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thewallflower00's review
3.0
A brutal thriller about two ghetto kids kidnapped by two “off” police officers. The elevator pitch alone strikes as Stephen King-like (From a Buick 8, Desperation) and that’s a compliment. But does the full novel follow through?
Yes, yes, it does. But only to a point. I was going to rate it four stars but the ending was unsatisfying. I don’t mind twist endings or hanging endings or even ambiguous endings. But there must be an ending. Endings mean resolution and there was no resolution about this. Being left with more questions than answers doesn’t equal a scary ending. Saw had a scary ending and it still answered everything. It Follows had a scary ending and it didn’t tie everything up, but it resolved the story. This is like “Well, I made my word count. Publish it.”
If not for that, it’s pretty good, and I looked forward to reading it each night. The characters are well-fleshed out and the relationships, both pre-existing and growing, are believable. It’s thematic of the boys’ friendship and motherhood-in-arms and being stymied by a system designed not to listen. That alone would be enough of an obstacle, but it’s combined with the vines of evil power controlling puppets from below.
The tagline calls it Stranger Things meets The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Maybe. I’d take out Stranger Things and substitute in Fresh (1992). Or the two kids from “The PJs” but without the funny. (Sorry, I don’t have a lot of selection.)
But given what I said about the ending, should you buy this book? I wish I could say. A bad ending can ruin a really good story (see Game of Thrones). I guess you’ll have to take a look for yourself and decide. Just preparing you for what you’ll get.
Yes, yes, it does. But only to a point. I was going to rate it four stars but the ending was unsatisfying. I don’t mind twist endings or hanging endings or even ambiguous endings. But there must be an ending. Endings mean resolution and there was no resolution about this. Being left with more questions than answers doesn’t equal a scary ending. Saw had a scary ending and it still answered everything. It Follows had a scary ending and it didn’t tie everything up, but it resolved the story. This is like “Well, I made my word count. Publish it.”
If not for that, it’s pretty good, and I looked forward to reading it each night. The characters are well-fleshed out and the relationships, both pre-existing and growing, are believable. It’s thematic of the boys’ friendship and motherhood-in-arms and being stymied by a system designed not to listen. That alone would be enough of an obstacle, but it’s combined with the vines of evil power controlling puppets from below.
The tagline calls it Stranger Things meets The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Maybe. I’d take out Stranger Things and substitute in Fresh (1992). Or the two kids from “The PJs” but without the funny. (Sorry, I don’t have a lot of selection.)
But given what I said about the ending, should you buy this book? I wish I could say. A bad ending can ruin a really good story (see Game of Thrones). I guess you’ll have to take a look for yourself and decide. Just preparing you for what you’ll get.
lee_readsbooks's review
challenging
dark
emotional
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
astoldbybex's review against another edition
challenging
dark
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
5.0
dylan_dr3's review
dark
emotional
funny
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
cyanide_latte's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
I am a mess of mixed feelings right now. If there is ever a sequel to this, I'm going to bed to read it.
kaiju_poet's review
5.0
There are so many things I could say about this book. Look, I gave this book five stars, I did! But that isn't surprising, Booth is a cut above most authors, and really I should be given a different scale for Max Booth Books. Like sure, this is a five star book, meaning I think it deserves to be in the top %20 of all books. But I also gave We Need To Do Something five stars. Are they equally good? Are they the same book? Did Max just copy and paste his high school science report over and over for different lengths, slap some covers together and publish them? I mean, maybe...
All joking aside, I read a lot of horror. I read edit, and write horror for a living. Touch the Night is the book Steven King wishes he wrote whenever he thinks about It.
If We Need to Do Something was a masterclass in pacing, Touch the Night is a masterclass in dialogue and human nature. Harold Bloom wrote extensively on Shakespeare and what makes him amazing is not his grasp of human language, but rather his grasp on human nature. (of course, this is white European nature, but still).
Max Booth is a modern Shakespeare, creating works that brush against who we are, sometimes as a society, and often as a family unit. This book hurt me in many ways. I felt the accusations of a father that didn't give an actual shit, I knew the terror of being surrounded by malice when moments before you felt invincible.
Touch the Night is devastatingly full of real characters, characters who buck archetypes, and archetypal behavior to become something real. Gone is the hero's journey and present is the nuanced pain that is life.
I know a lot of authors who write out their nightmares, but very few who find themselves capable of tapping into mine. This book upset me, as a son, as a minority, and as a father. Well done Max, well done.
All joking aside, I read a lot of horror. I read edit, and write horror for a living. Touch the Night is the book Steven King wishes he wrote whenever he thinks about It.
