Madness - Jason Brant

Title: Madness (Asher Benson #2)
Author: Jason Brant
Genre: Horror
Rating: 3/5
# pages: 377
Date read: December, 2015

Asher Benson has once again fled to a secluded cabin in the mountains outside of the sleepy town of Arthur's Creek, West Virginia. Government agents surround him day and night, blanketing his entire life in constant surveillance under the guise of keeping him safe.

That facade is shattered when every cell phone in Arthur's Creek rings simultaneously. Anyone who answers the call is driven into a violent, psychotic madness that turns the entire town into a slaughterhouse.

And Ash is caught in the middle of it all.



Honestly, I can't quite figure out what I think of this book. It was every bit as captivating as the first book in the series, and I had serious problems putting it down, but it was a LOT more gory than I typically want my books to be, and I read most of it with a bit of a cringe on my face. The carnage started on page 5 and didn't end until 3 pages before the end!

But it was well written, I like the characters, and it ended with the main bad guy still not found, so I'm still contemplating whether or not I want to read the next book in the series.

The Sense of an Ending - Julian Barnes

Title: The Sense of an Ending
Author: Julian Barnes
Genre: Fiction
Rating: 3.5/5
# pages: 150
Date read: December, 2015

Tony Webster and his clique first met Adrian Finn at school. Sex-hungry and book-hungry, they would navigate the girl-less sixth form together, trading in affectations, in-jokes, rumour and wit. Maybe Adrian was a little more serious than the others, certainly more intelligent, but they all swore to stay friends for life.

Now Tony is retired. He's had a career and a single marriage, a calm divorce. He's certainly never tried to hurt anybody. Memory, though, is imperfect. It can always throw up surprises, as a lawyer's letter is about to prove.


Interesting style of writing that I definitely don't think is for everybody. I was intrigued by it, but think it would have gotten old if it had been a full length novel, rather than a novella.

The book somehow reminded me of some of the books I read for AP Danish ("Det forsømte forår", "Midt i en jazztid" etc.) which isn't necessarily a bad thing, and made me appreciate the book in a way I might not have done otherwise.

There's not much action or plot, but I really felt like I got to know Tony, and could relate to many of his musings about growing older and looking back at your teenagehood. (That makes me sound really old :-P).