Customer Reviews

Blood Games

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(11)

 

 

This is a slightly different Laymon book. While it has many of the standard elements they are weighted differently in this one.

Five young women met as freshmen in college. Although all quite different, circumstances of their initial meeting bonded them together. One thing they all had in common was they did not like injustice and wrong-doing (particularly when aimed at one of themselves). During college they have a number of wild adventures where they dole out their own brand of justice. These stories are portrayed as flashbacks throughout the book.

Just after graduation they decide to get together once a year for new adventures. Each year a different one chooses where they will go and what they will do. This time Helen, a fan of horror movies, has chosen an abandoned hunting lodge where a slaughter took place many year earlier. But things quickly turn serious when they realize that the place is not completely abandoned. But it is when they decide to cut their visit short and leave the first day that things begin to go wrong. Now the ladies must pull together and use their skills in their most serious adventure.

Unlike many other Laymon books, we do not see characters become uncontrolled when the bonds of civilization are broken. This book really focuses on characters standing up for themselves and taking the law into their own hands. Also unlike many others, this one offers better explanations as to why the characters make the decisions they do and why the police are not an option. Definitely chilling in parts with great atmosphere. Things really do proceed right to the final page. A must for Laymon fans.

PS. Look for the author's cameo.

Before reading this book I'd never even heard of Richard Laymon. I picked this up at a book closeout store for $1 and figured for a buck it'd be an ok read. My expectations were far exceeded. It's been a LONG time since I've read something that captured my attention and had me so engrossed for hours. I didn't put the book down at all once I started reading! I've never found anyone besides Dean Koontz who gave me such an exciting read! I am running out tomorrow to look for more Richard Laymon books!

Let me first state that I am a fan of the horror genre; I love thrillers, horror, all of it. Every blood drenched word.

Richard Laymon has never even spoken to a woman. Never, not in his entire life has he ever even observed how women interact with each other. I would bet he is an only child. His portrayal of five adventure seeking women is plastic and unbelievable. These are professional women, a model, a film major who records everything for posterity and works at Universal, a PE teacher, an English major with a PhD in Chaucer and a married woman with a college degree and an inheritance. None of them have been in prison or the military or in any other occupation to give them the skills to do what they decide to do after one of their numbers is killed by a "hillbilly" in the woods of Vermont. Do they spend time really searching for their lost friend? No. Do they spend time looking for the lost car keys, so they can get the heck out of there? No. Instead, they hike off into the woods convinced that Helen was kidnapped. When they are directed back to the lodge and do find Helen, naked, slaughtered with a knife still stuck in her belly do they find the missing car keys and leave? No. Do they put their clothing back on and hike out of the woods? No. They decide to hunt down the killer of Helen and "gut the bastard." For all these women know, the woods are teaming with backwoods people. What, do they plan to kill them all?

Not believable, not on any level. I am from a fairly street smart, rough, up bringing. I just don't buy a fashion model and an assistant film director, along with a Chaucer major suddenly getting a rabid desire to kill everyone in sight. None of them have enough testosterone to do the job. And the kink and weird sex that Laymon throws in must be his fantasy. These young, fairly nice looking, fairly prissy women running around in various states of nakedness carrying a tire iron, an old blunt knife and an old, stolen shot gun as weapons is laughable. The first thing they do is plug the shotgun barrels with mud and soak all the shotgun shells. I wouldn't pull the trigger, they'd be safer to use it as a club.

And the cat fights between these women! Why are they still friends? God, I'd have gladly gutted the wise cracking, pain in the butt, Finley by the end. Pure Hack, of no entertainment value, avoid it.

I will be avoiding his work in the future.

Half a star.

Different people read Richard Laymon for different reasons, but I read him because he combines those bastions of the horror genre, sex and violence, with a sense of fun that is infectious, making his novels more pleasurable than most other horror. Of the three novels I've read (the other two are Island and In the Dark), Blood Games is the least of the bunch, but it is also the one which seems to be the most typically Laymonesque, as if he had cranked up the output on all the things for which he is known.

One of the best known aspects of his work (whether it is appreciated depends upon the individual reader) is that his female characters have a tendency to disrobe early and often. After all, why else would Blood Games feature five lead female characters, if not to have them be comfortably nude with each other? (In fact, they first meet as a group in a dormitory shower, with one of them videotaping the rest.)

