Book Review: Let’s Go Play at the Adams, by Mendal W. Johnson
Вставка
- Опубліковано 14 жов 2024
- I actually wrote a book review for Let’s Go Play at the Adams, by Mendal W. Johnson over on my Goodreads account: www.goodreads....
Almost all my reviews appear on Goodreads first.
Overall this is a 4 star read--MAYYYYbe 4.5 stars.
If you like this video, consult a physician. Or subscribe to the channel.
Socials:
The Jeff Word Facebook group: / theje.. .
Instagram: / the_jeff_word
Discord: / discord
Goodreads: / 7. .
Fans of Suntup Facebook Group: / 42707. .
Fans of SST Facebook Group: / 19845. .
Fracassi Freaks!! / 30827. .
OFFICIAL FRIEND/SPONSOR OF THE CHANNEL:
Rapture Brewing on Facebook: / rapturebrewing
Authors you need to read:
Philip Fracassi: amzn.to/3ADwxVo
Sarah Pinborough: amzn.to/3uRbdbF
Chad Lutzke: amzn.to/3yHGIad
Kealan Patrick Burke: amzn.to/3yM2Pwo
Ania Ahlborn: amzn.to/3alsToG
Patrick McCabe: amzn.to/3ah0rV1
Josh Malerman: amzn.to/3NM1Osu
Robert McCammon: amzn.to/3ctlLY2
Small Presses you need to follow:
Suntup: suntup.press/
Earthling: earthlingpub.co...
SST: sstpublication...
Centipede: centipedepress....
Lividian: lividian.com/n...
Great review, Jeffinoff! Johnsons choice with the third person narration was mind wrenching.. getting into the brain of each captor was brilliant. Wow! Brutal, however
Much smarter and darker than I was expecting.
And thanks for the throwback to the old name! hahahahaha good times.
Just finished this book, and it still is sticking with me! Great take on the book here!🤙
Thank you! I'm afraid for another read of this one.
This has been on my TBR pile but has been getting bumped a lot recently as I’ve been on a fantasy binge. Looking forward to it, though.
I'd love to hear your thoughts when you do.
@@THEJEFFWORD Me too.
Thank you for this review. Though I read the book several months ago, it really affected me. So much so that I wrote a couple personal alternative endings to help me deal with it. One of the things that makes it such horror is that it's plausible. Having grown up in the 60s-70s I could too easily see this really happening. Including the part I think you were talking about having difficulty with (I'm guessing at what that was.) Also the book makes a point about the politics of a collective. The Freedom Five group show how the sum of a group of peoples flaws and weakness can be worse than any of the single individuals in that group and how slippery slopes of group thinking can come about. I will remember this book for the rest of my life and still think of more of my own personal alternative endings. Thanks again for this well spoken review.
BTW, the other book this reminded me of is Lord of the Flies. (another one hit wonder writer)
It cuts deep. I thought a sequel would be very satisfying. Paul is killing with the help of his sister and John tries to stop him.
@@THEJEFFWORD John??? The rapist/murderer???
@@henrytjernlund yes. I’d make him remorseful. I’d make him hate himself for what he’s done and be tortured by the guilt all these years. Always looking for a way to make it right. But that’s impossible. When he sees new murders by the truly psychopathic siblings he feels like maybe he can do something after all.
@@THEJEFFWORD Why not Bobby? He was the one that wasn't completely onboard with the plan. In one of my personal alternative endings I've written, I have Bobby changing his mind and defying the others. In the other ending Cruz has a part along with 2 ghosts.
SPOILERS
And this book might also be an allegory of the psychological phenomena of Group Think where a group of people behaves in unison in such a way that none of them would do individually. And this does happen. There is news footage of a crowd of fans after a sports game setting fires to cars and such. Another variation might be safety in numbers. Or conforming to a group in power and the kids are most definitely in power. Like I keep saying, this story works on multiple levels. And I think Mendal Johnson did an amazing job (though sad) of writing a story that does that.
