Book 44: The Ruins.
Book 44: The Ruins.
Author: Scott Smith, 2006.
Genre: Horror.
Other Details: 336 pages.
I began to wonder after reading the high praise given to this novel by the likes of Stephen King and Salon.com, if we had read the same book. I'd also like to know where were the ruins of the title? There are no ruins! It should have been titled 'The Hill of Evil Plants' or something similar. I understand the movie adaptation has the action taking place on a ruined vine-covered pyramid rather than a hill, which demonstrates that someone in Hollywood must have noted the lack of ruins and sought to correct this.
The start of the novel was quite promising; two young American couples are having a sun-soaked, booze-filled holiday in Mexico and befriend Mathias, a German chap. Mathias is concerned about the whereabouts of his younger brother who recently met a woman on her way to join an archaeological dig. She had left the brother a rough map drawn on a napkin with directions to these ruins (but its just a hill!) in case he fancied joining her. Of course, little brother was off like a shot to follow the girl of his dreams and with no word and their departure date approaching, Mathias was getting worried. So he asked the others to come and help him find his brother. They think this will be something of a lark and so pack their rucksacks for a day trip out and take along Paulo, another chap they'd met on holiday who is Greek and speaks no English. So they all jump on a tourist bus to the town nearest to the location shown on the map.
After a bumpy taxi drive down a narrow road they arrive at their destination. Completely ignoring the warnings given by the taxi driver that this is a 'bad place' and also ignoring the attempts by the local villagers to deflect them from following the path shown on the map, they end up at the foot of hill covered in a thick vine with blood-red flowers. Before long the six find themselves trapped on the hill with the villagers ensuring they don't come back down. Up there they find the remnants of the archaeological camp that was investigating an abandoned mine (doesn't count as ruins for me). With limited food and water they plan to wait until Paulo's friends find the note and map he'd left them and come along. Anyway, very unpleasant things then begin to happen and continue right up to the final page.
What attracted me to the book was its setting and the promise of a horror premise involving Mayan ruins. However, this was window dressing and there was no real sense of the location and did I mention the lack of ruins? They could have been anywhere in the world just off the beaten track. Scott Smith also seemed to ignore an important rule for any good horror story: if you are going to put your characters in deadly peril then you really need to make them likeable or else your readers aren't going to care about their fate. Indeed, they might be cheering for the monster. Basically my desire for answers kept me reading despite my annoyance with the characters, the lack of ruins and the many plot holes.
I discuss further with some spoilers and a Broadway song.
......
For example, in a Mexican village only a few miles from a larger town was it realistic to have no one speak English or be able to use sign language to effectively indicate hill=death? Also, why didn't any of the tourists have a Spanish phrase book so they could have figured out what the villagers were trying to tell them? Why were they pinning so much hope on the Greeks joining them when none of them, again surprisingly, spoke no English? Plus, why hadn't the villagers alerted someone before this of the dangers? The whole ignorant, superstitious peasants scenario seemed condescending.
These quibbles are before the plot descended into silliness with the deadly blood-sucking and flesh-eating vines suddenly being able to mimic voices and emit mouth-watering smells to torment the characters psychologically. Frankly, this worked so much better in Little Shop of Horrors where at least you knew Audrey II had come from outer space.
Much more like it!
They may offer you fortune and fame
Love and money and instant acclaim
But whatever they offer you
Don't feed the plants
They may offer you lots of cheap thrills
Fancy condos in Beverly Hills
But whatever they offer you
Don't feed the plants
Look out! Here comes Audrey Two!
Look out!
[AUDREY II] Here I come for you!
[COMPANY] Hold your hat and hang on to your soul
Something's coming to eat the world whole
If we fight it we've still got a chance
But whatever they offer you
Though they're slopping the trough for you
Please, whatever they offer you
Don't feed the plants! - Finale, Little Shop of Horrors
A horror novel featuring deadly plants isn't an easy thing to pull off; John Wyndham managed it in The Day of the Triffids, but the premise can easily lend itself to parody such as Attack of the Killer Tomatoes.
Some reviewers applauded Scott Smith's not providing answers because 'life doesn't always have answers' but really I felt this was more down to laziness because he didn't have enough imagination to work things out in the plot to a satisfactory conclusion.
Still having borrowed this book from the library, it cost me nothing apart from a few hours of my time to read. OK, so I won't get those hours back but sometimes it is good to read a book that you can metaphorically throw across the room in a scathing review.
Cross-posted to 50bookchallenge.