The Seventh Wave product reviews

Amongth the multitude of 'Demons trying tio invade the mortal realm' tales out there, none struck a deeper chord with the fans than H.P. Lovecraft's 'Cthullu Mythos' tales... and this story strikes a very similar note, without coming across as just a copycat rip-off. Having a strong tone of "Witches and Sourcerers", it still manages to include tones of "Demons from another dimension", demonic possession and souls as currency... while also somehow making the demons as naive about the mortal plane and vulnerable to it's lures and vices... a truly remarkable feat of literary engineering.

I did feel that some of the characters which played a ig part in the plot were still a little flat, especially the main co-ordinator, mover and shaker - Freda. Though she is the lynchpin that holds the story together, she always seems far more hidden than revealed, no matter what. This may be a part of the 'mysteries of the magical' idea, but it backfired a bit for me, in that I can't find myself empathising with a character I don't know. Callum and Sam - the two protagonists - are far better defined, and thus can draw the reader in far more effectively, but even Sam is a character that seems to fade as the story progresses.

Frankly, though I *did* enjoy this book, I find myself at a loss to explain exactly why... it doesn't tick all the required boxes for me, it doesn't carry anything spectacular or truly unique, the style is erratic and jumps around suddenly in places, and some of the bad guys are far more 'approachable' than the good guys... and yet I found myself keen to keep reading it whenever I got, or could make, 10 minutes to spare. Perhaps all the negatives just worked... a strange sort of linguistic alchemy of it's own...

Overall, a surprising book that doesn't fit the pattern of the kinds of books I enjoy, yet it found a niche, climbed in and made itself at home. This, if nothing else, made it remarkable for me... and possibly for you too.