, laggiù dove dimorano i veri mostri, senza sapere che quanto rimane della sua vita passata lo sta inseguendo, e che quando lo raggiungerà porterà con sé morte e distruzione, causando infine la nascita di un nuovo ed indimenticabile eroe delle tenebre.
- La vita della morte (Racconto lungo, The Life of Death) ✰✰✰
Dunque quella era la Morte. Non c'era niente di artistico o di affascinante da vedere, non c'era niente che assomigliasse vagamente alle fantasie di Kavanagh, non c'era la serena bellezza di salme avvolte nei sudari su fresche lastre di marmo, non c'erano preziosi reliquiari, non c'erano aforismi sulla natura della fragilità umana, non c'erano nemmeno nomi o date.
L’incontro di una giovane donna ossessionata dalla riapertura di un antico mausoleo con uno strano tizio che soffre della stessa ossessione porterà a tragiche conseguenze per lei e per quanti la circondano.
- Il sangue dei predatori (Racconto lungo, How Spoilers Bleed) ✰✰✰✰
Aveva fatto i suoi conti: se fosse stata battaglia, avevano scarse probabilità di sopravvivere. Eppure, davanti al nemico che se ne andava, ancora non notava alcun segno di reazione da parte degli indios. Il silenzio metteva in risalto le prove dell'orrore commesso: il cadaverino per terra, la canna del fucile ancora calda.
Una banda di mercenari che vuole impadronirsi della terra abitata da una tribù di nativi dell’Amazzonia, si spinge troppo oltre in un macabro e raccapricciante racconto di avidità, violenza, maledizioni e morte.
- Torri all'imbrunire (Racconto lungo, Twilight at the Towers) ✰✰✰
La gola nera del vicolo era debolmente rischiarata da un barlume isolato, il lume stentato di una finestra dai piani superiori. Gli fu sufficiente comunque, per vedere la sagoma del forestiero riversa al suolo. Le terrificanti mutilazioni che aveva subito facevano pensare a un tentativo di rovesciarlo come un guanto.
Cospirazioni e tradimenti in un delirante racconto a base di guerra fredda e lupi mannari.
- L'ultima illusione (Romanzo breve, The Last Illusion) ✰✰✰✰
Valentin fugò quasi immediatamente il suo infondato ottimismo, prendendolo per un
braccio e bisbigliandogli all'orecchio: "Sono qui."
Non era il momento più opportuno per mettersi a chiedere a Valentin come lo sapesse, in ogni caso Harry prese mentalmente nota di accertarsene quando, o per meglio dire se, fossero usciti dalla casa avendo ancora la lingua ben saldamente ancorata al fondo della bocca.
Quando Harry D'Amour, investigatore dell’incubo dal torbido passato, viene assunto per vegliare sulla salma di un famoso illusionista, morto in circostanze a dir poco insolite, scoprirà che quello che lo attende è decisamente molto più strano ed inquietante di quanto si aspettasse.
Cominciò a comporre la combinazione che apriva la valigetta. All'interno la Maschera cominciò a dare segni di agitazione.
Presto, altrimenti la perdiamo.
Le dita frettolose sbagliarono ad allineare le cifre.
Sbrigati, dannazione.
Azzeccò finalmente la combinazione. La serratura scattò.
Mai Faccione gli era sembrato tanto bello.
Ho adorato alla follia Cabal di Clive Barker quando lo comprai e lessi per la prima volta tutto d'un fiato nei primi anni ‘90, subito dopo aver letto e riletto fino alla nausea la serie a fumetti basata su di esso, uscita all’epoca nella collana antologica Hellraiser pubblicata dalla storica Play Press, ed essere rimasto traumatizzato dal trailer dell’omonimo film, che però recuperai e vidi solo in seguito, splendido adattamento cinematografico diretto dallo stesso Barker, con un mefistofelico ed indimenticabile David Cronenberg nel ruolo della Maschera (Faccione), serial killer dagli occhi di bottone che non ha nulla da invidiare ad altri famigerati e più conosciuti suoi colleghi.
""Ho versato sangue..." mormorò Boone. "Ho ucciso undici persone."
Gli occhi azzurri lo osservarono attentamente. Erano divertiti.
"Io non credo," replicò Peloquin.
