Three weeks after finishing Clive Barker’s The Damnation Game I still do not know what to make of it. While it started out interesting enough with a thief searching the ruins of Warsaw for a mysterious, unbeatable card-player. Then, fast-forward, it is several decades later, and a reclusive millionaire hires a boxer turned small-time criminal as bodyguard. So far, so good.
But before I figured out that the millionaire and the thief were the same person, and what happened when he and the card-player first met, the story got plenty weird. There was a lot of super-natural stuff and gore, and I could not make much sense of it. In the end, it all came together and, sure, there were some nifty scenes … but by and large, I was longing for a story with a head and a tail and clear path to get there. I am not always like that, but this time, it just was not happening for me.
- Book read
- Clive Barker — The Damnation Game
- First line
- The air was electric the day the thief crossed the city, certain that night, after so many weeks of frustration, he would finally find the card-player.