Customer Reviews

BAD THINGS

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(23)
3 star:		(18)
2 star:		(8)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Michael Marshall can write - that's for sure - but he uses so many different styles in this novel that it becomes a difficult read. The premise is very promising and the aurthor does the rare thing of grabbing the reader from page one. The intro is mezmerizing. It continues on strong as characters are established years later and we see how they are dealing with the tragedy that intoduced the book. I was on the edge of my seat for the first 50 or so pages and was prepared for an exciting, suspenseful spooky read.

Sadly, after the first 50 pages the book went all over ther place. It went from character to character, was told from different perspectives and it was often hard to even know who you were reading about. The plot that had such a solid beginning also went a little haywire. The story starts with a family and the mysterious death of the son. As the novel plods along it looses track. Different plot lines are meshed together and plausibility is somewhat lost as the story becomes hard to follow.

The book is one you will want to finish for through all this it is apparent that the writer is talented and the reader will want to see where he is leading things. I skimmed through some of this book as I pushed to make it to the end. I just feel a big let down for so much could have been done with this plot. The author is talented but this is not one of his best. Suspenseful at times it just doesn't really work.

Michael Marshall has created a formidable story that keeps you on the edge of your seat. Even the innocent rustling of leaves makes your scalp crawl. I cannot read this book at night when I'm alone--it's just too creepy. But creepy in an excellent way.

When two people have died mysteriously -- a little boy and a sixtyish man--no one seems concerned about investigating. But three years after his son dies, John Henderson is drawn back to that horrible place and back into the nightmare. Will the woman who says she "knows what happened to his child" be able to lead him to the truth? Or will she, too, die before the that truth is exposed?

Something wicked lurks in North West Washington State. This book is a must read for those who like their thrillers with a touch of ghoul.

Definitely recommended read.

Diane Davis White
Author, Moon of the Falling Leaves

I had high expectations for Bad Things. It sounded like it would be a fast-paced thriller novel and spooky natural story, presented in a character-driven work. It is all those things. But somehow the combination didn't gel the way I had hoped.

As a character-driven novel, Bad Things succeeds pretty well. I felt a real empathy for the main character, John Henderson, and his "retreat" into a solitary life after the death of his son. His actions throughout the story were very consistent with his personality - that of someone who was extremely confident and competent, and then had faced complete impotence in the protection of his own son. The cast of supplemental characters is rich. None of the individual characters is explored completely, but as a whole they are a varied and interesting group.

As a fast-paced thriller novel, Bad Things is okay. There are plots and subplots, twists and turns. There dangerous action sequences, and they are completely realistic and believable. The story arc and pacing feel right. But there's not enough action and suspense to really excel as a thriller.

I found the weakest aspect was the supernatural elements. The supernatural stuff is more hinted at, than clearly explained. I suppose that is intended to leave more to the reader's imagination, and to increase the sense of spookiness. But for me, I ended up thinking "Huh? What happened? I don't get it." more often than feeling that chill up my spine.

All in all, I did enjoy this book. But it won't be on my favorites list.

I'll skip a recap of the book and leave that to the professional reviewers and just cut to the chase... I enjoyed this book for three reasons: 1) For much of the book I was pondering what "bad things" the main character might have done to deserve his punishment and 2) For a full 2/3 of this book I seriously wondered if ghosts and witches were just a figment of my imagination. 3) Having recently gone through a painful divorce I can attest to Michael Marshall's expert capturing of the pathos and he wove it nicely into the story. His insight into the loss stemming from a divorce and his larger insights into love, life, and human nature added an extra pleasure to the read. I highly recommend this book and if you need a label or what the pitch to Hollywood might be to get you to buy it, then think Angel Heart meets Ghost Story and you've got it.

I expected to be much more impressed with Michael Marshall's Bad Things. Having read - no, devoured - many of his previous novels, I began this one with very high expectations.

Approximately the first 50 - 60 pages fully lived up to my expectations. I got very involved with the character of John Henderson and felt that I understood why he had made the decisions that he did. The set up for the mystery was also well presented and well written, and it was what kept me reading.

I began to have problems with some of the plot elements after this point, and while I didn't lose interest in the story, I found myself confused by some of the twists introduced.

The supernatural angle of the story began to pull me back in, only to turn out to be very dissatisfying. When I got to the end of the book, my first thought was - not that original after all. This I think was my biggest disappointment because I had come to expect real originality from this author in the past.

