Customer Reviews

Grimm Reapings

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

I know sequels are never supposed to be better than the original, but R. Patrick Gates breaks that mold with "Grimm Reapings."

I quite enjoyed this book's predecessor, "Grimm Memorials," but found some flaws among its fun and shocking frights and gore. "Grimm Reapings," however, is just about perfect.

The story picks up thirteen years after "Memorials." The original book's hero, Jackie, is now in college. His sister is starting a new life with her artist boyfriend and turning the old Grimm funeral home into a bed and breakfast. Their mother, Diane, has fiercely protected her young son, Steve, from knowing anything about what happened in the past. Steve, who Diane was pregnant with at the time of the murders thirteen years ago and who Eleanor Grimm wanted to transfer her soul into, finally comes to learn what his family's history is when he sees the story play out on a TV show (which Jackie and Jen contribute to).

I won't reveal anything else about the plot. But let's just say that Eleanor Grimm makes another appearance.

"Grimm Reapings" is a much tighter novel than "Memorials" was and a lot of what I found silly and somewhat distracting in that book is gone from this one. There are some truly sick, utterly perverse ideas and horrifically fun gore and violence in this book. I've read just about every type of disgusting horror novel in existence, but when you figure out the evil that Eleanor is perpetrating on this family, you will gasp. Gates isn't just being gross here -- he's being daringly vile. Shockingly and merrily so.

While "Memorials" started out slow, "Reapings" runs right out of the gate and is completely and urgently gripping. Its plot doesn't read quite as lofty as the original, but the drive of the story more than makes up for it. Once again, the characters are shallow (the person you like the most is, not so strangely, Eleanor), but I can't even begin to complain about that. This novel is just much too entertaining -- delivering in every way you could want -- for that.

"Grimm Memorials" was good enough to get me to read its sequel, but "Grimm Reapings" goes down, for me, as one of the most rollickingly fun and deliciously and sickly depraved horror novels I've ever read.

Let me preface this review by saying that if you haven't yet read Grimm Memorials, you probably won't enjoy this book. Read the original first, then come back to this. Or better yet, order BOTH books RIGHT NOW and read them back-to-back!

R. Patrick Gates is probably the best kept secret in hardcore horror. Until stumbling upon his recent 'haunting' novel The Prison, I had never heard of him. Further research about said author provided minimal information, i.e. no personal website, few online interviews and relative obscurity since the mid-90's left me wondering if I had perhaps unveiled one of those 'hidden gems' that avid readers of any genre just love to fall across. Well, the truth is such in the case of this brilliant, if relatively unknown writer.

While I did order and devour The Prison very quickly, it's story and content good, but not completely to my liking, it was enough for me to reach for Grimm Memorials. Boy am I glad I did! A modern twist on witchcraft and fairy tales, Grimm Memorials was one of the most disturbingly twisted and deliciously sick works of horror literature I've ever had the pleasure to chase my eyes across. Edward Lee, Richard Laymon and Jack Ketchum, being the undisputed 'holy-trinity' of extreme horror, have a new contender upping the bar of hardcore horror.

However, this is not a review of GM, but rather it's sequel, Grimm Reapings. A complete synopsis can be obtained easily enough so I won't cover that. And as well, I despise it when reviewers give away too much of the plot, so I'll keep my info brief and ambiguous.

The first item of note concerning GR, is that this book is pretty much useless without having read Grimm Memorials, and as well, the original is still miles more entertatining than this follow-up.

That is NOT to say that GR is a bad book...quite the contrary, it is very much in the vein of its prequel; filled with great storytelling, gripping suspense and plenty of lip-licking sickness that hardcore horror fans crave.

I won't say much about the plot, other than that it does pick up thrteen years after the first book, and proceeds to set the hook immediately.

Fans of more 'quiet' horror may find Gates storytelling a bit too extreme and nasty. But, if Ed Lee, Laymon, Ketchum, Charlee Jacob and the like are some of your preferred authors in the field, DO NOT hesitate to try out Gates' work. I simply suggest that you start with the Grimm books as they are truly shining gems in a sometimes lackluster genre.

Grimm Memorials by R. Patrick Gates has been one of my favorite horror reads to-date. The author has followed it up with Grimm Reapings, which serves as a worthy follow-up, although one that is vastly different from it's predecessor.

