What do You think about In The Night Room (2006)?
Having read 'The Talisman' and 'Black House' and simply adoring those books I was excited to jump into this book knowing that Peter Straub was the author....Unfortunately.....this book was nowhere near the incredible stories of the above mentioned books (along with the help of Stephen King these 2 books are fantastic). The story was at times confusing and hard to follow.....there were some pretty entertaining parts such as the mass amounts of chocolate, Coca-Cola, and sugar needed to save Willy from perishing but the continuous use of "Butt-Sex" as the nickname for Timothy Underhill by his so-called 'spiritual advisor' Syrex was just annoying and a bit offensive.The supernatural aspect of the book started out as a great concept but never did hash out to anything spectacular or fascinating. The book-within-a-book concept was also great in the beginning but ended up just fizzling out with a less than climactic ending.I really want to read something else of Peter Straub's to find out how his writing can really reach out and grab you.....it just wasn't this book......but I am willing to give him another chance.....'Ghost Story' will probably be the book to do it for me.....
—Tracy Walters
This came to my attention via a glowing offhand recommendation from Nick Mamatas:And Peter Straub’s metafictional In the Night Room compares favorably to anything, anything, written in the past twenty years or so, by anyone.Do not believe the hype.I kept reading almost to the end before giving up and skimming, in the increasingly futile hope that it was just doing something really clever by being deliberately awful. Alas, no. I am pretty positive this is just bad. Here is your checklist:* Über-creepy overuse of the word “gamine.” The exact cumulative effect here was rarified and hard to describe, but you can get pretty close by looking for message board discussions of which underage anime girl is more moe.* Stephenkingception. Yes, that’s correct, this is a book about a writer writing a book about a writer.* Incredibly janky and incomplete plotting and structure, which mostly fall into the category of lingering first-draftisms. Characters who think things like “I don’t know why, but I just can’t explain the situation to this other character until much later!” (← paraphrase.) Potentially interesting structural gambits introduced and then completely abandoned. (There’s one passage that briefly looked like it might be an extrusion from a later draft of the book-within-a-book, but it never bore any fruit.) Overly instrumental character mood transitions. Improper mid-boss disposal. Unfired arsenal strewn about this mantlepiece like raccoons got in there. If this shit was only afflicting the fictional fictional world in the story, I’d have eventually decided it was hilarious, but it’s even worse in the first-order fictional world! Unless… :O :O :O there’s a game beyond the game??? NOPE, DON’T CARE.(There is in fact a game beyond the game, yes, okay, I already know about Lost Boy, Lost Girl, shut up. It doesn’t justify this book sucking.)* Über-creepy danger-induced sexual pliability in the heroine and ludicrous flattery of protagonist’s sexual prowess. Yes, okay, I get the metafictional joke there, and the other metafictional joke; it was still stomach-turning. Also, to make that joke truly funny, there would have to be a punchline somewhere, a more drastic and thorough negation of Underhill’s expectations (specifically in regard to this Willy’s interior life, not just his expectations on the plot and premise level) later, and the whole thing was ultimately written the same way you’d write it if you weren’t having us on. If a tree falls in the etc. etc. etc.* Clunky prose. Like, really bad. Bad enough that I really honestly did think it was a ruse until about page 200.Of course, stirred into the mess are some really good kernels of invention and premise. The bit about the “real books” (every book has a platonic-form perfect version in the higher planes, and copies sometimes leak over between worlds) is obvious poison, but it’s a deliciously seductive poison. The underlying nut of the story is about how fiction can cause real harm, and I can dig that. Kohle was suitably menacing (before he disappeared from the book for the middle three fifths, see above re: janky plotting). I AM GENERALLY DOWN FOR METAFICTION. But none of the rest of it lives up to any of those fragments of promise.PW gave this thing a starred review. I feel like I am being trolled here and can’t tell who’s doing the trolling. I would say “don’t read this book,” but I actually want you all to read it so you can suffer along with me. >:[
—Nick Fagerlund
Okay, I tried with this book. I really tried, but I only got to page 240 (almost two-thirds way through). It is rare for me to give up on a book, even a bad book, but especially a book I have already invested so much time in.Aside from the fact that the story is extremely hard to follow and not particularly engaging, the writing is bad...really bad, ie "Coverley's blond head snapped sideways, and his spoiled face hardened in concentration," (God that sounds painful), so bad that I couldn't forget I was reading.There were moments when I thought, okay, this is going to get better, and pushed forward, only to be disappointed. There was nothing in this book for me. The characters were contrived and uninteresting, and the story, confusing and odd, with neither the creepiness or horror elements I expected. This was a random pick off the library shelf for me. Peter Straub has edited several "horror" collections that I have come across and I figured I'd give his work a try. I'm willing to give him another shot, but so far, not impressed.I would not recommend this book, however, if you enjoy cheesy, contrived characters and odd, unconvincing story lines you might want to give it a try. In all fairness...maybe if I had stuck with this one it would have gotten better...maybe.Here's an example of the writing that put me over the edge:Context: Willy is a fictional character, who crosses over into the real world while being pursed by her psycho, ex-CIA fiance. She turns up at a B & N reading of an author she likes to read when depressed who also happens to be her creator. They have this immediate connection and she ends up in bed with this man...totally innocent...she's just scared, he's helping her, and this is what happens next. Also, up to this point, he's gay. "Where are you?" she said. "Are you there? Ah, I see, you are there. My goodness. Don't you think you should sort of wiggle out of that stupid thing you're wearing? You're so huge, you're going to strangle yourself."I wiggled out of the stupid thing, my panting organ even harder for having been so blatantly flattered, and she shed her bra and her little tighty-whity with what seemed one fluid motion, and after that a kind of paradise opened before us. When I entered her, it was like entering paradise. Within her, I felt miraculously, blissfully at home---in the perfect place at last. I fell in love---that's the corniest, most banal, and truest way to say it. Before, I had felt as though I was falling in love, and now I had completed the journey. I was there, I wanted to hold her, cherish her, celebrate her for the rest of my life. It happened that quickly. I felt cleaved to Willy Patrick, as if we had one soul. We were like the gods depicted in erotic transport on half-ruined temples lost in the middle of great jungles. In the end, we seemed to flow together, to wear each other's skin and fine ecstatic release as one four-legged, four0armed, two-headed organism."God," Willy breathed. "You're the author I want when I'm depressed, all right. I'm going to stop fretting about agency. I don't care. I've never been fucked like that before, and I want more of it."So judge for yourself.
—Shaun