"Non spetta a noi," interloquì Jackie. "Tu non lo puoi giudicare."
"Ho un paio d'occhi nella testa, no?" sbottò Peloquin.
"So riconoscere un uomo pulito quando ne vedo uno."
Da sempre uno dei miei romanzi e film preferiti, al punto che quasi ogni anno mi rivedo almeno una volta con piacere la Director’s Cut di Cabal (Nightbreed - 1990) e, anche se più raramente, mi lascio sempre sedurre volentieri dall’oscuro richiamo di Midian e dei suoi occupanti e torno a perdermi tra le pagine di questo splendido volume pubblicato all’epoca dalla Sonzogno.
Purtroppo lo stesso non posso dire per gli altri racconti contenuti al suo interno, alcuni dei quali a mio parere decisamente tra i meno memorabili dell’autore britannico, di cui rimuovo dalla mia memoria quasi ogni traccia ad ogni ennesima rilettura.
Agitò un dito sotto il naso di Boone. "Tu non sei un Notturno," lo accusò, "tu sei carne. Ecco che cosa sei. Carne per la bestia."
Mentre parlava l'ironia si dileguò dalla sua espressione e si trasformò in fame."
Perfino il visionario e piacevole L'ultima illusione, del quale esiste un adattamento cinematografico a cura dello stesso Barker (Il signore delle illusioni - 1995) che avevo visto una volta anni fa a casa di amici, di cui ricordo davvero poco e niente e che prima o poi devo finalmente decidermi a recuperare, alla fine non mi ha lasciato molto a parte un paio di scene piuttosto disturbanti che già iniziano a sbiadirsi dalla mia memoria mentre scrivo questa recensione.
"Alzati," gli ordinò Boone.
"Se vuoi uccidermi, fallo subito," pregò Ashbery. "Che sia finita."
"Perché dovrei ucciderti?"
"Io sono un prete."
"E allora?"
"Tu sei un mostro."
"E tu no?"
Ashbery alzò gli occhi verso di lui.
Poco male, vorrà dire semplicemente che tra qualche anno o meno li leggerò volentieri di nuovo come se fosse la prima volta.
Quattro stelle inzuppate di sangue.
March 2, 2012
So much of this book is said in subtext, in the language that the characters speak secretly of themselves and others, that I see a lot of readers having completely missed the point or not even willing to formulate an opinion to take a stab at answering the questions they say the story raised for them and never answered. The heart of the book is Lori, a highly sympathetic and believable female character (Barker's good at that), and the shift from Boone's narrative to hers at first felt jarring, mostly because I felt that it was going to shift back. It never did, and that's what made it perfect. It's the change in Lori and her better understanding of herself and her feelings for Boone that drives the whole thing for me, and makes it truly romantic, above and beyond anything I've read that's been labeled a romance. The prose is gorgeous, tight, impressive, as always, in how straight forward and crude Barker can be while still managing to come close to the poetical (but never florid.)
September 10, 2022
"Quando la luce cede alle tenebre
giungo alle porte di Midian
necropoli antica
sede di orrori e supplizi
la mente è debole
la vita una fuga
la morte una nuova alba"
Ad essere onesti ho affrontato la lettura di questo romanzo molti anni fa e ad oggi ne ho fugaci ricordi. Devo ammettere che non mi era dispiaciuto, anche se alcune scelte narrative non credo mi avevano convinto del tutto.
Al momento mi limito alla sufficienza piena delle tre stelle, sperando di avere la fantasia di rileggerlo per confermare o modificare il mio giudizio.
giungo alle porte di Midian
necropoli antica
sede di orrori e supplizi
la mente è debole
la vita una fuga
la morte una nuova alba"
Ad essere onesti ho affrontato la lettura di questo romanzo molti anni fa e ad oggi ne ho fugaci ricordi. Devo ammettere che non mi era dispiaciuto, anche se alcune scelte narrative non credo mi avevano convinto del tutto.
Al momento mi limito alla sufficienza piena delle tre stelle, sperando di avere la fantasia di rileggerlo per confermare o modificare il mio giudizio.
