Customer Reviews

In the Flesh

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3 star:		(3)
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This is subversive literature of the best kind. It targets and fires at male sexual identity, the educated upper middle class and the world's governing clan, turning them on their ear and leaving them the worst for damage. Barker is a great aesthete of the fantastic and an iconoclast that leaves no turn unstoned. Here are four short stories that show a master spellbinder at work:

"In the Flesh": Cleveland Smith, recurrent criminal, is undergoing one of his usual stops at jail. Unable to leave the crime life, he studies, searching for the origin of sin. When a spooky new kid is put as his cellmate, he is placed on the threshold to the answers he is looking for...

"The Forbidden": An English academic steps out from the Ivory Tower into the housing projects, and learns from the local gossip the urban legends of everyday violence and death. Yet she refuses to believe them. So the urban legend materializes for her own benefit, in the shape of the Candyman...

"The Madonna": Two men, a racketeer and an ineffectual businessman, plan to turn an abandoned swimming pool spa into a recreational complex. But this two men, who go around displaying their confused manliness, are about to find how fragile their masculinity can be, and whether anything will be left of them afterwards...

"Babel's Children": Vanessa Jape always refused to take the clearly signaled road. She just had to venture through the unmarked path. So it was no surprise she ended getting lost during her vacation at Greece. What she wasn't expecting, though, was finding the convent, the unusual dwellers therein, and the real rulers of the world...

From gory horror to cosmic dread to a fable beyond classification, Barker is one of the best writers of dark fantasy you will ever find.

I had read a lot of Clive Barker's short stories when I was younger, but forgot which ones I had read since I hadn't read them all. I couldn't remember if I had read In the Flesh or Inhuman Condition since they both started with the same letter. While reading this one, none of it was familiar until I got to the second of four stories, called "The Forbidden". It is the basis for the Candyman movies. I never saw the movie, but the story stuck with me since it was very creepy and gross. When I read it, the movie had not been made, but one scene in it became ingrained in my brain. A woman who is doing some graduate school research on a very poor neighborhood. She goes into an abandoned house to find drawn on the wall an extremely disturbing face laughing, but the doorway was being used as the mouth. It was so descriptive that when I had an assignment in my junior English class to describe a room that another person in the class would have to guess who it belonged to, I described that room. No one guessed it was the room of a psychopathic killer, but instead thought it was a messed up teenager. :)

The first story in the book, called "In the Flesh", didn't do much for me. It had supernatural and horror elements to it with a guy who had questions about good and evil and where sin comes from. Then he gets a cellmate who just isn't quite right. I think when I first started reading Clive Barker, I was attracted more to his horror stories, but as I got older, I enjoyed his fantasy stories more. The first one was more in the horror realm, but beyond the final twist and the "city" that he dreams about, I didn't care much about the crazy cellmate. I actually could have enjoyed the entire story if the cellmate had been left out, even though I guess it was the point of the story, I just didn't care for that half of it.

I actually enjoyed each story more than the last one so I did enjoy "The Forbidden" more, but my favorite part is still the room description. The rest of it was not as cool as I remembered. I did enjoy the third story, "The Madonna", that did have supernatural elements but it seemed more in the fantasy vein and I just loved it. It is about an abandoned bath house where naked women swayed some men to come to them, but the men might not have wanted to do it if they knew the consequences.

My favorite story was the last one called "Babel's Children" where a women who loves to drive off the beaten path comes across a nunnery that isn't run by nuns, but has held some brilliant minds captive for years for some very twisted games. It was the most realistic story out of all of them, but you still had to suspend your disbelief about the games being played. With the way some things happen in the world, you wonder sometimes that maybe major world decisions are being made the way it is described in the book. I had a good chuckle about the absurdity of it.

This was one of Clive Barker's early books, a collection of short stories. Included is the novella for one of the most realistically terrifying horror films ever made, and an icon of its time, The Candyman. As far as horror series go, this is one of the scariest because it's so realistic. As far as Barker goes, I can respect him. As a teenager and young adult I idolized him, then as I began doing my own projects I emulated influences like Barker's kind of disturbing Christian constructs and also those of [...]. I think that Clive Barker will remain an icon of the 80s and 90s generation of gothic horror because Pinhead and The Candyman are right up there with Freddy or Jason, which they somehow continue to make today. The new Hellraiser movies became stereotypical staring with the fourth one to the newer ones, as it remained realistic, moreso making the cenobites seem like the good guys amongst a mess of caricatures.

