Customer Reviews

Midnight Voices

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(22)
3 star:		(14)
2 star:		(14)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Suspense and murder set against the façade of an eerie New York apartment building form the backdrop for this latest novel from veteran author John Saul. When Caroline Evans' husband is murdered while jogging, her world is turned upside down. Trying to raise ten-year-old Ryan and twelve-year-old Laurie on the meager salary of an antique store employee, Caroline barely has enough money to survive. When she meets Tony Fleming, her circumstances seem to improve.

Upon their marriage, Caroline and her children move into Tony's apartment in The Rockwell, an ancient apartment building abounding with rumors of dead bodies and ghouls. Though many of the residents other than Tony are elderly, they seem unusually friendly towards the children even as Caroline begins to redecorate Tony's apartment. But Ryan's outspoken aversion to his kindly step-father and Laurie's nightmares put a damper on Caroline's newfound happiness. And when Laurie's sickness comes on the heels of the illness of their young neighbor Rebecca, Caroline begins investigating Tony's sacred study. The secrets she discovers there give Caroline a chilling sense of foreboding as Laurie's evil dreams intensify and she weakens further.

Mr. Saul has craftily executed the quintessential suspense/horror novel with the normality of the book's beginning being marred by the introduction of terrorizing elements. The mystery is a gradual evolution captivating the reader's attention. The only drawback is the somewhat abrupt ending after such a spellbinding build-up.

Normally, I'm not a great John Saul fan. I don't think he has the breadth of Stephen King. However, he does spin a good tale now and then. This is one of his better ones.

Saul does rely on a well worn formula: small family facing a hideous, supernatural foe. Unlike King, whose protagonists can come from any place in society, Saul seems to like all his characters to be graduates of Ivy League institutions and be upper middle class. I would like him to tackle a high-school dropout hero.

Nevertheless, Saul does introduce several plot developments that make this a decidedly above average book. I particularly liked then ending. He does capture the feeling of Manhatten. Other touches shows that Saul has really grown in his genre. A book worth reading.

When Caroline Evans's husband is murdered in Central Park, she thinks her life is over until she meets Tony Fleming a resident of a posh New York apartment building. Although her children are uneasy living in the Rockwell, Caroline hopes they will adjust with time. Although initially happy, her son and daughter are plagued by nightmares, and the building inhabitants are both cloying and creepy...Is the Rockwell more than it seems or are Caroline and the children just imagining things?

I picked up Midnight Voices only because it is narrated by my favorite narrator Aasne Vigesaa, and I was not disappointed. Aasne manages to capture the voices of Caroline Evans, her new husband Tony, and the creepy residents of the Rockwell apartment building to a T.

This book is not for the faint of heart, however. The residents of the Rockwell are truly terrible. Without giving details away, at times I was forced to fast forward certain scenes where torture was murder were described in detail. Fortunately these scenes were few. I had only a couple of peeves with this book. 1. Its never really clear what the ghoulish people in the Rockwell are doing with their victims. Also. Its never clear how they themselves got to be the way they are. 2. The key ring which Caroline has from the antique store is just a little too handy. Especially at the end. 3. Social Services never followed up with the Albions about Rebecca Mahew. 4. Finally, the residents of the Rockwell weren't too smart in their choice of victims.

Other than that, this was a compelling and gripping audiobook. I truly hope there is a sequel.

Neo-gothic thriller writer John Saul takes the creepy hotel out of his novel 'The Right Hand of Evil' and sets it down next to Central Park West and then moves the youth sucking old people from his novel 'Darkness' into it and cooks up with one of his most lukewarm offerings in years, Midnight Voices. The novel starts off farily well, with a murder and a nightmare sequence that may or may not be an actual nightmare. Then its all downhill from there. By the fifty page mark it is clear to the genre savvy reader just what is going on in The Rockwell (that not too subtle ironic name, think Norman, is about as witty as Saul gets) and the reader must work through another two hundred or so pages before the characters figure out the plainly obvious, that evil inhabits The Rockwell. Not helping is that it is evil we have seen done before, to death, in better told tales. Longtime fans of Saul will no doubt read this out of obligation, but others will put it down long before the heroes figure out the danger they are in.

Caroline Evans, recently widowed has a lot on her plate. Her two young children, Ryan, 11 and Laurie, 13 chafe at their financial reversal. They are no longer able to attend the private school where they had established peer relationships; at the public school they now attend they often feel slighted.

Caroline's fortune appears to change at a chance encounter in a park. A casual conversation with a seemingly interested person leads her literally to love. She is soon introduced to Tony Fleming, a sophisticated gentleman who lives in Central Park West in a building many describe as being haunted. Shortly after their wedding, the family of four settles into the "haunted house" and frightening events become the norm. Only Ryan appears to be aware of the senior population and how they appear to be rejuvenating; even a portrait on the ceiling appears to reflect the ages of the established occupants.

The quest for youth appears to be the priority of the building's residents. Children disappear and the question is who and what is responsible. Is Tony what he seems? And does he really know Caroline and her children before he married her?

This chilling story will certainly keep readers engrossed until that last page is read.

