Sign in with Facebook
Loading...
27th out of 167 books
—
27 voters
The Doll Who Ate His Mother
A freak automobile accident leaves Rob, Clare's brother, dead. Someone has stolen his right arm, and Clare's investigation into the bizarre event leads her into a realm of untold horrors.
Paperback, 288 pages
Published
August 28th 1985
by Tor Books / Tom Doherty Assoc
(first published 1976)
Friend Reviews
To see what your friends thought of this book,
please sign up.
Community Reviews
(showing
1-30
of
595)
Not since H.P. Lovecrafthas there been such a master of the macabre on the literary scene as Ramsey Campbell.
Clare Frayn is a stumpy little school-teacher whose only seeming grace is the understanding and love she has for Rob, her wild, undisciplined brother. Late one night, knowing that her brakes are faulty, she drives him home through the rain-drenched streets of Liverpool. A man steps in front of her car. Her brakes fail, and in her wild maneuvering to bring the car back under control, Rob i...more
Clare Frayn is a stumpy little school-teacher whose only seeming grace is the understanding and love she has for Rob, her wild, undisciplined brother. Late one night, knowing that her brakes are faulty, she drives him home through the rain-drenched streets of Liverpool. A man steps in front of her car. Her brakes fail, and in her wild maneuvering to bring the car back under control, Rob i...more
I’d only read Ramsey Campbell’s shorter fiction before this but had always been hugely impressed with his distinctly British tales, but I can’t say I was blown away by this 1976 novel. The chief problem is that Campbell doesn’t grasp the characters and make them convincing, they never achieve depth and sometimes their motivations are frankly baffling. Of course, a bunch of stereotypes and ciphers working their way through a scary situation is something horror cinema does ad nauseam, but in horro...more
The second best thing about this book is its title.
The best thing is an incident in the first chapter. After a car crash, the first person on the scene, rather than offering help, steals the severed arm of one of the victims who subsequently bleeds to death.
After that there is a so-so tale of a true crime writer, the sister of the man with the stolen arm, another man whose mother was eaten on after dying of a heart attack, and a young hippie street performer. (This was written in 1976.) About ha...more
The best thing is an incident in the first chapter. After a car crash, the first person on the scene, rather than offering help, steals the severed arm of one of the victims who subsequently bleeds to death.
After that there is a so-so tale of a true crime writer, the sister of the man with the stolen arm, another man whose mother was eaten on after dying of a heart attack, and a young hippie street performer. (This was written in 1976.) About ha...more
Jul 04, 2010
Rowan MacBean
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
horror fans
Recommended to Rowan by:
Stephen King
I had some doubts about this book pretty far into it, but I'm glad I gave it a chance and finished it. I realized the major plot twist ("at it were," as the author himself says in the afterword) almost the moment it was possible and I thought I was going to have to be bored through more than half of the book until it was revealed at the end. Fortunately, it's actually revealed to the reader and the characters about two-thirds of the way through, and it's dealt with at length instead of in half a...more
This was an interesting one--I was not loving it at the beginning because it was throwing me off kilter a lot but that came to be a part of the fun. A very quick read, 153 pages including the afterword by the author (which was terribly charming in and of itself--almost an apology for any flaws--very sweet). Creepy without being terrifying and for me, quite original--there was a twist in the middle I did not see coming (I admit, I am slow about such things but don't hate--it makes reading more fu...more
Bleak and tense.
Clare Frayn was giving her brother a ride home on night when someone ran in front of her car and caused an accident. Her brother died instantly, but they never found his arm. The man who ran in front of the car seemingly disappeared around a corner shortly after the accident, carrying something looking suspiciously like an arm...
A couple of months later, popular true-crime writer Edmund Hall contacts Clare for help in researching his latest book, "Satan's Cannibal," about the man...more
Clare Frayn was giving her brother a ride home on night when someone ran in front of her car and caused an accident. Her brother died instantly, but they never found his arm. The man who ran in front of the car seemingly disappeared around a corner shortly after the accident, carrying something looking suspiciously like an arm...
A couple of months later, popular true-crime writer Edmund Hall contacts Clare for help in researching his latest book, "Satan's Cannibal," about the man...more
I really tried to like this novel. I had read 'The Hungry Moon' previously, and despite its flat and uniteresting characters, I enjoyed it and loved the atmosphere. 'The Doll Who Ate His Mother' had some good scenes in it but over all I felt very underwhelmed. Ramsey Campbell's prose style is strong and the story is decent, but the characters are barely recognizable as human, thus destroying any suspense and making this relatively short novel a goddamn chore to get through. I'm sure he has bette...more
Disappointing ending, but the rest is pretty great. For once, I find myself wishing that a horror author had gone into more detail about the supernatural elements in a book*. It would have been fascinating to learn more about the magician (or was he?) guy and his weird occult dolls.
*For more information on why this is usually a bad thing, see: most Stephen King short stories, Dean Koontz, or most horror films released in the past ten years.
*For more information on why this is usually a bad thing, see: most Stephen King short stories, Dean Koontz, or most horror films released in the past ten years.
