A review will come...

“Midian. He’d heard the name of that place spoken maybe half a dozen times by people he’d met on the way through, usually those whose strength was all burned up. When they called on Midian it was as a place of refuge; a place to be carried away to. And more: a place where whatever sins they’d committed– real or imagined– would be forgiven them.”Cabal is the story of a town called Midian and its monstrous residents, the Nightbreed. It is a story of humanity vs monsters, nothing unusual in that un...

If you have never read Clive Barker before, start with Books of Blood Volumes 1-3, and then, if you enjoyed that, go for 4-6.This review applies only to "Cabal," and not the short stories from Books of Blood, Volume 6, that are included in most versions of the novel.The nostalgia pull of reading Clive Barker’s “Books of Blood” when I was 20 years old almost moves this to three stars, but I just can’t do it. Clive Barker excels at (a) evocative and concise turns of phrase, (b) novel premises, if

”They were with him still, perfectly remembered. Eleven rooms and eleven bodies, fixed in his mind’s eye. The wall Decker had taken five years to build had been brought down in as many minutes, and by its architect. Boone was at the mercy of his madness again. He heard it whine in his head, coming from eleven slit windpipes, from eleven punctured bellies. Breath and bowel gas, singing the old mad songs.”Aaron Boone has been under the care of the psychologist Philip Decker for years. The goal is

A long gestation - bought 2001, completely read...now.Midian is the Vanishing Point of Reference"Cabal" is a bloodier The Graveyard Book: hero lives in cemetery among...uh, friends...because normal life is ruined by machinations of psycho-killer; but that isn't enough for the evil doctor. No. Decker (played in the movie by David Cronenberg) has to press the issue...but goodthing for the hero that not everything in and under the cemetery is dead. And there goes the hellraiser, being chased by the...

"When the sun goes out and there's only night, we'll live on the earth. It'll be ours."After being convinced by his psychiatrist that he is responsible for a whole host of murders, Boone flees to the semi-fantastical Midian, a crypt inhabited by shape-shifting monsters who call themselves the Nightbreed. I only needed to read the first couple of paragraphs of Cabal to be reminded why I have fallen for Barker's works - his writing is simply incredible. His ability to present horror and gore in su...

3.5 rounded up.I’ll keep this short and sweet. Cabal has an interesting, imaginative premise, though I really wish Barker had shown us a lot more of Midian. He barely scratched the surface, and that is a big shame, because I was dying to know more. Also, the characters were extremely thin and not nearly as developed as I would have preferred.So why the 3.5 rating (rounded up to 4)? Simple. I’m a massive sucker for a great villain, and Cabal’s is top-notch; so much so that he completely elevates

Let me start this review by saying that this book just works for me.➔I love when a horror book has a good plot and a message behind it. Cabal is a horror book primarily focusing on its’, you guessed it, Cabal(here’s a definition from Wikipedia): A cabal is a group of people who are united in some close design, usually to promote their private views or interests in an ideology, a state, or another community, often by intrigue and usually unbeknownst to those who are outside their group. ➔It’s f...

This wasn't unentertaining, but it's certainly not why I like Clive Barker.CABAL is a contemporary gothic love story that I could only describe as Edgar Allan Poe meets Beetlejuice. Or Tim Burton if he stopped trying to make goth culture cute and accessible. It's simplistic, yet it means to be simplistic and I just didn't find the Clive Barker that I love, who enjoys pushing boundaries in this book. It was well-crafted at best, but not an inspiring read.

I'm abandoning the much cherished dark fantasy novel Cabal by Clive Barker at the 118 page mark. My father was a big fan of Barker's in the '80s; I remember him mentioning Books of Blood which as a 14-year-old Texas boy, sounded like something I'd like. I'm not above giving this novel another try when the events outside my window aren't scarier than the ones a horror novelist conjured, but this was one of those books I started rewriting in my head while reading it: terrific theme and some solid

Cabal is the story of Boone, a tortured soul haunted by the conviction that he has committed atrocious crimes. In a necropolis in the wilds of Canada, he seeks refuge and finds the last great creatures of the world - the shape-shifters known as the Nightbreed. They are possessed of unearthly powers-and so is Boone. In the hunt for Boone, they too will be hunted. Now only the courage of this strange human can save them from extinction. And only the undying passion of a woman can save Boone from h...