If We Need to Do Something was a masterclass in pacing, Touch the Night is a masterclass in dialogue and human nature. Harold Bloom wrote extensively on Shakespeare and what makes him amazing is not his grasp of human language, but rather his grasp on human nature. (of course, this is white European nature, but still).
Max Booth is a modern Shakespeare, creating works that brush against who we are, sometimes as a society, and often as a family unit. This book hurt me in many ways. I felt the accusations of a father that didn't give an actual shit, I knew the terror of being surrounded by malice when moments before you felt invincible.
Touch the Night is devastatingly full of real characters, characters who buck archetypes, and archetypal behavior to become something real. Gone is the hero's journey and present is the nuanced pain that is life.
I know a lot of authors who write out their nightmares, but very few who find themselves capable of tapping into mine. This book upset me, as a son, as a minority, and as a father. Well done Max, well done.
bluemouseman's review
adventurous
hopeful
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
thomaswjoyce's review
5.0
What do two twelve-year-old boys do in 2005 small-town Indiana when they’re having a sleepover, watching horror movies, but can’t sleep thanks to the amorous noises coming from the mother’s bedroom? They do what many kids—including this book’s author—would do, and go on an adventure. But what begins as some adolescent hijinks quickly descends into some heart-stopping horror as Alonzo and Josh stumble from one terrible situation to the next. The two boys are instantly likeable, especially to anyone who is of a certain age and can relate to the era in which they grew up. While Josh is more of a strait-laced kid whose parents are still married (though not necessarily happy about it), Alonzo is more hot-headed and likely to react with his mouth and his fists before his brain can register what is happening.
This is bad news when the boys are racially abused by a garage attendant and subsequently picked up by two police officers. But they aren’t taken directly to the nearest station, and there is definitely something weird and terrifying about the officers. Booth takes a situation that is, unfortunately, all-too-familiar in today’s society, one which is horrifying for normal reasons, and gives it a very Weird horror twist. The young boys are subjected to the kind of hellish nightmare that would send most adults insane with terror when they find themselves at a remote farmhouse occupied by a frightening family of monsters in human-form. Tortured and terrified, the boys must endure hell to try to survive and escape a fate worse than death, a mission by the family that will have dire consequences, and not just for the boys.
While the boys try to escape, their kidnapping hasn’t gone unnoticed. Although the racist sheriff is less than helpful, the mothers are determined to find their kids, no matter what they have to do. Alonzo’s mother (Ottessa) has been raising her son single-handed for a long time, and is as quick-to-temper as Mary (mother of Josh) is mild-mannered. While Jasper, Josh’s father, seems to be more interested in the Baseball World Series and blames his son’s disappointing behaviour on the bad influence of Alonzo, Mary and Ottessa quickly take the law into their own hands in their desperate quest to track down their sons. But they’re hampered every step of the way by the racist attitudes of many of the white inhabitants of Percy, Indiana. Much like the darkness that seems to live within the farmhouse, racial intolerance is like a cancer that is rotting away kindness and decency in the small town. One horror is otherworldly, cosmic, while the other is entrenched in American society thanks to centuries of oppression. Booth manages to knit the two together to strike a very effective balance and create an original and horrific story.
Incorporating many of the storytelling traits we have come to expect from him, Booth has delivered a deeply unsettling and horrifically harrowing story. Some readers may connect with one boy more than the other; perhaps we were the more timid friend in the dynamic, eager to please and eager to follow. Warned off the “troublemaker” by our parents. Or maybe we were that so-called troublemaker, the kind of kid who stood up and didn’t take trouble from anyone. Or maybe those readers with kids will relate with the mothers, some more meek than others, but all of us willing to do whatever it takes to protect our children. Of course, race plays a major role in the story, but Booth never gets “preachy” about it. He doesn’t have to hit the reader over the head with it. But many North American readers will be familiar with some of the racist language and behaviour depicted within these pages. Not that racism is a solely American problem; it didn’t originate there, and ignorance and intolerance are rife throughout the world. But the racism faced by our protagonists will have been witnessed, or experienced, first-hand by many readers, rooting this story firmly in the real world. Then Booth adds the nightmarish and Weird horror that knocks the characters for six, the action described in bloody detail. He makes us see the boys through each other’s eyes, makes us fret for their safety as if we were Mary or Ottessa, and, ultimately, he puts us through a metaphorical “emotional” grinder. This book is not for the faint-of-heart but, if you’re brave enough, it is an incredibly entertaining and rewarding read.