Rather an odd horror novel, as the title might suggest. Is this strange cannibal fellow a devil-child or just seriously disturbed? The book does a good job of being disconcerting and alienating, and it strikes a fine balance between suggestion and certainty on the supernatural front. Everything MAY be perfectly natural, or it MAY reflect malign magical forces. Good but not great horror fiction--it'd get 3.5 stars, if half ratings were possible.
I don't know if my mood wasn't right for this book, if I wasn't used to Campbell's style, or if it really was just a dumb book, but I hated this. In hindsight, I'm not sure why I even finished it other than that I wanted to see if there was going to be a big reveal.
The story was stilted, the characters were unlikable, and the plot was contrived to get from one "disturbing" scene to the next.
I'm going to try Campbell again in the future, but it's going to be awhile.
The story was stilted, the characters were unlikable, and the plot was contrived to get from one "disturbing" scene to the next.
I'm going to try Campbell again in the future, but it's going to be awhile.
A Slow burner, and the ending seemed like it didn't really fit the story, but Ramsey Campbell can put words to paper in a way few others can. Beautifully written, so much so you may not care as much about the ending or the fact that he gives away the mystery in the last 50 pages or so...
1 like · like · see review
view 1 comment
I think I read this in high school ... discovered Campbell via Lovecraft. Like most of his short stories, this is creepy, atmospheric, almost oppressive in its grimness. I think short fiction is more his natural form, but this worked well for a longer piece.
Mixed response to this book. Generally weak on characters but occasionally some quirky moments and good depiction of 'misfits'. In places I thought what a great writer and in others I thought the writing was pedestrian. Glad I stuck with it though.
Aug 06, 2011
Elisa Kay
added it
I enjoyed this book right from the start. It had me hooked from the beginning. The story of an odd man with hatred in his heart.
I read this in my teens when I loved horror books. The title sounds rubbish but don't be fooled..a great read for a horror fan!!
Great creepy book! Campbell makes you really scared, but you're not quite sure of what. Everything I've read by him is that way. Awesome!
I enjoyed the first half very much but had trouble maintaining interest. Could have been me as Campbell is an amazing writer.
Campbell's style is extremely strange; his prose is cool, almost icy, and his characterizations unsympathetic in the extreme. All this, however, makes this novel somehow more affecting and horrifying than a more dramatic approach would have. This grisly tale of an evil child (told with overtones of Satanism and Black Magic) set against the somewhat drab and mundane backround of modern Liverpool, sets your teeth on edge from the first page and holds you spellbound. The undramatic way Campbell han...more
It's more a crime story than anything else, sort of an odd and eerie "day in the life" of an unsettled and unsettling shadow-crawler of a man. It does have a supernatural element to it and there were parts that were absolutely unsettling and creepy.
Like most Campbell novels, starts out like gangbusters but the ending disappoints.
Stephen King recommended book and author.
Book noted as "important to the genre we have been discussing" from Danse Macabre, published in 1981. Book and author discussed in chapter 9 where King also said this about the book: "My Plan is to discuss ten books that seem representative of everything in the genre that is fine; the horror story as both literature and entertainment, a living part of twentieth-century literature..."
Book noted as "important to the genre we have been discussing" from Danse Macabre, published in 1981. Book and author discussed in chapter 9 where King also said this about the book: "My Plan is to discuss ten books that seem representative of everything in the genre that is fine; the horror story as both literature and entertainment, a living part of twentieth-century literature..."
Currently rereading this ... doing a Ramsey Campbell extravaganza of sorts.
Have I read this? I'm not sure. It has been sitting on my shelf for a very long time. You think I would remember reading a book with a title like this. Need to read (or reread?) soon.
loved the near obsessive use of colour...
The title of this book caught Me, as it would anyone, it had mixed reviews so I was glad that I read it,
4 out of 5 for imagination on this one, its well written with some good characters,
4 out of 5 for imagination on this one, its well written with some good characters,
Oct 24, 2007
Lindsay
rated it
1 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
horror fans
Shelves:
misc-horror
This book is slow to start and the end is really deus ex machina. There are some interesting bits in the middle, but for a book about a Satan-possessed cannibal stalking London, it's pretty boring.
Ramsay Campbell is really a fine atmospheric writer and I much enjoy his short stories. I wasn't in the mood for this book length work, I think. I could never get all that involved in it.
A haunted house novel written by the "horror writer's horror writer," which, frankly, I'm still trying to understand the love for him.
Nothing was happening at around 130 pages. I couldn't keep on going. :\
| topics | posts | views | last activity | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Is it worth a read? | 4 | 6 | May 10, 2013 04:56am | |
| Contemporary Brit...: The Doll Who Ate His Mother | 1 | 3 | Feb 23, 2013 05:46am |
John Ramsey Campbell is a British writer considered by a number of critics to be one of the great masters of horror fiction. T. E. D. Klein has written that "Campbell reigns supreme in the field today," while S. T. Joshi has said that "future generations will regard him as the leading horror writer of our generation, every bit the equal of Lovecraft or Blackwood."
More about Ramsey Campbell...
Share This Book
No trivia or quizzes yet. Add some now »
