Customer Reviews

Oktober

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

 

 

I first read this when it came out in paperback years ago. It was my second novel of Stephen's after the amazing Valley of Lights. This was the one that secured my admiration of his books.
I loved the sense of place that he evokes and the rising desperation of a man out of his depth against a powerful pharmaceutical company.
At the time I was studying Chemistry at university and it struck a chord. It is, if anything, more relevant in this day and age.
Some people have criticised the ending for leaving matters in the air but for me it's the main thing I remembered prior to re-reading it. At the time it did what a good novel should and got me thinking. It certainly made me want to buy his next novel.
Which is what I did - I'm proud to say I have read every novel he has published since.
These new ebook versions mean I can have his whole back-catalogue in one easy place. One of the few authors I will make time to re-read!

I really enjoyed it. Oktober plays with an impressive cauldron of genres. While clearly paced and written like a thriller, the plot is backed up with a weight of scientific knowledge and a disturbing, beautifully-realised supernatural element. One Amazon reviewer mentioned that the only 'real danger' occurs when the protagonist 'tries to find out what happened to him', but I disagree. Jim is in constant danger from the outset, from others and his own personal demons. The world is out to get him, and something is always breathing down his neck. The use of multiple strands, following a wide cast of characters, allows the reader a glimpse of the broader effects of his actions (and of those pursuing him). Though there is some fairly substantial technical jargon to wade through and some of the characters that are not given enough page time to fully form, the book never becomes too complex or boring. It's tough, cool and definitely worth a look.

I enjoyed Gallagher's supernatural thriller "Valley of Lights" so when I found "Oktober" I decided to check it out. The plot, about a man, Jim, who is injected with a mysterious drug, sounded interesting, but the story was not well crafted at all. The first problem is that Jim never seems to be in any real danger. He's just having occasional nightmares. The only real danger is when he starts to try to find out what happened to him. The pharmaceutical company has some big conspiracy against him, but the potential of this plot is never fully realized, and the same is true for most of the subplots. The result is a mix of rather uninteresting, slow paced plot elements, leading up to a rather confusing ending. Not recommended.

I read and enjoyed Stephen Gallagher's RED, RED ROBIN, so I was looking forward to getting into his OKTOBER novel. Unfortunately, I was disappointed. RED, RED ROBIN did a much better job of placing us inside the heads and minds of its characters. OKTOBER seemed much more interested in moving its players around the European settings, and I felt that the book was the poorer for it.

The story begins with an ordinary man being injected with an experimental drug. Literally brought back from death, Jim Harper is now dealing with the strange side effects. Along the way, he meets various characters loosely related to what happened to him as he attempts to unravel the mystery surrounding the drug and the company that created it. He encounters various stock conspiracy scenarios, and none of them feel particularly inspired.

OKTOBER is nominally a thriller, but it just feels like it's going through the motions. The book never lets us build up towards anything, as the characters are just drifting through the narrative. There are just too many aimless story elements present. There's a computer hacking subplot that goes nowhere. A possible blackmail scheme just fizzles. And the experimental drug side effects (greatly hyped by the back cover) are mere window-dressing, and, while some of the hints dropped about them are intriguing, they ultimately lead nowhere.

While I can't say that I liked the book as a whole, there were definitely enjoyable pieces of it. Gallagher's prose is quite effective, and there are some passages that sparkle. In particular, a handful of dream sequences are shockingly vivid, and reminded me of why I liked RED, RED ROBIN so much. Unfortunately, there weren't enough of these to resurrect the book for me, yet there were enough of them for me to give Gallagher another chance.