Customer Reviews

The Hour Before Dark

5 star:		(40)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

Douglas Clegg has established himself as one of the strongest and most original voice of modern horror fiction. His books aren't about how much blood can be shed on each page, or how many characters can be killed in the story. His stories are about real people faced with greater-than-life situations, situations that often tangle with the paranormal.

The Hour Before Dark is undoubtedly one of Clegg's best. The book quietly written (it isn't about shock value) and brilliantly executed. He slowly but constantly builds up the suspense until, in the end, you realize that it has reached sky-high levels.

The story concentrates on Nemo, a man who returns to his family house (situated on an island) where his father has been murdered. There, he finds his sister Brooke, a strange and sligthly disturbed young woman, and his brother Bruno, a no-nonsense kind of guy. As they are brought together to face their past (and also the present), their family house becomes alive with energy. And the only way for them to face this evil will be to play what they call 'the dark game', a game their father thought them, a game that must be played in the hours before dark, a game that can be dangerous and deadly. The very game that made all of this begin in the first place.

This novel has many great and creepy moments that you will not soon forget. It is a tour-de-force of horror suspense that will leave your breathless. The pacing is amazing, as the suspense builds constantly, never stopping, until the very end (and even in its final pages, the suspense rises again). And the ending itself is simply perfect.

The Hour Before Dark will be this year's best horror novel. Read it before everyone else does!

If Stephen King is the "Master of Horror," then Douglas Clegg (author of THE NIGHTMARE HOUSE, INFINITY, BREEDER, and YOU COME WHEN I CALL YOU) is definitely the "Prince of the Macabre!" In Mr. Clegg's newest book, THE HOUR BEFORE DARK, he takes us to Burnley Island, which is just off the coast of Massachusetts and is the home of Gordie Raglan, the owner of the Hawthorn property. When Gordie is brutally murdered by a psychopathic killer and his body later discovered in the property's smokehouse by his daughter, Brooke, the local police are soon stumped as to who could have committed such a heinous crime. The oldest son of the Raglan clan, Nemo, returns home to be with Brooke, and his younger brother, Bruno, hoping that the three of them will be able to figure out who killed their father. It isn't long, however, before something very dangerous in the Hawthorn house causes long forgotten memeories to rise to the surface in the minds of the three siblings. To save their sanity and their lives, Nemo, and his sister and brother will have to delve into the past to find the answers to their father's secrets and to the Dark Game that they used to play as children. THE HOUR BEFORE DARK is a powerful testament to the writing skill of Douglas Clegg. This is an author who knows how to grab the reader by the jugular in the first few pages and not let go till he's gotten the very last drop of blood out of us. He writes characters that are fully formed with the same fears and desires and psychological problems as our closest friends. Well, maybe not the same fears and maybe a lot more in the way of mental disorders. All three of the Raglan children have trouble loving and trusting and being close to another human being; but, then again, don't we all? Mr. Clegg also has a unique talent in being able to show the innocence of childhood with flashbacks and how quickly it can be taken away without a second's notice. And, yes, the atmosphere of the Hawthorn house has been created to perfection with its strange eeriness, beckoning shadows, and unexplainable voices that come from out of nowhere. One can easily imagine death lurking around every corner, anxious to claim its next victim. As for the Raglans, the author has structured a family with very special secrets...secrets that can kill like a sharp knife through an eye socket. This makes THE HOUR BEFORE DARK the ideal Halloween gift for those of you yearning to experience the true essence of fear!

