Customer Reviews

Horrorween

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After I was a ways into this book, I realized that I vaguely remembered Orangefield from the earlier book "Hallows Eve." It seems to me as though this earlier book (released in 2004) was a bit stronger, especially given that my memory is so bad that to have remembered anything about a book two years after reading it is somewhat amazing! However, this was a fairly good book as well. I won't go into plot details - the book focuses around Samhain, The Celtic Lord of the Dead (according to this book) and his attempts on behalf of a shadowy background figure he calls Dark One to destroy the world.

My main gripe is the fact that everyone in the town talks about "Sam" sightings, when anyone who knows anything about Samhain knows it is pronounced "sow-en." Of course, probably the residents of Orangefield are too ignorant to know that . . .

Anyway, if you like Sarrantonio, if you have read his previous books about Orangefield, or if you just feel like a fun, scary Halloween book, give this one a try.

I picked this one out my tbr pile back in October because it seemed to be geared towards Halloween. From the back blurb it appeared to be a spooky tale about a town plagued by the "Lord of Death" and creepy pumpkins. What it really was, however, was a hastily slapped together book containing three loosely related novellas (all of which had been printed elsewhere) which would've been fine if I were looking to read a collection of ho-hum poorly researched novellas but I wasn't.

I made it through the first story which I had a nagging feeling I'd read before. It was about a writer suffering through writer's block, a marriage that is falling apart and . . . bees. The ending drove me nuts as I saw it miles away and wondered why the protagonist never realized it. The author throws in his version of Samhain, whom he calls "The Lord of Death" and calls "Sam". Apparently, "Sam" is terrorizing the small town where the nasty bees and the not-so-bright writer live. Anyone with just a passing bit of knowledge about the celtic holiday Samhain will know that it is pronounced "Sow-en" not "Sam hain" so I pretty quickly lost all interest in this book. If you're going to write a book with a twist on a celtic holiday at least do the basic research and get the pronunciation correct, sheesh. But then I guess it would've been quite silly to go around calling your big scary evil villain "Sow". It didn't help that this story was extremely average and the follow up bored me so much that I couldn't get through it.

Orangefield is the pumpkin capital of the world. It is a town that lives for Halloween. A town that is home to Samhain, Lord of the Dead. This book is sort of a followup to HALLOW'S EVE (2004). Parts of the book were previously released in slightly different forms as "Hornets" (2001), "The Pumpkin" Boy (2005), and ORANGEFIELD (2002). The two short stories make up the first half of the book. First we have an author of children's horror stories who hits a writer's block one warm October until a promise changes everything. Next the hunt for some missing boys ties in to only kidnaping cases and a sophisticated robot.

Finally we get a longer story concerning three individuals who will play a part in leading the way for Samhain and his master. A young girl has become The Wizard. A young man with chemical imbalances does whatever the voices say. Finally, a veteran has become The Pumpkin Keeper to avoid memories of the war and what he did. These three and a town librarian are part of Samhain's plan. If Samhain succeeds, then his master will rule the world. But can even the Lord of the Dead predict just how humans will act? Will he be able to get them to do what is necessary to bring about the reign of his master? Well, you will have to read the book to find out.

The opening story was very good and chilling. The Pumpkin Boy was interesting but seemed to lack just a few paragraphs that could have realized its potential. The novella that makes up the rest of the book was a quick read but a little disappointing. Why is the girl now The Wizard? How is it anything other than just a name? I don't know. How did the young man's actions serve Samhain? We know Samhain told him to do them but not why. Only the veteran seemed clear from his actions. Who is Samhain's master? I expected more but didn't find it. This was a disappointment after the strength of the opening story. I was also disappointed at the way Halloween was portrayed. Here we have a town that practically worships the holiday and yet, on the day, people are distrusting and vandalism runs rampant. Sure didn't seem like a town that loved the holiday. There are good points to this book like the opening story but overall it was rather weak.

Al Sarrantonio wrote a series of books about Halloween, Samhain and a fictional town called Orangefield. The first was Halloweenland and the second was Hallows Eve. This is the third and is comprised of three novellas instead of being a full-length novel like the first two. The first two novellas are fairly short - about 100 pages each - and the third one is around 200 pages.

The first novella is about a children's author who has a hornet infestation in his house. There wasn't a lot of action but the ending made up for that. I liked the children's book he was writing about a character named Sam Hain. It reminded me of Sam from Trick 'r Treat.

The second novella is about Pumpkin Boy, a half-robot half-pumpkin creation. This was definitely the best of the three. It was creepy, fast-paced and had a conclusion I never saw coming. Sarrantonio should've made this story into a full-length novel and forgot about the other two novellas.

The third novella is about Samhain appearing to three citizens of Orangefield and telling them to do things in order for him to take over the world. There wasn't a lot of explanation in this one. I never fully understood how Samhain planned to take over the world through these people. It dragged along and had very little action (I think this is where I stopped reading last year). And the ending was so anticlimactic. Practically nothing happened at the end when I was expecting a big finish since the rest of the novella had so little action.

Overall, Sarrantonio is a good author, writing fantastic descriptions of Orangefield at Halloween. But his character development is lacking. I never cared about any of the characters in Horrorween.

It's an okay read for Halloween and definitely gets you in the spirit with all the pumpkin and jack-o-lantern descriptions. But if you're looking for something with lots of action and gore or something with interesting characters you might want to skip it.

Horrorween collects three novellas by Al Sarrantonio, all based in the town of Orangefield, NY, the pumpkin capital of the world. Aside from the town's reputation for pumpkins, Orangefield is also known for "Sam sightings", appearances by Samhain, the Celtic Lord of the Dead.

The first story, 'Hornets', deals with Phillip Kerlan, a popular author of children's horror stories. He is having trouble writing a Halloween-themed short story dealing with Samhain, the Lord of the Dead that doesn't come off as too scary for his young readers.

The stress of this writers block is causing strife in his marriage. He hits a bit of luck and completes the story in a single night only to wake up and find his wife has left him (or did she?)... All this during a particularly warm October.

A pleasant story, but a slightly different presentation would have made it much better. The problem is that the story is so simple that it telegraphs its twists (though the ending really was a surprise). Overall, 'Hornets' is a good story with a strong ending, but at almost a hundred pages was a little too long.

The second story 'The Pumpkin Boy' starts with a wallop as a young boy spies a mechanical man with a pumpkin for a head tramping through his back yard. He trails this 'pumpkin boy' through various pumpkin patches and into the woods until he is lost.

A strange and spooky story with a very, very well done atmosphere. It's unfortunately hamstrung by a terrible ending that felt like it was lifted from Scooby Doo.

The final section of the book is the novella Orangefield, which is also the best story of the book. We follow four separate characters through the month of October. They are all (to varying degrees) being influenced by Samhain, but to what purpose?

Each character's story was intriguing and the characters had enough depth to make me care about them.

Unlike 'Hornets', I was wishing Orangefield was a little longer. It could have easily been expanded into a novel. I would have liked a little more detail on what Samhain's plans were and maybe to spend a little more time expanding the characters.

I liked Mr. Sarrantonio's writing. He did a very good job of evoking autumn and the feeling of Halloween. The atmosphere he evoked reminded me a little of something Ray Bradbury would have done but didn't feel in any way like a swipe.

Each story had enough troubles to keep this from being a book I would really push, but it is a nice, not too deep read if you are looking for something suitably spooky in the days leading up to Halloween.