John Saul uses a really old and worn out plot line: Old people sucking the life out of young people to stay alive (and young) forever. The worst part is that the author makes you SUFFER through endless, obvious, and repetitive "clues" that the main character keeps ignoring. The "evil" old people living in the apartment building are soooooo over-the-top evil that you expect them to finish each sentence with "Mu-ha-ha-ha". For example, in nearly all of the chapters of the book, some evil old lady brings "strange tasting" cookies/candy/or fudge for the children to eat(daily), but insists that the mother NOT try any ("it isn't good for your figure deary"...Mu-ha-ha-ha). The kids eat the fudge, get loopy and go to bed at like 5PM. At the stroke of midnight (because that's when crappy stories get spooky) the kids proceed to have "dreams" that the old people in the building are standing in their bedrooms touching them inappropriately (no joke) - Oh, and saying subtle things like "Shhh, I think she's awake. Quick, give her some more fudge! Mu-ha-ha-ha". The mother doesn't get suspicious until the old people in the building (totally serious...no joke) tie her to a bed and dope her up for several days. Ok, hold on because even then, she still wants to give them the "benefit of the doubt". When one of the immortal old people finally gets killed, he immediately decomposes. Can you imagine? What an original idea.

I've read many a John Saul book yet I have never run into this particular problem. I was bored beyond the first few chapters, I agree with the other reviewers when they made the point that Mr. Saul tried to hard to make his main character liked. Her daughter is totally forgettable and her son is an utter hellion. It was very predictable, one reason for that were the typical characters. The irate Social worker, and the gastrological challenged Detective.

Not only that the actual method the spooky cronies were using to extract whatever juice from the children is never really explained. Vague descriptions gore and of the shadowy shapes that are committing these acts.

All in all it was an extremely irritating (dare I say painful) book to actually finish. After closing the book I vowed to write a review so no one would make the same mistake I made in buying this book. I know Mr. Saul can do better than this.

Since the sudden, tragic death of her husband, Caroline Evans is left alone to raise her two children in New York City. As Caroline struggles to pay her bills, she also has to cope with her son's hostility over his father's death. Just as she believes she has reached the darkest place in her life, Caroline meets Anthony Fleming, a charming man who wins her heart.

Shortly after their meeting, Caroline and Anthony wed, and he moves her into his apartment building, the building known as The Rockwell has it's own history, and the stories surrounding it are those of vampires and witches.

Once Caroline and her children move into The Rockwell they will be plagued with nightmares, and soon her daughter will become sick, and her son will grow angry towards his new step-father. What has Caroline gotten herself into? Can this building possess true evil? And, is the man she calls her husband, the man she loves, a monster?

As Caroline begins to investigate the strange occurrences, and disappearances surrounding The Rockwell she uncovers dark secrets about Anthony's past, secrets that are best left unlearned.

`Midnight Voices' is not the best novel from John Saul, while it does have some creepy moments, the novel suffers from too many characters and not enough surprises. A John Saul novel is usually very entertaining, and although `Midnight Voices' picks up the pace about half-way through, it drags along with various sub-plots, and the introduction of back-round on too characters.

John Saul has written much better this, he still is one of the better writers in the horror field, but next time he should concentrate on the thrills, and suspense, as found in some of his earlier work; `The Homing', `Black Lightning', `Right Hand Of Evil', and `Night Shade'.

Nick Gonnella

When Brad Evan's was killed while jogging in Central Park at night, he had ignored the feeling he was being watched for the past ten weeks. His death leaves his widow Caroline broken hearted and broke. She takes a job working in an antique store where she meets Irene Delamond who lives at the Rockwell at 100 Central Park West, a building more exclusive than the Dakota.

Irene takes an immediate liking to Caroline and decides to set her up with Anthony Fleming, one of the Rockwell tenants. Within a year, Carolina marries Anthony and she and her children from her first marriage move into 100 Central Park West where the tenants, most of them elderly, take an extraordinary interest in the two youngsters. It isn't until Caroline stumbles upon something terrifying in her husband's office at home that she realizes that Anthony and his friends want something more from her and the children than friendship.

Fans of Stephen King and Dean Koontz will be thrilled with the latest offering of John Saul. MIDNIGHT VOICES is a chilling work of horror that slowly but believably builds toward an inevitable climax. Readers will love Caroline who will do whatever it takes to protect her children from those malevolent Dorian Gray like beings wearing the mask of mortality.

Harriet Klausner

The novel had enough terrorizing scenes and enough gore to make it a page turner for horror fans, but there are a few problems with it. First, I think Saul went overboard with "down on her luck " nature of the lead character Caroline. Her husband was murdered (that part is necessary), she is running out of money, she hates her boss because her boss is SO unfair, the bills are piling up, she struggles to make time for her kids, blah blah blah. It seems as if Saul is down on his knees begging us to like his main character. But his descritions and development of the old people in the Rockwell building and the building itself are deliciously eery. I did find the book a little on the predictable side. The reader will figure out most of the story about halfway through, if not earlier. All in all, it was a fun novel to read, but one I wont remember six months from now.