Inhuman Condition

God, just talking about The Inhuman Condition makes me itch to read it all over again for the tenth time. Clive Barker, especially early Barker like In The Flesh, The Inhuman Condition & The Books Of Blood are so righteously killer, I can't help but re-reading them whenever I get the chance. Talk about visionary horror, Clive Barker turned the entire Horror Genre upside down with his fiction. Inventive, clever, well-written & above all, original, he was like the new incarnation of H.P. Lovecraft. Genius. The Inhuman Condition consists of five novellas: The Inhuman Condition: Some hoods roll a drunk and steal something very precious. A piece of rope with three knots in it. Nothing special, right? Well...once you untie the knots, something comes into being. Something terrible. Great story. The Body Politic: Charlie has the strangest thoughts. He thinks his hands are planning a revolt, plotting against him and the whole human race. Crazy, right? Well...when he wakes up to find that his hands have strangled his wife, he's not so sure any more. Another great, original story. Revelations!: A modern day ghost story with a small twist. An evangelsit and his troupe check into a motel where a murder most foul had taken place...so do the deceased couple, for they're there to recreate the murder or try and reconcile, who can tell. Witty and strange. Clive keeps us enthralled. Down, Satan: The only detraction from the book's brilliance. A rather short story about a man who wants to hang with Satan so he builds Hell on earth just for that very purpose. Bizare and dark, never really takes off as a full story. The Age Of Desire: Weird. That's the first thing that comes to mind when I think about this story. A group of scientists are doing experiments with hallucinogenic love drugs. The results are very interestng. Probably the most pornographic of all the stories. This one will make you wonder what really churns through Clive Barker's brain. Overall, an excellent incarnation of horror. Buy it, read it, love it. Dig it!

Again, I love Clive Barker. His work is just awe-inspiring. This collection borders on classic in the likes of H.P. Lovecraft and Poe. Shoot, it doesn't just border, it crosses over. These stories will be remembered years to come, mark my words. Clive Barker is genius. His work is the real deal, he cannot be immitated. His craft is so incredible. The stories are horrifying, gruesome, and beautiful. The Body politic is terrifying as is the title story about a knot and the demons that hell unleashes when the knot is undone. This is great stuff. Why can't all authors have this ambition?

He was just cutting his teeth when he wrote this, but it still stands strong. There are moments that make you cringe and some that make you look over your shoulder. If you're a fan of Barker's or just of horror in general, don't miss this one.

This collection of short weird stories is one of my favorite books. It is the first Clive Barker's book I read and since then I am a Clive Barker fan. All the stories have a witty plot, which catches you by the neck and doesn`t release you until you read the very last word. The atmosphere created in each of the stories is so mysterious, like a living nightmare. The characters are excellently psychologically depicted. It is really addicting, I couldn`t stop reading, - so, if you are having your exams, I don`t recommend it to you! But if you have read other books by the same author and have liked them, or if you simply like horror stories, you shouldn't let this go.

This is probably the second or third Barker collection I came across, way back in 1987. I was a high school kid, immersed in King, Straub, Lovecraft, Koontz, but Barker was a writer I had to think about, someone whose writing style aimed above the usual 6th grade average. His images were unsettling and confusing--I remember coming to the end of the title story and thinking, "Wwwhaaat?" but that was so long ago. I credit Barker with making me a more discerning, sophisticated reader. Horror could be sharp with wit, laced with the blackest comedy, and subversive like the punk rock music I loved. He approached topics like sexuality and psychology unlike any other writer I had ever read. This book, Volume 5 of "The Books of Blood," is one of the very strongest. He toys with religious fanaticism and fundamentalism in "Revelations," with the Devil in the modern world in the fable "Down, Satan!" and with eros and extreme arousal in "The Age of Desire," one of my favorite stories by him. This was one that I would retell to my shocked friends at lunch. They wanted to be weird, to be outcast, but Ha! they weren't willing to go all the way. Barker, he goes all the way. He is, along with Harlan Ellison and Lovecraft himself, the only writer of any type of fiction, that I can reread now, over a decade later, with satisfaction and awe and respect. Clive Barker. Make no mistake.