The Hour Before Dark is Douglas Clegg's best novel to date. It begins with Gordie Raglan's brutal murder in a small island town in New England. His sons, Nemo and Bruno, come to the house to comfort their sister, Brooke, who is considered a suspect.
The killing stirs up painful memories for Nemo. His mind keeps flashing back to the day his mother left the family. Then there is the "Brain Fart", which left a week-long hole in the memories of all three children. Nemo blames this on the Dark Game (taught to them by their father in the smokehouse where he was murdered) that went a little too far. The gap continues to bug Nemo, along with his sister's increasingly bizarre behavior.
Bruno isn't faring too well, either. He hates his father for the way he punished them. Nemo tries to gloss over those incidents, blaming his mother's desertion for his father's violent temper. As he cooperates with the police and pacifies his sister, he finds himself both drawn to and repelled by the smokehouse. He doesn't believe the town's theory that a serial killer had struck his father down. Something far more sinister and evil had killed Gordie, and it was still in the house, tormenting them with nightmares about a woman who held a striking resemblence to their mother. Brooke's deteriorating mental state forces the brothers to carry her to the smokehouse to play the Dark Game one last time, to banish the demon that is preying on them.
What they received was a horrifying replay of the past, which they barely escaped from. Clegg did an excellent job with the climax. That scene was one of the most harrowing, breath-holding scenes I've read in my life. Highly recommended.

When a good author writes their masterpiece of a novel, it is truly a fascinating experience for the lucky reader. Mr. Clegg has given us, what I feel, to be his best work yet (and I'm sure not the last). The Hour Before Dark is at once mysterious, intriguing and compelling. He lures you down the path of pages, teasing you just enough so you must keep flipping pages, damn the risk for papercuts!

I delve into the haunted world of Nemo as the mysteries unraveled and the tensions heightened. I could not put this book down.

The brutal murder of his father brings Nemo Raglan back to Hawthorn, the house on the small New England island he has fled many years before, for reasons he only partially understands. He is reunited with his younger brother, Bruno, and his beautiful sister, Brooke, whose fragile emotional state seems headed for a mental breakdown.

The three siblings are bound by the childhood traumas of their mother's desertion, their father's punishment in the ancient stone smokehouse where he was murdered and the Dark Game, the secret game they had played in childhood, whose hypnotic embrace they have never escaped.

In THE HOUR BEFORE DARK, Douglas Clegg peels back the layers of a family's dark past to reveal a hideous secret. Within the walls of Hawthorn lie the clues to a mystery that has haunted the two brothers and their sister from childhood and to the supernatural evil that is slowly taking over their lives.

Douglas Clegg won both the Bram Stoker Award and the International Horror Guild Award for his short story collection THE NIGHTMARE CHRONICLES. Now In his finest literary effort to date, Clegg establishes himself firmly as one of the leading authors in the horror genre. He pulls the reader in immediately and builds suspense until it's hard to breathe. Great characterization that puts the reader inside the skins of the leading characters, pacing that gradually builds to a shocking climax, intriguing setting and a haunting mystery combine to make this one of the best novels I've read in a long time. Writing as Shannon Riley, I had the privilege of being the first reviewer to cover this book for a top horror magazine, and I am happy to report that it is now a strong contender for a 2002 Bram Stoker Award.

If you love horror, hold onto your chair; THE HOUR BEFORE DARK is a powerhouse of a read.

This was my fiirst Clegg title. I'd heard it was his best, and it definitely didn't let me down. The nice thing about it is that it relies heavily on atmosphere and social issues, rather than gore and blood.

Which is not to say it isn't bloody. It most certainly is, but the blood is shown only peripherally, which gives it a darker feel. What really is the most terrifying is whether or not the characters are losing thier minds.

This is a dysfunctional family to say the least. Yet, somehow, Clegg lets us know that it is not their fault. Slowly and surely he lets us into their past, and the messed up home life that transformed them into walking mental patients: The writer who can't keep a relationship, the gay little brother who is beyond surly, the sleepwalking sucidal sister. And the memory of a mother who walked out on her family when they were just kids. And of course the father, now a collection of body parts in the town morgue.

Clegg is one of the few writers who seems able to trust that his audience is smart, and he doesn't go for cliches as a result. The book doesn 't end like a traditional novel, it just sort of ends, which for me, rang truer to life.

