Book Review - The Daemon In Our Dreams by John F. Rooney
Category Book Reviews
I received an offer via email to read and review a copy of The Daemon In Our Dreams by John F. Rooney. It's not a book I'd normally run across in my regular reading genres, but the premise sounded interesting. And while the writing style showed promise, the story line left a bit to be desired.
The story starts off with an assassination in a London pub. An unidentified killer stands in the doorway of the pub, singles out three different people, and proceeds to kill each of them with three shots. He then disappears into the crowd, and the media starts to go wild with the story. After that quick and deadly start, the story goes back to three people who are having strange dreams. The dreams involve a man, apparently of Indian origin, who appears and glares at each of them. The imagery involves melting skulls and demonic transformations, and they seem like something more than just a bad nightmare. These three people, none of whom know each other, all meet on a cruise that ends up, of course, in India. They discover that they've been haunted by the same visions, and attempt to figure out what it all means. The tension escalates as they start seeing the actual dream man in the different ports, and the appearances seem to be more threatening. The relationships deteriorate as the pressure mounts, and none of them know how this will all culminate in the end. The guess is, not well...
From a straight writing perspective, the book is pretty good. Quite a bit of the material revolves around the culture and sights of the ports. I found that pretty interesting, actually. But the story plot involving the dreams was thin. Even as the story ended, I still didn't know why these three had been singled out. Nor did I understand what the killings accomplished. I'll be the first to admit that I don't always get deep and subtle stories. But I'm not sure there *was* a point here. I'd have been happier if it was just a story about a cruise...
I think Rooney has promise as a novelist, but he definitely needs some work on the plotlines. Couple a solid plot with his writing style, and I'd be looking for his next work...
I received an offer via email to read and review a copy of The Daemon In Our Dreams by John F. Rooney. It's not a book I'd normally run across in my regular reading genres, but the premise sounded interesting. And while the writing style showed promise, the story line left a bit to be desired.
The story starts off with an assassination in a London pub. An unidentified killer stands in the doorway of the pub, singles out three different people, and proceeds to kill each of them with three shots. He then disappears into the crowd, and the media starts to go wild with the story. After that quick and deadly start, the story goes back to three people who are having strange dreams. The dreams involve a man, apparently of Indian origin, who appears and glares at each of them. The imagery involves melting skulls and demonic transformations, and they seem like something more than just a bad nightmare. These three people, none of whom know each other, all meet on a cruise that ends up, of course, in India. They discover that they've been haunted by the same visions, and attempt to figure out what it all means. The tension escalates as they start seeing the actual dream man in the different ports, and the appearances seem to be more threatening. The relationships deteriorate as the pressure mounts, and none of them know how this will all culminate in the end. The guess is, not well...
From a straight writing perspective, the book is pretty good. Quite a bit of the material revolves around the culture and sights of the ports. I found that pretty interesting, actually. But the story plot involving the dreams was thin. Even as the story ended, I still didn't know why these three had been singled out. Nor did I understand what the killings accomplished. I'll be the first to admit that I don't always get deep and subtle stories. But I'm not sure there *was* a point here. I'd have been happier if it was just a story about a cruise...
I think Rooney has promise as a novelist, but he definitely needs some work on the plotlines. Couple a solid plot with his writing style, and I'd be looking for his next work...
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Posted by Jhon Smith At 05:46:01 On 04/05/2010 | - Website - |