February 23, 2020
Cabal è assolutamente un ottimo romanzo horror/fantastico, mi ha sbalordito veramente tanto, sia per le argomentazioni assolutamente particolari, la descrizione delle ambientazioni, degli stati d'animo dei personaggi e specialmente del protagonista, dell'essere stato in grado di "terrificarmi" veramente a livelli esagerati, neanche i film horror che guardavo quando ero piccolo mi avevano spaventato così tanto. Infatti non riuscivo a leggere più di 50 pagine di fila, ad esempio: una volta, addirittura, ho distolto lo sguardo dal libro e mi sono guardato in giro per la camera e avevo quasi la sensazione che ci fosse un alito di vento proprio vicino alla porta-finestra di fronte a me, allora ho chiuso il libro e mi sono alzato un po' con i battiti del cuore accelerati e ho smosso la tendina sulla porta-finestra e niente... ehehehehehe... ho mollato lì il libro e l'ho ripreso il giorno dopo!
Voto: 10
Allegati, al romanzo Cabal, ci sono la raccolta di racconti de "Libro di sangue 6"
La vita della morte
Un racconto doloroso e profondamente inquietante, scritto con una maestria fuori dal comune.
Voto: 8
Il sangue dei predoni
Un'avventura terrificante nella giungla, dove la fame di potere può fare brutti scherzi.
Voto: 7.5
Torri all'imbrunire
Questa storia non mi ha convinto, .poco intrigante.
Voto: 6
L'ultima illusione
Questo racconto ha chiuso questo libro come "la ciliegina sulla torta", visionario.
Voto: 9
Voto: 10
Allegati, al romanzo Cabal, ci sono la raccolta di racconti de "Libro di sangue 6"
La vita della morte
Un racconto doloroso e profondamente inquietante, scritto con una maestria fuori dal comune.
Voto: 8
Il sangue dei predoni
Un'avventura terrificante nella giungla, dove la fame di potere può fare brutti scherzi.
Voto: 7.5
Torri all'imbrunire
Questa storia non mi ha convinto, .poco intrigante.
Voto: 6
L'ultima illusione
Questo racconto ha chiuso questo libro come "la ciliegina sulla torta", visionario.
Voto: 9
January 29, 2025
Es una novela rara, pero Clive Barker ya me tiene bastante acostumbrada a eso. Me gustó mucho el libro porque tiene de todo un poco: criaturas nocturnas que la rockean, un setting sepulcral, una trama con matices de slasher, y personajes bien definidos y elaborados. Había visto la peli hace muchísimos años y no recordaba nada, pero fue un placer conocer la historia original, ya que me terminó encantando.
April 29, 2025
I don’t write reviews.
And again I’ve seen this film a dozen times, yet have only read it thrice. Surprisingly, I was able to create my own mind images over the ones given me by the cinema, no small feat. This is a very enjoyable tale, though I’m always left wanting more. I’m not a fan of how, lately, everything is a trilogy or a series, but this could’ve done with more.
Another again, Barker used the “good girl” tried to save the “bad boy” trope. Lori was really a sweetheart and, who am I to say, but she deserved much better than Boone. I wish we would’ve seen more of Boone’s transformation in the story and really, more of Midian and the Nightbreed. Regardless, the story was clean, well-paced and highly entertaining.
And again I’ve seen this film a dozen times, yet have only read it thrice. Surprisingly, I was able to create my own mind images over the ones given me by the cinema, no small feat. This is a very enjoyable tale, though I’m always left wanting more. I’m not a fan of how, lately, everything is a trilogy or a series, but this could’ve done with more.
Another again, Barker used the “good girl” tried to save the “bad boy” trope. Lori was really a sweetheart and, who am I to say, but she deserved much better than Boone. I wish we would’ve seen more of Boone’s transformation in the story and really, more of Midian and the Nightbreed. Regardless, the story was clean, well-paced and highly entertaining.
October 30, 2016
Aaron Boone está sufriendo espantosas pesadillas que le llevan a visitar al psiquiatra Decker. Y es que Boone está convencido de que es un asesino. En una de sus sesiones, Decker le muestra a Boone unas horribles fotografías de crímenes que le convencen definitivamente de ser el autor de dichos asesinatos. A raíz de estos problemas mentales, entrará en conocimiento de Midian, un lugar en el que los monstruos pueden encontrar su hogar.
