****THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SOME SPOILERS****
I really wanted to like this book. It’s based on the video game of the same name…well, actually IS the video game, so if you’ve played the game, then you’ve read the book. In fact, while I was playing, I was thinking to myself “wow, this would make a great book!”
It’s about an author, Alan Wake, who vacations with his wife to a remote town with a little cabin on an island called Cauldron Lake. Sparked by a serious case of writers block his wife, Alice, decides this would be just the thing to re-connect with each other and to get his creative juices flowing again. His wife goes missing, and he spends his time trying to find out what happened. Finding missing pages of manuscript around, his mind twirls around whether or not this is real, is what is happening on the pages he finds happening now, etc. The whole book is a real mind screw, as was the game. It’s why I was drawn to the story in the game. I just don’t have as much time to play games as I’d like, and the story above is why I picked up the book. I’d get the story without having to play the game.
Well, it turns out the game was better. The book should have been better, but the writing is really terrible. The way the author moves from one thing to another is choppy, and it doesn’t really make sense…take this passage for instance, keeping in mind that Alan Wake is BEHIND bars. I’ve read the previous pages several times to make sure that nothing was said about him leaving the jail cell.
“The Dark Presence roared through the darkness, drowning out Nightingale’s voice, deafening them all. it grabbed nightingale, jerked him off his feet and down the hallway, bursting through the door to the outside and carrying him off into the night. The manuscript pages fluttered slowly to the floor.
Suddenly there was a piercing sound, like guitar feedback, and Sarah thought of Barry Wheeler talking about him and Alan onstage last night — he said they were like rock gods as they fought the Taken. Sarah’s smile faded as hundreds of birds made out of shadows flapped out of the night, hundreds of ravens swarming into the rotor of the helicopter.
The chopper bucked wildly and the control panel lit up, telling her what she already knew: they were going down. Wheeler screamed next to her. She glanced over at Alan. He looked back at her, jaws clamped as he hung on.”
Huh?? When did he escape the prison bars, when did they get into a helicopter? The last scene they just watched a guy get sucked down a hallway. This happens a lot more than just this instance. It’s an instance of where things are explained in a video game cut-scene that just didn’t get written well.
Richard Burroughs as the potential to be a good author, but he needs a better editor. Pacing and continuity are two huge things that he needed help with.
I’d put this at the bottom of the heap, read it only if you are very very interested to find out what happened if you find yourself not able to finish the game.