Overall, his storytelling was as strong as ever, but was negatively affected by a weakly tied together plot. My recommendation would be to start with other books by this author, so that this one doesn't unfairly turn you off his writing.

Great beginning, awesome jacket--- exited after first hour of reading. Then boom --- nothing---- spent the whole book worried about a couple of drug using kids who have nothing to do with the end story. The story should have involved the witch and wife who ruined his life. Don't waste your time reading this book. The end of the book annoys you after realizing how much better the book could have been without the middle. Completely underplayed the power of the women in the town for the pleasure of a drunk mans drag of a cigarette which was described every 25 pages.

Maybe my expectations for Michael Marshall's BAD THINGS were too high. This is the first book of his that I've read and it grabbed me at the start. John Henderson watches as his four-year-old son dies in front of him and falls into the lake. No one can find a cause of death, and the resulting death leads John and his wife Carol to divorce.

Years later, an unusual email brings John back to the town he abandoned while he searches for the truth regarding his son's death. This is the key storyline, but other smaller plots also wind through the story. They range from John's co-workers battled to keep her boyfriend safe from drug dealers to John's reunion with his ex-wife.

What I found was that I grew tired of the subplots and kept skipping them to get to the main storyline. I hoped the dealers would beat the boyfriend so that that storyline could come to an end. It grew to be more annoying than intriguing or suspenseful.

Last night, I settled down to read the ending and found myself equally disappointed. There were so many ways the storyline could have gone and instead, the conclusion did little more than bore me. It lacked the chills I was expecting.

This was my first Michael Marshall book which I decided to read based on glowing reviews of his other books. I really wanted to love this book because I enjoy psychological thrillers, but I found that I just liked it ok.

John Henderson witnesses his son's inexplicable death at the lakehouse. The little boy urges his father to run then falls. The coroner finds it was neither the fall nor the water that killed this little boy. John then goes on to lead a very ordinary life withdrawing from everyone. One day, John gets an email from someone who claims to know what happened to his son. John returns to the lakehouse, and the dealthy incidents begin. John uncovers the town's old secrets and finds himself resisting the possibly supernatural forces of Black Ridge.

This was ok, but I had trouble fully engaging myself in the plot because of the wordiness. The twists in the book kept me reading though. It was a decent read and suspenseful but not exactly a thriller.

Make no mistake - Michael Marshall is an accomplished writer, as evident in the cleverly and intelligently crafted "Bad Things". Problem is, what starts as a well-rendered mystery with supernatural undertones cascades into a maze of disjointed, though elegantly told, themes and story fragments.

Marshall wastes no time in jarring the reader into the pages with the unexplained death of four-year old Scott Henderson at the idyllic lakeside home of John and Carol Henderson in Black Ridge, Washington. Fast-forward four years, John is now waiting tables in an Oregon beach side dive and divorced - the apparent collateral damage stemming from his son's mysterious demise. If not untroubled, John's new life is at least stable, until he receives an email from a stranger claiming to know the truth behind young Scott's death. John packs an overnight bag and heads north to meet the stranger, finding the town where he once lived unchanged on the surface, but just barely covering vaguely sinister undercurrents. All signs of the trouble seem to point to the Robertson's, Black Ridge's patrician family for generations, the stereotypical small town family of wealth and power, who have chosen the remote and deeply wooded forest rather than town-center for the site of their sprawling manor. John is quietly drawn into the creepy web of the Robertsons, but finds he is hardly alone. The story gets convoluted as it darkens, more people start dying, and the reader is soon enmeshed somewhere between Stephen King and Ken Goddard.

Marshall draws interesting characters with sufficient depth and credibility, and throughout, displays an uncommon grasp of human emotion, particularly in its ebb. But the pace is uneven and the messages confused, and by the time I got 250 pages or so in I was wondering if Marshall would ever get to the punch line. He does - more or less - but lacking the visceral terror of King or the very subtle supernatural shading often employed by James Lee Burke, the climax left me wanting. All things considered, an entertaining read worth the time, but not the best from this talented author.

Marshall's Bad Things is something of a novelty. It's a well-written literary thriller that borders on gothic and horror while simultaneously being funny with endearing characters. You don't get that combination all that often. Bad Things was, as a result, an incredible compelling read. I literally didn't want to put it down. About two thirds of the way through, it became clear that the punchline, cause of the bad things, wasn't going to be too satisfying (to me at least) but that didn't prevent me from enjoying the novel. Give it a whirl. The buzz around Marshall is well-deserved.