‘Cabal: Razas de noche’ (Cabal, 1988), del británico Clive Barker, empieza como un thriller para pasar a convertirse en una novela de terror. Si bien hay escenas sangrientas, Barker no se centra tanto en ellas, como en otro tipo de descripciones y sentimientos. El libro empieza muy bien, y engancha desde un principio, con el misterio que plantea sobre Midian. En mi opinión, la historia va de más a menos, y toda la parte de Midian no termina de convencerme.
‘Cabal: Razas de noche’ (Cabal, 1988), del británico Clive Barker, empieza como un thriller para pasar a convertirse en una novela de terror. Si bien hay escenas sangrientas, Barker no se centra tanto en ellas, como en otro tipo de descripciones y sentimientos. El libro empieza muy bien, y engancha desde un principio, con el misterio que plantea sobre Midian. En mi opinión, la historia va de más a menos, y toda la parte de Midian no termina de convencerme.
April 5, 2020
If you have never read Clive Barker before, start with Books of Blood Volumes 1-3, and then, if you enjoyed that, go for 4-6.
This review applies only to "Cabal," and not the short stories from Books of Blood, Volume 6, that are included in most versions of the novel.
The nostalgia pull of reading Clive Barker’s “Books of Blood” when I was 20 years old almost moves this to three stars, but I just can’t do it. Clive Barker excels at (a) evocative and concise turns of phrase, (b) novel premises, if not the actual plots; and (c) conjuring his bestiary. These are all better served by the short stories. The premise of Cabal is fairly routine and tired; there is nothing nearly as innovative as what was displayed n short stories like “The Body Politic,” Jacquline Ess: Her Will and Testament,” “Dread” or “In the Hills, the Cities.”
In terms of plot, the story is both too abrupt and too belabored: the character motivation and “discovery” elements of the beginning are rapid-fire and truncated (and bewildering;y nonsensical), with the “stand-off” toward the end dragged-on and on. Re-examining the novel, there’s really nothing of note that occurs between the middle and very end of the novel.
If anything, this is like a belabored version of "The Skins of The Fathers" from Books of Blood II, right down to the multifarious monster descriptions and “monster v. humans” showdown. Reading this after Books of Blood does it no favors, as it seems so damned derivative. The biggest failing is that Clive Barker’s characters are so one-dimensional and boring, with nothing interesting whatsoever about them. They have no personality, they are merely vectors for this simple plot to proceed, with melodrama as a poor substitute for substance. Worse is his heavy reliance on cliche: like in Books of Blood, every priest or authority figure is a a cartoon hypocrite. (I think every police officer in every Clive Barker story is a dimwitted, heavy-handed thug, and every priest is either a secret pedophile or sex pervert; it’s also odd that there seems to be some kind of conflation or equivocation made between a priest who secretly wears woman’s undergarments and literal monsters who murders and then eats human flesh).
Another failing has to do with style: Clive Barker, while a wonderful stylist, writes everything here with such high-pitched melodrama that everything kind of blurs together. There’s no real catharsis when everything is written with such high drama.
And finally, of course this is just a subject of taste, but Clive Barker’s sex writing is cringe-tastic, and for a 200 page novel, a decent 5-10 percent of this novel is taken up to purple prose about wet cunts, that ironically, for a writer so supposedly charged sex, renders the proceedings so damn unsexy.
This review applies only to "Cabal," and not the short stories from Books of Blood, Volume 6, that are included in most versions of the novel.
The nostalgia pull of reading Clive Barker’s “Books of Blood” when I was 20 years old almost moves this to three stars, but I just can’t do it. Clive Barker excels at (a) evocative and concise turns of phrase, (b) novel premises, if not the actual plots; and (c) conjuring his bestiary. These are all better served by the short stories. The premise of Cabal is fairly routine and tired; there is nothing nearly as innovative as what was displayed n short stories like “The Body Politic,” Jacquline Ess: Her Will and Testament,” “Dread” or “In the Hills, the Cities.”
In terms of plot, the story is both too abrupt and too belabored: the character motivation and “discovery” elements of the beginning are rapid-fire and truncated (and bewildering;y nonsensical), with the “stand-off” toward the end dragged-on and on. Re-examining the novel, there’s really nothing of note that occurs between the middle and very end of the novel.
