If that doesn’t describe an Old One, I don’t know what does. They are the stuff of nightmares’ nightmares and want only to slip into our dimension, drive us mad, and subjugate the empty shells of human beings who are left. Behind the shadows, lying in wait, pulling the strings, exist the Iad Uroboros on another plane of existence. There are times when Barker’s baddies are positively Lovecraftian. His credentials portray him as someone more in the “horror” camp of speculative fiction, and that’s borne out by the book-not horror in the nu-school sense of gore and death, but horror in the old-fashioned sense of dread, evil, and doom. Clive Barker brings an impressive imagination to the table. I could try to praise The Great and Secret Show for its merits, for the characteristics that endear it to other readers. But if one truly reads widely-and it’s something I take pride in doing-then it will happen. In many ways, coming across a book that doesn’t interest one even though it’s a good book makes writing a review far more difficult than coming across a bad book. And that, for anyone wanting a one-sentence review (contingent upon understanding the nature of my opinion of Last Call), is that. The Great and Secret Show reminds me of the only Tim Powers novel I’ve read, Last Call.
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