I enjoyed this book of four short stories. It was well-written and very subtle. Barker tells four very different stories about the human mind. The first story was the most interesting, focusing on two inmates in a prison. It focuses on the question of original sin.

In the Flesh consists of four short stories: In the Flesh, The Forbidden, The Madonna, and Babel's Children. The first two stories mentioned are well-written horror stories. The story In the Flesh makes this read worth it, by far the best of the four, fans of the Books of Blood will once again recognize the saying: "The dead have highways," only in this story the reader sees where those highways lead to. The Forbidden though a clever ghost story was also disappointing, primarily if the reader has seen the film "Candyman" prior to reading the story. The Madonna and Babel's Children were probably the weakest and most disappointing stories, not horror and not as imaginative as one would expect from Barker.

This is one of Barker's earliest collections, and shines because it is free of the usual flights of fancy that color his newer, longer works. Barker still posesses one of the most unique imaginations in literature, but his longer novels are sometimes muddled with too much fantasy as opposed to horror. There is no such problem with these short pieces. Razor sharp writing, evocative descriptions, and a unique philisophical view within each keep these stories fresh even over twenty years after their publication. It is hard to find proper words to describe Barker's work because it is so full of imagination, that it sometimes defies any type of description. He definetly takes chances that no other writer would, which is all the more exciting because you are reading the work of a young man who is just finding his voice at the time. While the opening story is probably the best, the second story, The Forbidden, is the inspiration for the movie "Candyman", and is also quite strong.

If you've never read Barker before, this is a good place to start, along with The Hellbound Heart and the Books of Blood. The strength of his imagination is palpable during reading and, like any good writer of horror, he takes you on a journey that is both believable and totally fantastic all at once.

"[When I read Clive Barker,] I feel like Elvis Presley watching the Beatles." - Stephen King

To get any potential bias out in the open, I want to say two things. First off, if I were to pick my favorite horror writer, it would be a toss-up between H.P. Lovecraft and Clive Barker (although Shirley Jackson's brilliant "The Haunting of Hill House" puts her in the running, but I don't see her as a full-blown horror writer). It still shocks me that Barker is outsold by King and Rice. Secondly, this was the first book by Clive Barker that I had read, so that may have affected my opinion.

The thing that draws me to his writings is his writing style. The man simply has a way with words. I could never imagine being near as good of a writer as this man. Sure, Stephen King has a great imagination, but he doesn't match this man's eloquency. This man could write air bag instructions and it would be fascinating. Also, he does an excellent job of mixing sub-genres. Horror can be classified into two sub-genres: psychological horror and gore. The former, when done right, is truly frightening. The latter is not, but is still appealing in a way. To paraphrase Stephen King, it's like looking at a car accident. You don't know why you look, but you still always turn your head, and while your conscious tells you that you should hope that the victims are alright, deep down you want to see blood. Clive Barker's works contain both elements. His writings are frightening due to the psychological elements and a constant sense of dread, but at the same time he paints his work like a car accident. Thirdly, I enjoy the fact that he rarely writes a straight-forward story. His plots are replete with metaphors and character motivations are rarely simple or Freudian.

Now it's time for a story summary. This book contains four stories that are somewhere between short stories and novellas. The first two are pure horror and the last two are modern-day fantasies, although they both contain elements which, though not scary, can be a bit disturbing. I'll try to keep spoilers to a minimum, but minor spoilers do come up in any synopsis.

"In the Flesh" - The story starts by describing a prisoner who is obsessed with the idea of original sin. He doesn't fully accept the Bible and he investigates this topic in his free time which, like any prisoner, he has plenty of. All the while, he has dreams every night of a ghost town in the desert. Initially, he doesn't understand what the dreams are about. Soon enough, a cellmate is introduced. He is a skinny man who quickly becomes a typical prison victim due to his size and his meek nature. His father (or grandfather, I forget) was a murderer who was executed at the prison and buried near the cell. At night, he speaks to his (grand)-father as if he were alive. The other prisoner soon finds out that the man has inherited a terrible supernatural power from his (grand)-father. What follows is a series of disturbing events related to the new prisoner's powers and the old prisoner's dreams which slowly become more revealing. These things are eventually tied together and the first prisoner eventually learns where sin comes from.