If anything, this is like a belabored version of "The Skins of The Fathers" from Books of Blood II, right down to the multifarious monster descriptions and “monster v. humans” showdown. Reading this after Books of Blood does it no favors, as it seems so damned derivative. The biggest failing is that Clive Barker’s characters are so one-dimensional and boring, with nothing interesting whatsoever about them. They have no personality, they are merely vectors for this simple plot to proceed, with melodrama as a poor substitute for substance. Worse is his heavy reliance on cliche: like in Books of Blood, every priest or authority figure is a a cartoon hypocrite. (I think every police officer in every Clive Barker story is a dimwitted, heavy-handed thug, and every priest is either a secret pedophile or sex pervert; it’s also odd that there seems to be some kind of conflation or equivocation made between a priest who secretly wears woman’s undergarments and literal monsters who murders and then eats human flesh).
Another failing has to do with style: Clive Barker, while a wonderful stylist, writes everything here with such high-pitched melodrama that everything kind of blurs together. There’s no real catharsis when everything is written with such high drama.
And finally, of course this is just a subject of taste, but Clive Barker’s sex writing is cringe-tastic, and for a 200 page novel, a decent 5-10 percent of this novel is taken up to purple prose about wet cunts, that ironically, for a writer so supposedly charged sex, renders the proceedings so damn unsexy.
February 27, 2023
This is my 2nd Clive Barker read and I continue to be incredibly impressed. I kind of went into this read blind and I was not disappointed. Barkers prose is incredible, immediately from the first page I was hooked. All the twists and turns kept me captivated. The main character was so beautiful written. Incredibly complicated and intricate, this even achieved with a lot of the side character. When it was over I was genuinely sad knowing there is no continuation of this story.
I was also pleasantly surprised there were 4 additional short stories added in this edition. Can’t wait to read more by him.
I was also pleasantly surprised there were 4 additional short stories added in this edition. Can’t wait to read more by him.
April 17, 2021
Let me start this review by saying that this book just works for me.
➔I love when a horror book has a good plot and a message behind it. Cabal is a horror book primarily focusing on its’, you guessed it, Cabal(here’s a definition from Wikipedia):
➔It’s focused on a group of creatures called The Nightbreed. The laws of their world are unlike ours but at the same time, those creatures are very similar to us.
In a way, this is that good old don’t judge a book by its cover – people who are traditionally presented in a positive light due to their social status turn out to be horrible, while people that wouldn’t be generally accepted in a society like The Nightbreed can be righteous and fair, paradoxically more human.
➔The question is how much does society influence the way we perceive the people around us?
And what does actually make someone human? What is humanity?
Because of this, the reader is shocked at the first twist and is kept on the edge throughout the entire book. The book toys with our perception of the characters and the world. If you think about it, Barker made a horror book where the biggest horror comes from an erudite human character and the traditional monsters are the ones the reader is rooting for.
➔Do we know the details about The Nightbreed or their world, Midian? There is a level of ambiguity to this, here’s one explanation:
➔Barker crafts a world and fills it with characters that have a great dynamic. One can exactly picture this whole book as a movie, which is not a big wonder considering Barker’s screenplay writing and general background in the movie industry.
Don’t get me started on the dark humor, this passage (more like half a page) made me laugh at 11 PM:
➔ Final thoughts : If you want a horror that isn’t atmospheric but nonetheless has a good message and plot with a story that can somewhat parallel Neil Gaiman’s Graveyard book, you just might love Cabal, as for me 4,5/5 a favorite Barker so far.
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For a horror book, this book is not horrifying.
However, was the story interesting and the characters entertaining? Hell yes. Review to come.
➔I love when a horror book has a good plot and a message behind it. Cabal is a horror book primarily focusing on its’, you guessed it, Cabal(here’s a definition from Wikipedia):
A cabal is a group of people who are united in some close design, usually to promote their private views or interests in an ideology, a state, or another community, often by intrigue and usually unbeknownst to those who are outside their group.
➔It’s focused on a group of creatures called The Nightbreed. The laws of their world are unlike ours but at the same time, those creatures are very similar to us.