This is bad news when the boys are racially abused by a garage attendant and subsequently picked up by two police officers. But they aren’t taken directly to the nearest station, and there is definitely something weird and terrifying about the officers. Booth takes a situation that is, unfortunately, all-too-familiar in today’s society, one which is horrifying for normal reasons, and gives it a very Weird horror twist. The young boys are subjected to the kind of hellish nightmare that would send most adults insane with terror when they find themselves at a remote farmhouse occupied by a frightening family of monsters in human-form. Tortured and terrified, the boys must endure hell to try to survive and escape a fate worse than death, a mission by the family that will have dire consequences, and not just for the boys.
While the boys try to escape, their kidnapping hasn’t gone unnoticed. Although the racist sheriff is less than helpful, the mothers are determined to find their kids, no matter what they have to do. Alonzo’s mother (Ottessa) has been raising her son single-handed for a long time, and is as quick-to-temper as Mary (mother of Josh) is mild-mannered. While Jasper, Josh’s father, seems to be more interested in the Baseball World Series and blames his son’s disappointing behaviour on the bad influence of Alonzo, Mary and Ottessa quickly take the law into their own hands in their desperate quest to track down their sons. But they’re hampered every step of the way by the racist attitudes of many of the white inhabitants of Percy, Indiana. Much like the darkness that seems to live within the farmhouse, racial intolerance is like a cancer that is rotting away kindness and decency in the small town. One horror is otherworldly, cosmic, while the other is entrenched in American society thanks to centuries of oppression. Booth manages to knit the two together to strike a very effective balance and create an original and horrific story.
Incorporating many of the storytelling traits we have come to expect from him, Booth has delivered a deeply unsettling and horrifically harrowing story. Some readers may connect with one boy more than the other; perhaps we were the more timid friend in the dynamic, eager to please and eager to follow. Warned off the “troublemaker” by our parents. Or maybe we were that so-called troublemaker, the kind of kid who stood up and didn’t take trouble from anyone. Or maybe those readers with kids will relate with the mothers, some more meek than others, but all of us willing to do whatever it takes to protect our children. Of course, race plays a major role in the story, but Booth never gets “preachy” about it. He doesn’t have to hit the reader over the head with it. But many North American readers will be familiar with some of the racist language and behaviour depicted within these pages. Not that racism is a solely American problem; it didn’t originate there, and ignorance and intolerance are rife throughout the world. But the racism faced by our protagonists will have been witnessed, or experienced, first-hand by many readers, rooting this story firmly in the real world. Then Booth adds the nightmarish and Weird horror that knocks the characters for six, the action described in bloody detail. He makes us see the boys through each other’s eyes, makes us fret for their safety as if we were Mary or Ottessa, and, ultimately, he puts us through a metaphorical “emotional” grinder. This book is not for the faint-of-heart but, if you’re brave enough, it is an incredibly entertaining and rewarding read.
motherhorror's review
5.0
Max Booth’s TOUCH THE NIGHT is everything one could hope for in horror fiction. It checks all the horror boxes for me. Which boxes are those, Mother Horror? I’m glad you asked.
The first and most important box for me is emotional investment. This can come in a variety of ways but the strongest vehicle for me is character development. If I can fall in love with the characters in a horror story, all the safe, warm and fuzzy feelings are off the table. That’s how I like my horror: Dangerous. Risky.
Immediately, I knew Max Booth III was gunning for emotional wreckage. He took his time developing the two, young protagonists straight away through authentic dialog and that sweet, sweet coming-of-age vibe we find in classic, Robert McCammon or Stephen King novels.
I felt my reader’s heart falling desperately in love with 12 year olds, Alonzo Jones and Joshua Washington even though they’re both up to no good. As a mother, I was worried about them from the get-go.
I marvelled at how Booth effortlessly slides into the skins of these youthful, African American boys as they speculate on everything from senseless police brutality to puberty issues. As a brief side note here: I think it’s brave for authors to step outside their comfort zone and write characters not of their gender, race or sexual orientation. Max gives the boys distinct personalities and voices that are probably not so different from his own childhood experience. He is able to infuse that context with the social injustices we all feel and blend this together to pen two very relatable characters. It felt scary to me, how much I was responding to them emotionally in so little time.
Obviously something bad happens to them. I’m not spoiling anything for you, right? This is horror. Horror is not kind to young people.
Alonzo and Joshua are not the only two characters here, given almost equal if not more page time, are the mothers of the two boys, Mary and Ottessa. These two are my new favorite women protagonists in a horror novel. Ottessa is just a natural born, loud-mouth, take-no-shit, badass. After certain events transpire, she teams up with Joshua’s mother, Mary who is the perfect counter weight to Ottessa’s unhinged persona.
The chapters with these two are laugh out loud funny. I read a few parts out loud to my husband because the dialog was just that colorful and memorable.
