One of the finest examples of post-apocalyptic fiction ever written. Intense, creepy and horribly claustrophobic, it's a masterpiece of the genre that should be on every horror fan's reading list and/or bookshelf.

Book – White
Author – Tim Lebbon
Star rating - ★★☆☆☆
No. of Pages – 62
Cover – Creepy!
POV – 1st person, past tense
Would I read it again – No
Genre – Horror, Novella, Fiction


** COPY RECEIVED THROUGH NETGALLEY **


Maybe I'm insane or maybe what I just read was rubbish, I can't decide. What I do know is that I just read a story about apocalypse, death, victims snowed in, and murder and I wasn't once a) frightened b) scared c) concerned or d) all that bothered about who lived or died.

Let me keep it simple:
It had a brilliant opening line - “We found the first body two days before Christmas.” but that was the best thing about it. Chapter 1 was a whole 21% of the story. The ENTIRE story fit into 49% of the book I read! I don't just feel disappointed, I feel cheated. Why the heck would anyone waste 51% of a book with an excerpt of another book?????? Please explain this to me, because I DON'T. GET. IT!

I'm not a fan of 1st person POV in the first place and this one really reminds me why. We see nothing about the main character that isn't thought by himself. We don't even know his name. Ever. In the whole story it was “I” and no name. And there are so much flashbacks as thinking back to things that have happened before.
There were serious editing issues and I see nothing here that tells me it's an unedited/unformatted document. Either way, if this has even been LOOKED at by the author, after writing it, then it shouldn't have these mistakes, unless it's a formatting issue. I'm talking about words running into each other, gaps between paragraphs that are not scene breaks, and a whole lot of other grammar issues.
Honestly, I was bored. It didn't have that 'horror' impact I was hoping for. There wasn't much going on that scared me or that was psychologically frightening. In a way, it reminded me more of Agatha Christie's “Ten Little Indians” film adaptation, that anything that might represent horror. And that ending? Seriously? That's how you end a psychological horror story? It was abrupt, bordered on lazy and I really don't appreciate that there wasn't a single attempt at explanation or resolution to the “why” or the “how”.

This is a really good, compelling read for such a short story. A small group of people are holed up in an old manor house in Cornwall. The weather is atrocious but the relentless snow is not the only white stuff out to get them.

This would have worked far better if it had been a full length book rather than a very short story as we could have got to know the characters, discover what had happened previously, how and why this motley crew ended up marooned in a Cornish Manor House surrounded by endless snow and who knows what hunting them. As it was I was just left thinking what was THAT all about! I love horror and dystopian books, but this tale didn't do much for me - sorry.