The majority of the novel's plot deals with the struggle taking place in the mind of 13-year-old Steve Nailer, who is slowly coming to terms with the events that unfolded at the time of his birth. Possessed by the weakened spirit of Elenore Grimm, Steve fights to hold her at bay. However, the increasing sexual thoughts and feelings of this pubescent child are causing his mental guard to drop, strengthening Elenore and providing the exact opportunity she needs to take control of his mind and body, using him to carry out the plans she began 13 years earlier.

This book is very well written. Its pages are populated with a cast of well-fleshed-out characters and horror aplenty. Surprisingly enough, however, much of the extreme gore that stood out in Grimm Memorials is replaced in this book by horrifying sexual encounters. Coitus has officially replaced cannibalism, which may not appeal quite as much to some readers.

This book differs from the first in many regards. The allusions to Fairy Tales and Nursery Rhymes are all but gone (explained away by Elenore having lost touch with her talents in her dormant state). The body count is greatly lessened. The sexual overtones are extremely hightened. The events that unfold are more psychological than physical (though very well-written I might add), and the story envelopes far fewer characters than the first book introduced.

Do not take the above remarks as complaints. This book comes highly recommended to anyone who enjoyed the first venture in the Grimm saga. Gates not-so-subtly hints at a third Grimm novel, and I'd kill for a taste of what he has in store.

I really enjoyed this book, I didn't know how much I would sometimes follow up books become weak and stuck in the same story... But this was truly as disturbing as the first one. The book is just as hard to put down as the first one. The story is strong... The witch continues her control and reign of terror.!!!!!!!!!!

It was just bloody awful. Mostly it just has sex, perverted sex and more gawd-awful sex. Barely anything else of a story.
You can basically consider it a soft-porn atrocity.

I have to first say I read The prison, and enjoyed its spookyiness so much I tried this one. Ok I was kinda lost cause I didnt know what happened to get them here from the first book,however, I stopped reading this book after 100 tiresome pages of masturbation! This seems to be one of Gates' keys to writing as I will not read anymore of his books since sex seems to have to be written into every other scene! Also its clumsy sex, unneccessary to go into such detail, and boring. His attempts at putting in fairy tales is also clumsy and seems old hat. Sorry Gates is so stuck on sex, his book the Prison seemed so promising but then he lost me as a reader.

The wrath of Eleanor Grimm continues to torment the Nailer family in this excellent sequel to "Grimm Memorials". The development of the characters is superb. R Patrick Gate's horror writing is second to none. I look forward to more work from this talented author.

I picked this up at Barnes and Noble in the New Releases section. The storyline sounded promising. I looked for the first book Grimm Memorials but they didn't have it. Generally I like to read books in order; I didn't find it to be a problem with this one. There was nothing you absolutely had to know from the GM to get in to this one. The author did a good job of referencing the previous story but allowing this one to stand on its own. I gave it 3 stars because, while the plot and premise of the story is really good, it was pretty predictable. The amount of gore didn't bother me but all the really unnecessary sex did. You immediately could tell it was written by a man or a woman trying too hard to come off as a man, by the amount of fellatio going on. Only a man in a novel would be getting serviced while coming up with some dastardly thing to do to someone. Everyone knows men can't multitask like that, lol. Really that was the worst part, all of it unnecessary. I'm all for sex if it moves the plot along in some way but it was more like Gates was trying too hard to come up with weird, pervy things to write about.

I thought only movie producers made the mistake of thinking gory scenes were a good substitute for true horror, but I was wrong. If you remove the sick, gory scenes from this book, all you would be left with would be sick, perverted sex scenes. If you enjoy sexual depravity involving incest and 13-year old kids with a generous helping of cannibalism and child torture thrown in for kicks, this is the book for you. Otherwise, steer clear! I couldn't even finish it, and that almost never happens.

I am flabbergasted there are any good reviews here! This novel was juvenile in its conception and telling. The plot is nothing more than a vehicle for the author to describe the most sexually explicit and violent things he can imagine. I love horror novels yet this bored me to tears. I have never in my life skimmed a book, yet I found myself just glancing over the last fifty pages or so. There are so many quality horror writers, it is a shame I wasted my money and time on this book. Most parts describing the "witch" and what she was thinking (mostly misquoted nursery rhymes) was laugh out loud ridiculous. If you're into lowbrow fiction, I'm sure you'll give this a good review, but for those of us looking for something a tad more sophisticated, I recommend looking elsewhere!