In a way, this is that good old don’t judge a book by its cover – people who are traditionally presented in a positive light due to their social status turn out to be horrible, while people that wouldn’t be generally accepted in a society like The Nightbreed can be righteous and fair, paradoxically more human.
”Boone shook his head. He had no way to describe the Breed that were not the old ways. They didn't belong to Hell; nor yet to Heaven. They were what the species he'd once belonged to could not bear to be. The unpeople; the anti-tribe; humanity's sack unpicked and sewn together again with the moon inside.”
➔The question is how much does society influence the way we perceive the people around us?
And what does actually make someone human? What is humanity?
Because of this, the reader is shocked at the first twist and is kept on the edge throughout the entire book. The book toys with our perception of the characters and the world. If you think about it, Barker made a horror book where the biggest horror comes from an erudite human character and the traditional monsters are the ones the reader is rooting for.
➔Do we know the details about The Nightbreed or their world, Midian? There is a level of ambiguity to this, here’s one explanation:
"Aaron," said the other. "Where d'you hear about Midian?"
"Same place you did," Boone said. "Same place anyone hears. From others. People in pain."
"Monsters," said Narcisse.
Boone hadn't thought of them as such, but perhaps to dispassionate eyes they were, the ranters and the weepers, unable to keep their nightmares under lock and key.
"They're the only ones welcome in Midian," Narcisse explained. "If you're not a beast, you're a victim. That's true, isn't it? You can only be one or the other."
➔Barker crafts a world and fills it with characters that have a great dynamic. One can exactly picture this whole book as a movie, which is not a big wonder considering Barker’s screenplay writing and general background in the movie industry.
Don’t get me started on the dark humor, this passage (more like half a page) made me laugh at 11 PM:
"Ever exorcize anyone?" he asked the priest.
"No."
"Ever watch it done?"
Again, "No."
"You do believe though," Eigerman said.
"In what?"
"In Heaven and Hell, for Christ's sake."
"Define your terms."
"Huh?"
"What do you mean by Heaven and Hell?"
"Jesus, I don't want a fucking debate. You're a priest, Ashbery. You're supposed to believe in the Devil. Isn't that right, Decker?"
The doctor grunted. Eigerman pushed a little harder.
"Everyone's seen stuff they can't explain, haven't they? Especially doctors, right? You've had patients speaking in tongues?”
"I can't say that I have," Decker replied.
"Is that right? It's all perfectly scientific, is it?"
“I’d say so."
"You'd say so. And what would you say about Boone?" Eigerman pressed.
"Is being a fucking zombie scientific too?"
"I don't know," Decker murmured.
"Well, will you look at this? I've got a priest who doesn't believe in the Devil, and a doctor who doesn't know science from his asshole. That makes me feel real comfortable."
➔ Final thoughts : If you want a horror that isn’t atmospheric but nonetheless has a good message and plot with a story that can somewhat parallel Neil Gaiman’s Graveyard book, you just might love Cabal, as for me 4,5/5 a favorite Barker so far.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
For a horror book, this book is not horrifying.
However, was the story interesting and the characters entertaining? Hell yes. Review to come.
April 3, 2016
(Okay so for whatever reason this appears as two books and my review didn't appear for this version? Well here it is again :D)
This year, I’ve gotten a stronger understanding of the difference between literary and simple genre fiction- or at least how I would define them.
A literary story needs to provide some unique psychological or philosophical insight or at least present an existing insight in a new way.
Genre fiction provides no new insight: it’s a reshuffling of existing material, often done to death, in a unique combination, purely for the purpose of entertaining. There’s endless crap like this on Netflix. Oh, there’s a love triangle, something something, vampires. A jealous ex takes her revenge on Daredevil. Nobody listened to the one guy who predicted the apocalypse, in Salem this time. It’s ingenious if you want to get away with that, because you can do it indefinitely. There are infinite combinations of these basic interactions and the new settings involved. If you’re into that, but I’m not a (big) fan of empty entertainment.
