Michael Griffin (4)
Auteur de The Lure of Devouring Light
Pour les autres auteurs qui s'appellent Michael Griffin, voyez la page de désambigüisation.
Œuvres de Michael Griffin
An Ideal Retreat 1 exemplaire
Oeuvres associées
The Children of Old Leech: A Tribute to the Carnivorous Cosmos of Laird Barron (1800) — Contributeur — 73 exemplaires
Étiqueté
Partage des connaissances
- Sexe
- male
- Lieux de résidence
- Portland, Oregon, USA
Membres
Critiques
Prix et récompenses
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Auteurs associés
Statistiques
- Œuvres
- 5
- Aussi par
- 13
- Membres
- 67
- Popularité
- #256,179
- Évaluation
- 4.0
- Critiques
- 4
- ISBN
- 50
- Langues
- 2
Are these four characters the last survivors of some apocalyptic disaster? Are they human guinea pigs in a strange experiment? They don’t know and we don’t know either. Mark – from whose perspective we seem to see things – suffers from strange memory gaps, perhaps induced by the medication. There are glimpses of hazy memories, hints suggesting a very different past. The quartet explore the levels of the bunker, trying to understand their situation and to possibly find a means of escape. We look on, as lost and perplexed as they are.
At first, this book reads like a literary equivalent of the “Big Brother” reality show. In close, enforced confinement, tempers fray, tensions simmer, occasionally overstepping into violence. Friendships are made and unmade, desire waxes and wanes. As the novella progresses, however, we realise that the claustrophobic horror portrayed does not exist merely an individual level, but also on a cosmic one. Tellingly, Griffin slips in references to Norse sagas. Whilst these mythical undertones initially seem out of place in a sci-fi scenario, they suggest that Armageddon House should be read as an existential fable, possibly representing our constant struggle to understand the human predicament – Where do we come from? What are we? Where are we going?
Whether the book works for you or not depends, of course, on what scale of “weird” you like your “fiction” to be. In some ways, Griffin’s novella reminded me of I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman. I feel that, like Harpman’s book, Armageddon House is a “novel(la) as thought experiment”. Narratively, it leaves too many questions unanswered. I find this frustrating but other readers, of course, might not – some might even delight in the ambiguities. Beyond the bare bones of the plot, however, the novella raises haunting, philosophical questions which cannot be easily dismissed and this is where its strength lies.
3.5*
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