"The Forbidden" - There's more spoilers here than in the other synopsises, but it's hard to avoid. Skip reading this part if you care. The movie "The Candyman" was based upon this story. The story revolves around a student doing research on the topic of urban legends. She visits a ghetto and learns about its urban legends through interviews and by photographing graffiti inside of abandoned buildings. The most common legend that arises from the interviews and the graffiti is that of the "Candyman". He is supposedly a serial killer with a hook on one hand who murders townsfolk in very brutal ways that would make Richard Ramirez look like a nice guy. However, having noticed parallels with other common urban legends, she naturally doubts the stories. She then checks newspapers and records and her beliefs are essentially confirmed. However, she finds out that the Candyman is in fact real. He is a supernatural being who was made and kept alive by the stories and continues killing to keep the stories and himself alive. Naturally, the student becomes more involved than she wishes.
WARNING: This story is unbelievably graphic. It's hard to believe that this made it past the editor.

"The Madonna" - This story is about two men who are visiting a large abandoned bathhouse. The electricity has not yet been turned on, so they explore the maze-like building with flashlights. On one trip, one of the men catches glimpse of what he thinks is a naked woman. He obsessively explores the bathhouse to find her. He eventually finds a very, very odd discovery within the bathhouse and he is affected in a very disturbing way.

"Babel's Children" - This is my favorite story from this collection. I won't give too much away. The story starts with a scene involving a woman who has car trouble and seeks out help. She notices a building in the distance and travels there for assistance. It turns out to be a nunnery, but she also notices that there are cameras everywhere. The nunnery is revealed to be a cover for a secret government organization and the woman is held captive for security reasons. She investigates further and finds out the organization's shocking purpose and then she seeks to set things right.
Note: This is the only story in this collection not grounded in fantasyland. Yet, I wouldn't classify it as an "it could actually happen" story since the plotline is a bit of a stretch.

I adore every story in this collection, but I'll rank them from favorite to least favorite anyway:
Babel's Children (many people's least favorite...hmmm)
In the Flesh
The Forbidden
The Madonna

First things first. The Last reveiwer referred to King and Koontz as hacks. King and Koontz should not be uttered together in the same sentence. That is sacrilege. Koontz is a hack. King is God. We mock what we don't understand. We fear what we cannot perceive. And let us remember, if it wasn't for King's kindly reviews, Mr. Barker might still be an obscure genius. Let me get one thing straight, Clive Barker is a (...)genius. No need to be angry with Mr. King. Secondly, let's talk about In The Flesh. Not for the average or mainstream reader as the last reviewer mentioned (He seemed very hostile and confused. Gender issues? Skeletons in the closet?)nor the faint of heart. Clive Barker is an acquired taste. Rigid in style and precise in wording, Clive Barker is not afraid to show us everything we never wanted to see. Be it pornographic or horrific, Barker never flinches. In The Flesh & The Forbidden are the masterpieces here. The Forbidden has the origins of the silly Candyman pictures, but I assure you, this incarnation of the Candyman is all out chilling. In The Flesh is a dark prison tale of a young man haunted by the taint of his grandfather's infamous deeds. The Madonna and Babel's Children are the lesser, but still brilliant tale of the book. The Madonna is a chilling, perverse look into the shadows of an abandoned sauna where strange apparitions dwell and ungodly depravities are unleashed. Babel's Children is a story of a woman on holiday who takes a wrong turn in the wilderness and comes across a strange abbey with even stranger inhabitants. Are they all crazy? Only Clive will tell. Overall another great chunk of Clive Barker's perfection. Read this and be afraid, for down the way and around the corner is an empty flat with a lot of graffitti on the walls, take a look inside and remember, Sweets to the sweet.

Dig it!

I must say, I get a bit weepy-eyed whenever I think of "In the Flesh." It's the first Barker book I ever read, and it hooked me in a way that fiction never had before. Barker plays with the English language as if it was his personal plaything, and we're only borrowing it.

This book gives a great mixture of smaller stories. It has the infamous Candyman who appears to be only a myth. But, by far, my favorite short story is how elder greek wise men decide the fate of the world upon the games that they play.