I think this is like my third or fourth Barker novel? You tell me, mate: I forget everything about them as soon as they’re done or I quit. I guess I keep returning because I find them compelling, but I don’t leave with any new metaphor/ insight. Everything is sacrificed in favour of pace. There’s sentences in here like ‘His expression changed quickly,’ and you’re like, ‘From what to what?’ but Barker’s like ‘There’s no time!!’ For example. Or the fact that one of the characters meets someone in the bathroom, who’s given like a paragraph of characterisation before she’s along for the ride for some reason. And given that Barker’s main selling point is the weird creatures and world, you’d think he’d do a better job of showing it to you.
‘Yeah so it’s like a teddy bear with blades on it.’
‘Where are the blades?’
‘On the teddy bear! Ah, forget it: he’s dead now.’
‘Well then I might as well forget the whole thing at this rate!’
You might think, if you wrote like this, you could just batter this stuff out indefinitely, right? The problem with this is that if anyone ever tells you a piece of genre fiction is ‘Unmissable’, ‘must-read’, whatever it is, it isn’t true. You can just wait five minutes for the next incarnation. Though what with whatever the next incarnation of it is, that I can see, it tends to be a diluted worse version. I swear to god I don’t understand at this point how anyone is excited about a new superhero film- like, has the energy to go watch it, discuss it… write it… act in it… work on it? It’s so tedious.
So don’t miss out on this one!
[I totally forgot that I wanted to read this because it inspired the album Midian by Cradle of Filth. What the hell did they see in this that I didn’t? That album is epic.]
This year, I’ve gotten a stronger understanding of the difference between literary and simple genre fiction- or at least how I would define them.
A literary story needs to provide some unique psychological or philosophical insight or at least present an existing insight in a new way.
Genre fiction provides no new insight: it’s a reshuffling of existing material, often done to death, in a unique combination, purely for the purpose of entertaining. There’s endless crap like this on Netflix. Oh, there’s a love triangle, something something, vampires. A jealous ex takes her revenge on Daredevil. Nobody listened to the one guy who predicted the apocalypse, in Salem this time. It’s ingenious if you want to get away with that, because you can do it indefinitely. There are infinite combinations of these basic interactions and the new settings involved. If you’re into that, but I’m not a (big) fan of empty entertainment.
I think this is like my third or fourth Barker novel? You tell me, mate: I forget everything about them as soon as they’re done or I quit. I guess I keep returning because I find them compelling, but I don’t leave with any new metaphor/ insight. Everything is sacrificed in favour of pace. There’s sentences in here like ‘His expression changed quickly,’ and you’re like, ‘From what to what?’ but Barker’s like ‘There’s no time!!’ For example. Or the fact that one of the characters meets someone in the bathroom, who’s given like a paragraph of characterisation before she’s along for the ride for some reason. And given that Barker’s main selling point is the weird creatures and world, you’d think he’d do a better job of showing it to you.
‘Yeah so it’s like a teddy bear with blades on it.’
‘Where are the blades?’
‘On the teddy bear! Ah, forget it: he’s dead now.’
‘Well then I might as well forget the whole thing at this rate!’
You might think, if you wrote like this, you could just batter this stuff out indefinitely, right? The problem with this is that if anyone ever tells you a piece of genre fiction is ‘Unmissable’, ‘must-read’, whatever it is, it isn’t true. You can just wait five minutes for the next incarnation. Though what with whatever the next incarnation of it is, that I can see, it tends to be a diluted worse version. I swear to god I don’t understand at this point how anyone is excited about a new superhero film- like, has the energy to go watch it, discuss it… write it… act in it… work on it? It’s so tedious.
So don’t miss out on this one!
[I totally forgot that I wanted to read this because it inspired the album Midian by Cradle of Filth. What the hell did they see in this that I didn’t? That album is epic.]
December 8, 2016
Por mucho que se le alabe como gran autor de terror no cambiara mi opinión sobre él: no tiene capacidad de causar terror, lo intenta dando asco.
Pues él tan solo mete cosas desagradables, monstruos repugnantes y sexo sucio. Y aunque tenga una buena idea, la destroza con su característica.
Pues él tan solo mete cosas desagradables, monstruos repugnantes y sexo sucio. Y aunque tenga una buena idea, la destroza con su característica.
September 3, 2020
A review will come...