This is a major aspect of the novel, with many loving descriptions of exposed, swaying breasts, and wet, clingy clothing showing that Laymon is interested in raising more than just his reader's heart rate. It certainly stretches the suspension of disbelief, but I believe that Laymon is merely following a popular novelists' maxim of writing the book he would like to read. But there's also enough suspense to carry over those readers who have had their fill of vivid descriptions of feminine anatomy. Actually, Blood Games is mostly suspense, with very few nasty events occurring, but their potential everpresent.

Five college friends -- known for their rowdy escapades back in the day -- gather for annual reunions at one's choice of location, in order to continue their adventures. This year is Helen's turn and, being a horror fan, she has brought Finley, Cora, Vivian, and Abilene to the abandoned Totem Pole Lodge, the site of many grisly murders years ago. At first, the atmosphere is enough to shake up the group, but then someone starts messing with their stuff, they lose their car keys, and one of them turns up dead. Now they've got to use all the physical and mental talents at their disposal to survive while they continue to search for the keys.

To give us occasional breaks from the relentless suspense, their struggle is peppered with flashbacks of their college pranks and of their first two reunions. This gives us, along with a chance to take a breath, the opportunity to delve deeper into the five characters. At the beginning, it is difficult to tell a few of them apart, but continuing to read opens up their individual personalities and makes them more recognizable by their actions and dialogue.

Richard Laymon has taken a plot and characters that could have easily gotten out of hand and kept tight control over them, exhibiting his novelistic skill while providing a hell of a good time. I can't imagine what a cut version would have been like, as any piece missing detracts from the whole, but this restored version from Leisure is ideal in its completeness. Blood Games may not be as instantly stunning as Island or In the Dark, but it is still a phenomenal piece of work and one that will continue me in my pursuit of more Laymon titles.

This book is not worth your money; I wish I hadn't paid full price. I was expecting some fun, some chills, some scares and it really only gave me goosebumps thinking of the fact that I paid for this when I could have gotten something better to read for the price I paid.

Don't get me wrong it had some scary moments but was overall it was a flop. Much of it was boring - especially the flashbacks which went on for chapters. The ending felt forced and rushed.

And oh man did the women in the book run around naked a lot. C'mon even when you are being pursued by a madman you cover up! I don't want to speak ill of the dead (I read that Richard Laymon has died) but this just seemed like a weird fantasy playing out for him - all the naked and lesbian-suggestive moments.

Save your money.

Blood Games is, quite possibly, one of the most disappointing books I've ever read. The premise is that five womem, who met in college and subsequently became best friends, meet for one week every year to carry on the "escapades" they began in college. The five friends take turns deciding where they will go for the time they're together, and this year the trip they take is to an abandoned resort as one of the women has a fondeness for the macabre. The real story is that the resort is haunted due to a previous tragedy, and that the evil that perpetrated said tragedy is still lurking about. The only real tragedy is the writing. As far as suspense goes, there isn't any. The plot is obvious and shallow. The author flashes back to the events and escapades of their college days, which, while somewhat creative, have absolutely no bearing on the current events. The flashbacks also show the five women to be cruel, vengeful, and two-dimensional; traits which follow them into the present story. The author also has an obvious obsession with female anatonmy, especially from the waist up. The women spend most of their time either nude, partially nude, thinking about becoming nude, or thinking about their friends being nude. The nudity has no bearing whatsoever on the plot. In essence, the book is a pathetic B-grade late-1970's style hacker movie, with gratuitous nudity thrown in the mix in an attempt to keep the movie in the theatre for more than one weekend. If you want good suspense, try a different author.

My favorite Richard Laymon novel is probably "The Traveling Vampire Show," but this one ranks right up there as well, right up there with "In The Dark" and a little better than "Island" or "One Rainy Night" in my humble opinion.

The way it's written does hearken back to the horror writing in the 1980s, and is somewhat reminiscent of situations and phrasings by authors like King, Straub, Ramsey Campbell, Robert McCammon, etc. from that time period. So when people say it does feel outdated, they have a point, but I prefer to think of it as feeling refreshing in a throwback type of way. Also, you just have to remember when it was written and accept it.