That was a long explanation of the first horror box. Well, the second one won’t take long because it’s TEETH. Does this book BITE??
Well, this book terrified me. There were scenes I had to stop reading in bed because I didn’t like the way it was making me feel moments away from having to feel all vulnerable in the darkness. The “bad guys”, the villains, are BAD. Ugly. Disturbing. Unpredictable.
Booth did not shy away from darkness. Let’s just put it that way and then leave it there. I feel like above all else in reviews, protecting the reader’s discovery of unique details is priority number one. I feel like I’ve described for you how I engaged with this one:
It was full blown emotional wreckage. It was dark and brutal. Unflinchingly scary. When I closed my Kindle on the ending, I immediately went to Max Booth III and told him I hated him. So I hope this expresses my true and honest feelings about TOUCH THE NIGHT. Basically, it will be a contender for best novel in 2020. It’s that damn good.
Mother Horror Blurb: Holy, dark pits of hell. Max Booth is so slick. Man! This book grabs ahold of you—forces that lump of flesh in your chest into a vice grip of emotional torture and you just plead for mercy. This book takes me back to some old school Stephen King days- those stories with flesh and blood characters you hopelessly fall in love with?? They have to fight the darkest evil and you pray for light. How will it end?
You MUST BUY THIS BOOK!!! Full review 2/19/2020
https://gingernutsofhorror.com/fiction-reviews/touch-the-night-by-max-booth-iii-book-review
The first and most important box for me is emotional investment. This can come in a variety of ways but the strongest vehicle for me is character development. If I can fall in love with the characters in a horror story, all the safe, warm and fuzzy feelings are off the table. That’s how I like my horror: Dangerous. Risky.
Immediately, I knew Max Booth III was gunning for emotional wreckage. He took his time developing the two, young protagonists straight away through authentic dialog and that sweet, sweet coming-of-age vibe we find in classic, Robert McCammon or Stephen King novels.
I felt my reader’s heart falling desperately in love with 12 year olds, Alonzo Jones and Joshua Washington even though they’re both up to no good. As a mother, I was worried about them from the get-go.
I marvelled at how Booth effortlessly slides into the skins of these youthful, African American boys as they speculate on everything from senseless police brutality to puberty issues. As a brief side note here: I think it’s brave for authors to step outside their comfort zone and write characters not of their gender, race or sexual orientation. Max gives the boys distinct personalities and voices that are probably not so different from his own childhood experience. He is able to infuse that context with the social injustices we all feel and blend this together to pen two very relatable characters. It felt scary to me, how much I was responding to them emotionally in so little time.
Obviously something bad happens to them. I’m not spoiling anything for you, right? This is horror. Horror is not kind to young people.
Alonzo and Joshua are not the only two characters here, given almost equal if not more page time, are the mothers of the two boys, Mary and Ottessa. These two are my new favorite women protagonists in a horror novel. Ottessa is just a natural born, loud-mouth, take-no-shit, badass. After certain events transpire, she teams up with Joshua’s mother, Mary who is the perfect counter weight to Ottessa’s unhinged persona.
The chapters with these two are laugh out loud funny. I read a few parts out loud to my husband because the dialog was just that colorful and memorable.
That was a long explanation of the first horror box. Well, the second one won’t take long because it’s TEETH. Does this book BITE??
Well, this book terrified me. There were scenes I had to stop reading in bed because I didn’t like the way it was making me feel moments away from having to feel all vulnerable in the darkness. The “bad guys”, the villains, are BAD. Ugly. Disturbing. Unpredictable.
Booth did not shy away from darkness. Let’s just put it that way and then leave it there. I feel like above all else in reviews, protecting the reader’s discovery of unique details is priority number one. I feel like I’ve described for you how I engaged with this one:
It was full blown emotional wreckage. It was dark and brutal. Unflinchingly scary. When I closed my Kindle on the ending, I immediately went to Max Booth III and told him I hated him. So I hope this expresses my true and honest feelings about TOUCH THE NIGHT. Basically, it will be a contender for best novel in 2020. It’s that damn good.
Mother Horror Blurb: Holy, dark pits of hell. Max Booth is so slick. Man! This book grabs ahold of you—forces that lump of flesh in your chest into a vice grip of emotional torture and you just plead for mercy. This book takes me back to some old school Stephen King days- those stories with flesh and blood characters you hopelessly fall in love with?? They have to fight the darkest evil and you pray for light. How will it end?
You MUST BUY THIS BOOK!!! Full review 2/19/2020
https://gingernutsofhorror.com/fiction-reviews/touch-the-night-by-max-booth-iii-book-review