February 21, 2015
Cabal is a novella by Barker that was the basis for the 1990 movie Nightbreed. It's a tale of a character named Boone who believes that he is a serial killer. During sessions with his therapist, Dr. Decker, he tries to convince Boone that he has to give himself up for the murders he committed. Boone decides that he would rather kill himself than be imprisoned for life. After a botched suicide attempt, he meets a half-crazed man named Narcissus. From him, Boone learns of a refuge for monsters that are similar to him in the northern Canadian woods called Midian. He escapes the hospital and sets out for Midian.
Barker crafts an interesting take on the monster movie-style saga where the humans are the real monsters and the shape shifters are the persecuted victims. Along the way, he sprinkles in a healthy dose of Lovecraft-inspired fantasy. The characters are interesting. But, I found myself wanting them them to be developed in more detail. I wanted to learn more of their origins, history, and capabilities. It felt like all I got was a brief tease. I guess when you're left wanting more, that's the sign of a good story. Unless Barker returns someday to fill in the blanks (like King tried to do somewhat with Dr. Sleep), I'll have to let my imagination do the rest.
4 out of 5 stars
You can also follow my reviews at the following links:
https://kenmckinley.wordpress.com
https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/5...
http://www.amazon.com/gp/profile/A2J1...
TWITTER - @KenMcKinley5
Barker crafts an interesting take on the monster movie-style saga where the humans are the real monsters and the shape shifters are the persecuted victims. Along the way, he sprinkles in a healthy dose of Lovecraft-inspired fantasy. The characters are interesting. But, I found myself wanting them them to be developed in more detail. I wanted to learn more of their origins, history, and capabilities. It felt like all I got was a brief tease. I guess when you're left wanting more, that's the sign of a good story. Unless Barker returns someday to fill in the blanks (like King tried to do somewhat with Dr. Sleep), I'll have to let my imagination do the rest.
4 out of 5 stars
You can also follow my reviews at the following links:
https://kenmckinley.wordpress.com
https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/5...
http://www.amazon.com/gp/profile/A2J1...
TWITTER - @KenMcKinley5
April 21, 2023
Una buena historia que tal vez hubiese sido más redonda como relato corto. Barker comenzaba aquí su andadura en su particular universo de terror fantástico, Lo mejor es la descripción de los seres y la cidad donde habitan: Midian. Cabe resaltar que la película me pareció muy superior al libro y allí es donde Barker dio rienda suelta a su imaginación y construyo un relato más satisfactorio de los hechos que aquí se narran. Eso si, en su versión extendida.
Un buen comienzo para el caudal de imaginación que desarrollaría más adelante.
Un buen comienzo para el caudal de imaginación que desarrollaría más adelante.
July 18, 2018
Nepravedno kod mene,zanemaren.Proslo je jače od 10 godina od pročitanog Barkerovog romana.I sa tom distancom u godinama i broju pročitanih knjiga,i dalje tvrdim isto.Da bi bio vrhunski pisac žanra. nije potrebna samo dobra ideja.Majstorstvo baratanja rečima mora biti na najvišem nivou.A to Klajvu vrlo uspešno polazi za rukom.Tome doprinosi i maestralno uradjen prevod.Sve u svemu,dobre pisce treba dozirati, a ja neću sigurno čekati ponovo 10 godina pre nego uzmem opet Barkera na čitanje
January 16, 2024
A Classic Horror
I was completely intrigued and captivated by the whole idea of Midian, a place where the freaks and unwanted of the world find refuge. Boone’s quest to find Midian has haunted me ever since I finished Cabal by Clive Barker. If that wasn’t enough, Barker throws in an incredibly evil villain that ramps up the horrors to unimaginable heights. Highly recommended.
I was completely intrigued and captivated by the whole idea of Midian, a place where the freaks and unwanted of the world find refuge. Boone’s quest to find Midian has haunted me ever since I finished Cabal by Clive Barker. If that wasn’t enough, Barker throws in an incredibly evil villain that ramps up the horrors to unimaginable heights. Highly recommended.
December 28, 2017
I loved this more when I was younger, and it is a memorable read but not something I always go back to. I was reading this and Great and Secret Show early on, and he shaped my words more than most authors. The dialogue was perfectly arranged in many parts. Boone is a hard character to root for, you're on Lori's side more the whole time. Overall Decker is a perfect nemesis but seems to be revealed too early, so the twists are elsewhere in relation to the Night Breed.
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