So much of this book is said in subtext, in the language that the characters speak secretly of themselves and others, that I see a lot of readers having completely missed the point or not even willing to formulate an opinion to take a stab at answering the questions they say the story raised for them and never answered. The heart of the book is Lori, a highly sympathetic and believable female character (Barker's good at that), and the shift from Boone's narrative to hers at first felt jarring, m...

I loved this more when I was younger, and it is a memorable read but not something I always go back to. I was reading this and Great and Secret Show early on, and he shaped my words more than most authors. The dialogue was perfectly arranged in many parts. Boone is a hard character to root for, you're on Lori's side more the whole time. Overall Decker is a perfect nemesis but seems to be revealed too early, so the twists are elsewhere in relation to the Night Breed.

(Okay so for whatever reason this appears as two books and my review didn't appear for this version? Well here it is again :D)This year, I’ve gotten a stronger understanding of the difference between literary and simple genre fiction- or at least how I would define them.A literary story needs to provide some unique psychological or philosophical insight or at least present an existing insight in a new way.Genre fiction provides no new insight: it’s a reshuffling of existing material, often done

Cabal is a novella by Barker that was the basis for the 1990 movie Nightbreed. It's a tale of a character named Boone who believes that he is a serial killer. During sessions with his therapist, Dr. Decker, he tries to convince Boone that he has to give himself up for the murders he committed. Boone decides that he would rather kill himself than be imprisoned for life. After a botched suicide attempt, he meets a half-crazed man named Narcissus. From him, Boone learns of a refuge for monsters tha...

The wind was not invisible. It had a texture, as though it carried a weight of dust, the motes steadily gumming up her eyes and sealing her nose, finding its way into her underwear and up into her body by those routes too.Cabal is the inspiration behind Barker's film, Nightbreed. I have seen Nightbreed twice, once well before it was appropriate viewing & then I rewatched it as a horror obsessed teenager. All I really remember from the film is that David Cronenberg was brilliant in it! After havi...

This book really took me by surprise. Although it is a story that includes much that is supernatural, I found it extraordinarily believable. In fact I found myself wishing that Midian was real. Midian is where the bulk of the action in the book takes place, and can be applied both to the ghost town and the cemetery that lies nearby. Even in it's heyday the town of Midian was a one street town, so the unusual thing about this cemetary is it's hugeness. The inscriptions on the various plots (which...

This story is all about Boone a man who is framed by someone very close to him, in a trusting profession for a series of gruesome murders he didn't commit.He seeks refuge in the wilds of Canada where he comes across the shape-shifters known as the Night breeds together they both have unearthly powers. Both are been hunted down though and both are needing to be saved.The gore is plentiful, a well crafted tale that caught my imagination. The characterisation is spot on and it's very atmospheric. I...

First published back in 1988, ‘Cabal’ followed the release of the hugely popular novel ‘Weaveworld’. The story turns all our ideas about horror fiction on its head, with Barker’s classic tale of misguided humanity. The tale subtly tackles the conception, misguided judgment and ridicule of views on homosexual community, with the homosexuals represented as the Nightbreed. Hounded, hunted and attacked, merely due to their way of life, the novel takes you into a world of questions and suggested conc...

I listened to the audio of Cabal by Clive Barker which comes in at fifteen minutes shy of seven hours and follows the disturbed protagonist Aaron Boone. Boone is a troubled man and is manipulated by his psychiatrist into thinking he's a serial killer. This modern day witch doctor, Decker, doesn't want to kill him with drugs he wants Boone to be his scapegoat. Through rumour and heresy he finds himself heading for the fabled Midian, where monsters take refugee, hot on his heels is his jilted girl...