Like I said last week, I would like to offer up a few bits of supernatural fun for your enjoyment. Today’s post I have a book to recommend for my adult readers.
What kind of spooky season literature ought we to read? Remember, that I am no fan of shlock. The gore-for-gore’s sake kind of story is untasteful. Neither am I a fan of the cheesy killer-doll nonsense of B-rated horror.
Horror fiction, in my opinion, is not characterized by the slasher, and grotesque, and shock. Horror deals with two things primarily: dread and the human psyche. How does man face the Dark he cannot understand? How can man bear his meager light agains tides of black? Horror fiction is the probing of potential hopelessness against the unsurpassing capability of man to be resilient and hopeful. To see the problem (monster, ghosts, or just bad men) and overcome. To have faith that there is a way out, to survive, even on the lip of the grave.
With this in mind, I’d like to recommend a book by Tim Powers, The Stress of Her Regard. Powers’ story revolves around a man, Michael Crawford, who is pursued across England and Italy by a lamia (a form of a vampire, maybe a nephilim?) in ther early nineteenth century with a supporting cast you may have heard of: John Keats, Percy Shelley, and Lord Byron all who are bound to other lamia. This particular lamia seeks to wed Michael, and thus the tale focuses on the stress of her regard for him.
There is one way to be free of these creatures, something all the characters are searching for, only one way of redemption from the powers of darkness. But some folk do not want to be separated from the power of darkness. They like what it does for them, how it makes them feel, and what they can accomplish with power outside of themselves (perhaps the lamia are an allegory for sin?). Spiritual idolatry is eaasily connected to spiritual adultery in this tale, something the Scriptures make very plain.
This book must come with a warning as well, it is for mature readers. Tim Powers can turn a phrase and he can paint a powerful picture with his words. It could be unpleasant for some to read certain portions, but sin and evil are unpleasant realities. Powers does not shy away from the effects of temptation and the burtality of giving in.
Tim Powers is a Christian, and he clearly has an understanding of the destructive ability of sin, but he also knows the power of redemption.