Laymon's typical loving description of body parts and people getting undressed in the oddest (and most contrived) of situations is present as well, as well as somewhat sexual scenes where you wouldn't expect them to be (would you try and sex up some guy you thought might be a serial killer when you're all alone in the wilderness? Probably not). It doesn't make for good realism (you shouldn't be reading Laymon if that's what you're after) but it does make for good pulpy escapism. You either have to accept this is what Laymon does or move on to another author.

The story does the now-famous Godfather 2 style unfolding of events, where the present story is interspersed with illuminating stories from the past. 4 women in their mid-20s, who met and had adventures while in college vow to keep close to one another, and not grow old peacefully, so they all go on "adventures" together one week every year. They rotate having each of the women chose an adventure a year. This year, the adventure is chosen by the frumpiest of the characters - a woman who loves horror movies and books. She takes the girls to an abandoned, isolated lodge in Vermont where the guests and staff were gruesomely slaughtered by backwards hillbillies a few years earlier.

You have to remember, while it's extremely doubtful that murderous, inbred hillfolk live off the land in Vermont these days (the only state I can imagine that happening is some sadly impoverished and rural regions of southern and western Kentucky, where the high school graduation rate is under 50% in some counties) this was in the 1980s, when it seemed more possible and life was less advanced and more rural in places.

If you guess that someone will happen that leaves the girls trapped in the lodge, miles from nowhere, and that some disturbing things will happen to spook them, then a lot of what happens won't be a surprise to you. The treat is the writing though. Laymon does a good job with the characters of the young woman, each of them are drawn interestingly and distinctively, if not 100% realistically. Their college adventures are well-written (my favorites are their terrifying Halloween encounter, their revenge on a typical college jock, and the filming of a student horror movie). Also, the lodge and its surrounding wooded environs are sketched out with a real eye toward successfully building a great mood that's spooky, with a lot of foreshadowing.

The novel does have a bittersweet ending as you might expect from Laymon (few of his books have "happy" endings) but it doesn't cheapen anything that came before it.

In conclusion, the pacing, atmosphere, and writing are good, and if you like gore and nudity, then you're in for a treat. Even if you don't like gore and nudity, this Laymon novel has a definite appeal that goes far beyond that. Recommended.

Much like "Dark Mountain", another relatively early Laymon, this is not one of his best, but, despite its flaws, of which there are many, it is one of my favorites. A lot of people complain about the flashback chapters concerned with the girls in college, but I enjoyed them for the most part (the Halloween episode was particularly fun and creepy, though I could have lived without the orgy one). The first half of the book, when the girls arrive at the Totem Pole Lodge, up until the disappearance of Helen, are the most enjoyable segments of the book. After that, when things take a decidedly "Deliverance" turn, it becomes less fun, and goes out with a whimper, rather than a bang. If you're not familiar with Laymon, be prepared to roll your eyes at the repetitive use of words such as "rump", and the constant sexual descriptions of female nudity that border on the perverse (Laymon was a fine writer but too often was hampered by trying to write for horny teenage boys). Despite its many flaws, this is an enjoyably creepy, suspenseful and entertaining read. It's far from fine literature, but you may enjoy its unpretentious fast-paced vibe.

Five friends from college agree to meet up for a weekend, once every year. This year it is Helen's turn, and she has chosen the abandoned, isolated Totem Pole Lodge, which has a grisly past, as the place to spend the weekend. However, the lodge is not as abandoned as they thought.

This novel is fairly standard Laymon fare. A gripping storyline, good character development, helped, in this case, by flashbacks to when the girls where in college together, and the usual improbable scenes, involving female nudity.

I found myself hooked on the book from the start. It is not as gory as some of his other books, and relied more on building up the suspense.

Richard Laymon has delivered us the masterful "In the Dark" and "Island", but unfortunately "Blood Games" is no masterpiece. Too many flashbacks interrupted the pace and tension of the story. Many of the characters engage in actions that go against their characteristics and seem quite unbelievable. This is not a book to start if you want a good introduction to Laymon. It's mildly enjoyable, but give his other work a try because he's still one of the top 10 horror writers of the last two decades.