Will you ever get anOTHER chance to right your wrongs? (Others - James Herbert)

Member Name: chrissypops

Product:	Others - James Herbert
Date:	21/06/01 (81 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Will keep you turning the pages, very indepth, a true horror as its based on fact

Disadvantages: Very in depth, keep you up all night, youll be sleeping with the lights on

I have had this book for about 6 mths believe it or not, sitting on my bookshelf, waiting, wanting to be read. I picked it up in a cheap book shop intending to start reading it as soon as I got it home. I'm not sure why but it got pushed to the back and in front came a few books in which I had read some good opinions, here on Dooyoo. Due out in the next few months, is the next book in the long line of books that the king of horror has written. Others being his most recent book, but he has written well over 20 books since the early 80s.


Well I am ashamed in leaving this book unread for so long. After starting it last week, I have now finished it, awe-struck. I wasnt all that sure when I started it. The first chapter was a little weird, starting in fact in what I would call Hell. This first chapter describes a man, a condemned man at that, within the reaches of Hell itself. You can almost feel the pain this man is in. His remorse, his pity, his repentance in what he did in his previous life. His man, his identity unknown was filled with dread. He didnt know how long he'd been there for, how long he was going to bed there for, but you can almost, almost hear him scream. His man was visited by two figures and after consideration, careful thought and probably spitefulness, gave his pitiful man his judgement.

In the second chapter and there after there is a great change in the book. You are thrown from Hell into the modern day world, into the life of Nick Dismas. Dis ( as his friends call him) worked as a Private Investigator. Learning the tricks of the trade from the dark side of the neighbourhood, Dis set up his own business with three others, Henry, Philo and Ida. These associates became very dear friends to Dis, even through his crippling disabilities. I shall not tell you what sort of disability Dis has, but believe you me James Herbert will tell you all.


Dis worked for many years as a private Investigator, the usual mun
dane stuff. Wives wanting to catch their unfaithful husbands, husbands who wanted to catch their wives being unfaithful. Repossesion work, whether it was houses, flats or cars. Missing persons ...Missing persons, it was this that was too change Mr Dismas's life ..forever.



One morning a lady, Shelly Ripstone came into the office imploring him to take on a case of her missing son. Easy enough he thought. Shelly had just lost her husband, he died a few week previously. She wanted to find her missing son which was taken away from her after she gave birth. Shelly told Dis that she had a very strong feeling that her son wasn't dead, like the doctors had told her, but alive somewhere. Shelly also went on to tell him that she had even seen a spiritualist, Louise Broomfield. Louise had even confirmed that her son was calling out to Louise, pleading with her to find him. Was Louise leading Shelly astray? Or did she pick up on something? Dis was a little puzzled by all this. Why would a women who gave birth to a child who died after child birth, why is she looking for him?


After a few false starts and quite a few dead ends, Dis managed to get more than he bargained for. One particular morning met Shelly Ripstone, Louise Broomfield at Shelly's home. This visit was purely to get more information from Shelly Ripstone. All he had was that eighteen years ago, her child was taken away from Dartford General Hospital. He had nothing else. So he was going to try and encourage her as painful as it was, to try and remember maybe a doctors name or anything he could go on.

Unfortunately while on his investigations he found that the hospital had burnt to the ground. Other hospitals didnt have any information either as they only kept upto ten years.

After probing into the this lady's past something very strange happens. Since he had took on this case the nightmares began, gently nudging, probing into his consciousne
ss. With Louise as a spiritualist, she started to get the feeling that someone was drawing them on in this bizarre case.

While Dis was asking questions things started to move in the room, as if a small storm was brewing. So gently it started, no one noticed. Then as Shelly Ripstone recalled the midwife's image in her minds eye, both Dis and Louise started to hear voices, calls for help, moaning and the sound of wings. Dis was very apprehensive as nothing had ever happened like this to him before. He thought maybe it was all the stuff he took while he was a teenager until Louise verified that she could here them too. Suddenly Dis was up on his feet, screaming, telling the voices to get out of his head and in a rush he rushed to the mirror in the hall. Dis could see nothing but wings, not his own image but wings, he could hear them flapping, could feel the movement of air. Suddenly it all stopped. Shelly Ripstone called out that she remembered the midwife's name it was Vogel, Hildergarde Vogel.

This was the beginning for Dis, his research lead him to a old people home, mysteriously located, in the middle of no where. Perfect Rest supposed to be a nursing home ....but was it? Its here that Dis discovers the dark secret of "Others" and finally he will resolve his own sad, mutated existence.

"Others" definitely stands up to James Herbert's usual standard of horror. But unlike some of his books this one is slightly different. Herbert states in the back of the book that the story is based on a true incident that occurred in a childrens hospital in London some years ago. The things that were described at the end of the book, and I'm not going to divulge, were from actual medial case histories. I think and I'm sure that after you have read this book, its that fact that's truly horrific. "Others" is more of a psychological horror, working on the terrors of your imagination, then out right gor
y horror.


The description in this book is as usual very in depth. In some places Herbert tends to get lost in his profound describing. If you are a person that reads but doesn't take it all in, you might find you will get a little lost. "Others" isn't hard going at all, the plot is easy to follow, but if you dont like to see whats in the book, surroundings in great detail, people described from outside to inside, then this isn't for you. You have to concentrate and its one of those books that I couldn't watch TV and read it at the same time. Believe me I have done that more than once and still followed the book. You need 100% for this book, but its worth it. Just watch for the twists and turns and dont worry if the first chapter at the beginning makes no sense, it will at the end. If you want to be scared out of your wits, then read this, sleep with the lights on and dont forget to cover the mirrors.

Summary: