![]() ![]() He is not alone.įinding a good horror novel – a truly resonant one, that manages to terrify you, entertain you, make you care for its characters, all while simultaneously giving you food for thought (and potential nightmares) – that is an increasingly rare thing, I think. ![]() He volunteers to hold down the fort and save the expedition effort single-handedly while Gus seeks medical attention, taking Algie with him.īut in the endless dark, Jack realizes that his logic might not save him after all. Despite his sighting of an impossible, malevolent apparition and the increasing sense of dread, Jack is determined to prove himself and his worth – especially to Gus – and fights off the sense of foreboding with logic. ![]() Then, when the leader of the group, the handsome and charismatic Gus, develops a potentially deadly case of appendicitis, the fate of the expedition comes down to Jack. But as the days get shorter and the midnight sun finally disappears for a long, cruel winter of endless night, Jack knows – he feels and eventually sees – that something else is there with the men. The expedition begins smoothly enough, although shortly before reaching their destination, the team loses one of their number (bringing the expedition crew down to just 3 men) – but the remaining members, Jack among them, are determined to make a go of their stay in Gruhuken. Something bad has happened at this place the ruins of an abandoned mine, a huge gathering of picked-clean bones and rusted tools, and a stained, solitary bear post are all that remains to stand vigil over Gruhuken. When they get closer to Gruhuken, however, the expedition’s Scandinavian transport crew begins to get jittery and attempts to back out of the deal to take them to that isolated outpost. When the crew arrives in Norway and begins their northward trek by boat, Jack is speechless at the cold, desolate beauty of the Arctic. Although he’s initially put off by pretentiousness and softness of his employer-colleagues, on the way back from his interview, Jack comes across a dead body near his home – and the starkness, the hopelessness of that death is enough to change Jack’s mind about the amateur scientific expedition, and he agrees to travel and spend a long winter at Gruhuken. As war progresses, Jack has only one hope to escape enlistment – by accepting a position on a team of upper class Cambridge types on an expedition to a remote location in the Arctic called Gruhuken, for a year of scientific observation. Jack Miller is a twenty-six year old lower-middle class failed academic, barely scraping by and without a hope for the future. It seemed like the perfect time to give the book a read. I had completely forgotten that I had Dark Matter on my shelf, and then I remembered how much Ana loved the book when she read it last year. Why did I read this book: After hitting so many duds and meh reads lately, I decided that I was really in the mood for something dark and terrifying. How did I get this book: Review Copy from the Publisher (a really, really old review copy) Soon he will reach the point of no return – when the sea will freeze, making escape impossible. Soon he will see the last of the sun, as the polar night engulfs the camp in months of darkness. One by one, his companions are forced to leave. As night returns to claim the land, Jack feels a creeping unease. At last they reach the remote, uninhabited bay where they will camp for the next year. Spirits are high as the ship leaves Norway: five men and eight huskies, crossing the Barents Sea by the light of the midnight sun. So when he’s offered the chance to be the wireless operator on an Arctic expedition, he jumps at it. Twenty-eight year old Jack is poor, lonely and desperate to change his life. Clouds of war are gathering over a fogbound London. ‘What is it? What does it want? Why is it angry with me?’ January 1937.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |