I wasn't there when i died (Nobody True - James Herbert)

Member Name: jenki2

Product:	Nobody True - James Herbert
Date:	20/12/08 (24 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: murder mystery, first person style, hardback

Disadvantages: Cheesy Ending

Nobody True - James Herbert - No price taken out of library

Nobody True is the story about a young man, James (Jim) True who throughout his life suffered from Out of Body Experiences. During one of these experiences (OBE's) he is murdered and mutilated... But he doesn't feel dead, he doesn't act dead.... So what's going on?

I'll stop with the plot spoilers there as I don't want to ruin it; yes I want you to go read it yourself! (Or check out the Amazon reviews, I almost spoiled the ending myself there)

I want to start with Herbert's style of writing, I love it, I am a big fan of first person style novels as I feel it draws you even further into authors mind. I almost felt like I was with Jim in his travels and part of his life, I knew his family and friends I was totally immersed in his world.

Nobody true is set in London so a lot of the places are familiar and thus easy to envisage. I built up a pretty strong image in my mind of the characters and places. Herbert does well to explain his surroundings and characters in a way that doesn't distract too much from the storyline. It subtly blends in making it easy to become part of his world.

The only distraction this novel had was random footnotes that to me seemed pointless and broke up the storyline. He places these footnotes at random points throughout the book, they go on to explain aspects which could easily have been explained in the storyline. It irritated me as I would lose my place in the book and ended up having to re-read each paragraph after reading, the mostly useless, footnotes.

Considering this book is a horror novel its pretty easy reading, yes there is murder, mutilation, necrophilia and general goriness but it's not enough to give you nightmares, no, no if anything it plucks at your heartstrings as you feel the helplessness of Jim trying to protect his wife and young daughter from a serial killer only he knows about.

But this review isn't all good, now this next bit might just be my pure hatred of cheesy things (Thoughts of Dr Who and Rose Tyler churn my insides).... But this book has a cheesy ending... A VERY cheesy ending so much so that I threw the book down and went on a 5 minute rant about how the ending ruined the tense, emotional, fearful horror story... I'll admit it was comforting at times but pure, 100% cheese.

All in all I was pleasantly surprised by this book; I think my colleague was also surprised by how much I liked it. I told him I wasn't a fan of horror and when I came into work with raving reviews (minus the last chapter) he was pretty blown away. I definitely recommend this book it is very easy to read and incredibly entertaining the world outside was lost when I was in this book.

Summary: I wasn't there when I died, now how do I save my family. James Herberts Nobody True is fantastic