Oh for sure there are some great examinations of human behavior in this book. He does a brilliant job of showing how seemingly normal people (kids, even!) can devolve into animals acting on pack instinct.
One of the saddest, heart wrenching, angst ridden, horrifically cruel books I’ve read in many years.
Yes. I can't believe how it all turned out. Maybe I'm naive.
@@THEJEFFWORD I can see it being plausible in 1970s world. It's somewhat like the novel Lord of the Flies.
SPOILERS
On a more basal emotional level I think Dianne became intensely jealous of Barbara, who is described as pretty or even beautiful. Barbara has caught Johns eye who begins to lust after her. Barbara is kind and idealistic whereas Dianne is again the opposite, pragmatic and cold and calculating. Dianne see Barbara as being weak, so she helps set in motion a game to prove that. And sadly Dianne proves that the kinder, idealistic, prettier, better educated Barbara IS weaker. But then the incident happens and Dianne must pull all her ability to strategize and come up with a solution to their problem (win the game.) Again, multiple levels to this story.
Yep I agree with this too. The best part of this book is how Mendal gives each kid a different motivation and path to brutality.
That's a great book to FEATURE.
It is. But not one for everyone.
What the kids do is half the horror. Why they do it is the other half the horror.
SO true. As hard as it is for a healthy well-adjusted brain to accept it, there are kids who did far worse than this for worse reasons. Look up The Hammer Maniacs. Or don't. THAT is absolute brain poison I will never forget.
I kind of thought it was about inherent evil and the goodness that dies a long the way. I really enjoy the read. It did seem like Dianne was the monster to fear.
An epic sequel would feature Diane and Paul. I can kind of map it out how I think it would roll.
I'm sure it would end with Dianne mercy killing Paul.
@@davidmalchaski9383 I'd make it a book about a series of unsolved killings that are noticed by John who has an addiction problem and never got over what they did to Barbara. He has enormous guilt. When he reads about these unsolved killings he's sure it's Paul. And he plans on stopping him. He can't change what he did but he can do something to make it right.
I would totally read that.😎
@@THEJEFFWORD I have my current 2 endings up on a fan fiction site.
I bought the paperback first and then the new hardcover. I liked it but I really don't think it's as good as you think it was. I'd give it maybe 4 or 3.5 I actually didn't like the VERY ending. And that part your talking about was a big let down for me.
Maybe my expectations weren't higher than my curiosity. I really didn't know what I expected. I'll say that I was disappointed by the first half of the book until I got to the second half and it made the whole thing sing for me.
I gave it a 4 on some site, maybe Goodreads.
And gave it a 4 on Amazon.
yes, the ending was so upsetting I wrote my own alternate endings (two of them).
Question, should public libraries carry this book in their holdings?
Absolutely.
SPOILERS
Watched this again. And I'm wondering about the one reaction with Barbara that you won't talk about. And I've seen other reviewer say something similar. I'm going to guess that it's the thing near the end. I think that her response is similar to stories of women in prisoner of war situations where they try to seduce a guard or official into loving them so that they will protect them. And John seems the ideal one to try this with. She is desperate and feels she has nothing to loose by try being sexy-Barbara.
Yeah, I agree with that interpretation. I just think it happens very fast and with little struggle on Barbara's part. Had Johnson taken the time to go deeper into Barbara's struggle, maybe it could have been more believable.
@@THEJEFFWORD SPOILERS AGAIN
She now knows they're going to kill her in a few hours. She's desperate. And I think there is some description earlier of her pondering this. So It's now or never to try and put it into effect. And I think there was a hint that he might have raped her yet again when she was in the basement. The author used the writing style of describe only, don't explain. So the reading has to figure some things out themselves. Anyway, it's a female prisoner's attempt to get a guard to fall in love with her and hopefully prevent what is to come.
FIRST!!!!!!!!!!!
SCORE!