James Herbert, The Ultimate Horror Writer
James Herbert, for me - and doubtless for thousands of other horror fans too - is the ultimate horror writer.
He is so consummate and can write any kind of horror story, be it one about monstrous mutant rats on the rampage, contaminated fog rising from an earthquake to turn people into homicidal maniacs, or a simple ghost story about a creepy old mansion deep in the woods.
His talent for writing a good horror story is reflected in his enduring worldwide popularity and his millions of book sales, all of which continue to be reprinted for a whole new generation of Herbert fans to enjoy.
Herbert is the product of an East London upbringing.
Born near the end of WW2, he grew up playing on bombsites and derelict buildings, wasteland left to ruin.
It is these locations that inspired him to write his first novel, The Rats, in 1974.
Granted, Herbert's earlier novels, like The Rats and The Fog (the book that contained that notorious garden-shears scene in the school gym that is still talked about to this day) were real, raw, in-your-face shockers - with a good dollop of sex thrown in here and there - and it is this style of explicit writing that carved for Herbert a special place in horror fiction history.
Back in the early seventies, the only other book that could really be described as a real "shocker" was The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty.
And then of course there was The Pan Book of Horror Stories, if you wanted to draw the analogy of a horror anthology.
But once The Rats exploded onto the horror literature scene, a significant trend was started, and the popularity of horror fiction was set to enjoy a huge surge in popularity.
In the light of the huge success of Herbert's rat novels, the bookshelves became utterly crammed with all kinds of animals-on-the-rampage novels - from spiders to cats to crabs - from a seemingly endless succession of various authors.
But try as they might, none of these new horror writers could quite recapture the sheer brilliance and originality that Herbert's rat novels had in bucket loads.
In his later novels, Herbert conveyed the impression that he wanted to move away from the gory shockers that made him famous, and try other kinds of stories, like The Magic Cottage, Others and Haunted.
Now as a die-hard Herbert fan, I have to confess to not exactly being over the moon (Moon, by the way, was of course another novel of his) about this softening of the horror content, preferring him to keep to his trademark visceral style and maybe produce another Rat or Fog-like shocker.
However, having said that, I still like to buy another new Herbert novel, as there is a certain quality about his style of writing that just keeps you coming back for more and more.
Devouring a new James Herbert novel is like going on a real good roller-coaster ride.
He certainly knows how to bring characters to life on the page, making them very down-to-earth and believable, and he is very good at placing them in all manner of hair-raising situations, pitting them against all kinds of supernatural forces.
Herbert's work - whether he writes explicitly or not - is real, compelling edge-of-the- seat stuff, and you always find yourself becoming really immersed in each new evocation of horror, as you root desperately for the main character and hope that the forces of good will eventually prevail over the forces of evil.
The two ghost novels he wrote - Haunted and The Ghosts of Sleath - featuring the psychic investigator David Ash, are good examples of such stories.
(A third novel in the David Ash saga, ASH, is due out in the autumn of 2012).
Whether he writes out-and-out visceral shockers, or just a simple, good-old-fashioned ghost story, there is no doubt that James Herbert is the ultimate horror writer, and one whose work will continue to be enjoyed by legions of fans for many more years to come.
He is so consummate and can write any kind of horror story, be it one about monstrous mutant rats on the rampage, contaminated fog rising from an earthquake to turn people into homicidal maniacs, or a simple ghost story about a creepy old mansion deep in the woods.
His talent for writing a good horror story is reflected in his enduring worldwide popularity and his millions of book sales, all of which continue to be reprinted for a whole new generation of Herbert fans to enjoy.
Herbert is the product of an East London upbringing.
Born near the end of WW2, he grew up playing on bombsites and derelict buildings, wasteland left to ruin.
It is these locations that inspired him to write his first novel, The Rats, in 1974.
Granted, Herbert's earlier novels, like The Rats and The Fog (the book that contained that notorious garden-shears scene in the school gym that is still talked about to this day) were real, raw, in-your-face shockers - with a good dollop of sex thrown in here and there - and it is this style of explicit writing that carved for Herbert a special place in horror fiction history.
Back in the early seventies, the only other book that could really be described as a real "shocker" was The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty.
And then of course there was The Pan Book of Horror Stories, if you wanted to draw the analogy of a horror anthology.
But once The Rats exploded onto the horror literature scene, a significant trend was started, and the popularity of horror fiction was set to enjoy a huge surge in popularity.
In the light of the huge success of Herbert's rat novels, the bookshelves became utterly crammed with all kinds of animals-on-the-rampage novels - from spiders to cats to crabs - from a seemingly endless succession of various authors.
But try as they might, none of these new horror writers could quite recapture the sheer brilliance and originality that Herbert's rat novels had in bucket loads.
In his later novels, Herbert conveyed the impression that he wanted to move away from the gory shockers that made him famous, and try other kinds of stories, like The Magic Cottage, Others and Haunted.
Now as a die-hard Herbert fan, I have to confess to not exactly being over the moon (Moon, by the way, was of course another novel of his) about this softening of the horror content, preferring him to keep to his trademark visceral style and maybe produce another Rat or Fog-like shocker.
However, having said that, I still like to buy another new Herbert novel, as there is a certain quality about his style of writing that just keeps you coming back for more and more.
Devouring a new James Herbert novel is like going on a real good roller-coaster ride.
He certainly knows how to bring characters to life on the page, making them very down-to-earth and believable, and he is very good at placing them in all manner of hair-raising situations, pitting them against all kinds of supernatural forces.
Herbert's work - whether he writes explicitly or not - is real, compelling edge-of-the- seat stuff, and you always find yourself becoming really immersed in each new evocation of horror, as you root desperately for the main character and hope that the forces of good will eventually prevail over the forces of evil.
The two ghost novels he wrote - Haunted and The Ghosts of Sleath - featuring the psychic investigator David Ash, are good examples of such stories.
(A third novel in the David Ash saga, ASH, is due out in the autumn of 2012).
Whether he writes out-and-out visceral shockers, or just a simple, good-old-fashioned ghost story, there is no doubt that James Herbert is the ultimate horror writer, and one whose work will continue to be enjoyed by legions of fans for many more years to come.
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