Customer Reviews

Temple: Incarnations

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Length:: 1:29 Mins

This is a story about a man named Temple, who awakens with amnesia, and calls himself Temple after the bible he finds in the motel room he wakes in. The story was a serialized novel in four parts. The first part tells about the world after The Fall, a plague that swept the earth and left everyone sick and the survivors in poverty. Temple is a sort of hero, but an anti-hero, as we find out quickly. In the first part a girl asks Temple to save her brother, who was taken away. Temple goes to look, finds out the boy when he is being brutally tortured and eventually killed; does nothing about it, and returns to the girl with no apologies. This is a slap in-the-face moment that leaves the reader thinking this guy is a jerk.

The next three parts are the travels of Temple to find out who he is and try to get his life back, which he does, after traveling to Paris and finally London. Although, it is not what he wants and the results is not what one expected. This isn't great work, but its good work, and a lot of fun to read. It's a dark fantasy, horror and a mystery story all combined into one. If you liked King Rat, Neverwhere or anything similar in style you'll like this book, even though it's much darker in tone.

After reading parts three and four of this novella in APEX DIGEST, I was looking forward to reading the whole story, especially parts one and two, which I'd missed. And certainly, there's some good nuggets in this novella: places where Savile's poetic prose sparkles and some real, gut-wrenching moments of horror.

But overall, the novella doesn't stand as a cohesive whole, and it's rather obvious the four parts of this story were written with little direction on the author's part, save of the author's intent to discover this main character of Temple, to learn who the man is and what the man's purpose in the post-apocalyptic world is. Appropriate, since that's the character's goal too. And I say this only because Savile's afterword makes his writing process clear. So in that regard, I think if Savile had gotten the chance to look over the novella as a whole, he may have been able to make the each part of the story gel a little better.

Still, for fans of Savile's work, particularly this set of stories, this book is a nice addition for their shelves. The original illustations from APEX DIGEST are added in this publication, so fans of Savile should be happy with this book.