My one problem involved a part of the mystery that Clegg stretched out over the novel. I won't go into it since it's a spoiler, but I had it figured out very early on, as I can only assume most readers did. It's didn't hurt the novel, but it wasn't the big revelation it was supposed to be when that scene came.

Lastly, the style of this novel is fantastic. It doesn't flow from page to page like traditional novles, it sort of cuts about, jumping from scene to scene. There may be three different moments on a page, separated by page breaks. In that sense it feels like a movie, it makes it a very quick read.

I highly recommend to anyone who likes dark, sad stories.

When 28-year-old narrator Nemo Raglan's father is brutally murdered, Nemo returns to his island home for the first time in a decade. Why isn't exactly clear; he was fond of his father and close to his younger brother and sister, but for some reason he hasn't much spoken to them or seen them in years.

Their mother ran off when Nemo was nine and nothing has been heard from her since. She was an exotic creature and never really accepted by the insular islanders. His sister, Brooke, still lives on the island; his brother, Bruno, hasn't found his path yet, but he's only 23. Not that Nemo's life is so great - he wrote a novel a few years previously, but has nothing in the works and no great career. No reason, really, why he shouldn't have visited his father before he was so horribly killed in the family's old smokehouse.

Clegg builds his story incrementally and Nemo's narration has an eerie affect; an unevenness, almost a stutter. He adds details, then leaves great holes, or wanders off the subject, even contradicts himself, but in small ways. This is annoying at first, as if the author had lost his place and his editor had fallen down on the job, but persevering readers will be rewarded. The atmosphere builds as chunks of childhood come back - to haunt. And some kind of ghost stalks the rambling old Raglan house at night, unless it's just the increasingly unbalanced Brooke.

Then there's the Brain Fart - a week in the children's lives that went missing somehow - they all had fevers, some kind of illness, and they've made something of an uneasy joke of it since. And there's the Dark Game, a weird imagination-meditation game taught to them by their war-hero father who used it to keep himself going as a POW.

The details of the murder emerge gradually, painting an increasingly horrible picture, alongside the stranger and stranger details of the children's almost claustrophobic island lives. Clegg ("The Infinite") heightens the suspense as he sparely constructs a creepy New England atmosphere, composed of old families with old secrets, old buildings with forgotten corners and convincing, intense characters. Some elements are predictable (in a satisfying way) and the climax pulls out all the stops. Scarily good.

Clegg writes yet another horror novel that keeps you on the edge of your seat.

When Nemo has to return to his childhood home after his father's brutal murder he finds himself defending his sister because everyone believes that she killed her father. Someone, or something had a score to settle with the old man. Surely nothing human could have committed such a heinous act? But what, or who is responsible for what happened that night? Find out what dark secrets the woods, and the family, hold. Remember, The Dark Game has started, and once the sun goes down, it can't be stopped. When the sun goes down, The Dark Game, becomes very, very real.

If you haven't heard of Douglas Clegg, I just have to wonder where you've been. Aside from using some of the most innovative and fan-interactive marketing techniques, Clegg is one of horror's modern masters! Whip out your plastic and buy a title or two and you'll see what I mean. The Hour Before Dark was a fantastic experience. It kept me at the edge of my seat the entire time, just dying to find out what happened next. Rich characterizations, engrossing plot, ideal setting, what can I say other than "WOW"! Oh, what's with my title of this review? You'll just have to read the book to find out!

Clegg hasd written some of the best fiction in the genre for close to a decade. And THE HOUR BEFORE DARK may be his best! Dealing with past family crimes that come to a head in a pretty fantastic climax, with characters that are real and stay true throughout the book, and a father figure that is straight out of mine and many other's lives and you've got a novel you can't and won't want to put down! Simply stated Clegg always raises the standard of horror and puts his own identifying spin on classic topics in the genre. Read anything by Clegg as soon as possible, he is that good. And please don't let the bomb reviews sway your opinion, these were left by a very jealous writer who is known to tear down successful writers' books as his own languish in the remainder bin and gather well-deserved dust!