The Glooming

     The Glooming by John Triptych.

     The Glooming is a Post-Apocalyptic/Mythological thriller.

     Sorry this post is a day late.  My son broke his elbow last night when I was in the middle of writing the review.  We spent a couple hours in the instacare center, then the rest of the evening trying to get him comfortable and settled.  I didn't get back to this until today.

     Okay, quick synopsis.  It's the end of the world.  Ancient creatures from folk-lore and myth appear in random places throughout the world.  People go crazy and swarm ancient worshiping spots, and then the area is transformed into a blackout zone where no technology works, sand storms, or clouds obscure vision, and these nightmarish creatures appear and destroy anyone who stands in their way.  The military is helpless against them.

     A runaway, 15 year-old girl named Tara (one of our protagonists), befriends a spirit-guide-like talking dog.  She ran away from an abusive home, and is almost unaware of the apocalypse going on around her.  The dog halfheartedly guides and protects her for the fight ahead.

     I went into this book really excited.  I was thinking, "The Mummy," or something similar because it begins with a mythological professor being recruited to investigate strange creatures who first appeared in Iraq.  The first couple chapters were really shaping up to be a great story.  Then, it took a turn for the worse.  Mr. Triptych has a weird view of how people act.  It's like reading the things people write in the comments section on the internet which they would never say or do in person because even the most snarky person knows that there are some things you just don't say or do in society.  I get what he was trying to do with the many stories of how the apocalypse came to different people, but the whole thing just rubbed me the wrong way.  I can't really put my finger on it.  There's a lot of racism, stereotypes, and open ridicule of religious beliefs.  It's also bloody/gory, with a few accounts of children's deaths, so not for the squeamish.  If you can get past the first eight chapters without being offended, or feeling ostracized, you'll probably enjoy the book a lot more than I did.

     The book jumps around about every chapter until you get halfway through, and then it starts to follow a cohesive story-line.  I've seen this done before; seemingly random events that all tie together at the end, and it can be done very well, but by the time the story hones in on Tara and Gyle's  (the protagonists), you're pretty lost.  It didn't meld well for me.

     This is probably the worst rating I've given an indie book.  I try to like them because I know how hard it can be to go it alone without much feedback, but I sincerely did not like the story-line.  It wasn't cohesive enough, the characters didn't feel real to me.  There could have been a lot more censorship.  I've read books with all of the horrific things Mr. Triptych described, and they didn't bother me as bad.  The only thing I can think is that he needed to introduce us to him more as an author before he started jamming the cruelty of the world down our throats.

     Sadly, I have to give the book.