The Cellar (Beast House Chronicles, Book 1): Who knows what might be down there…

Lean, mean but slightly dated shocker. Richard laymon found more success in the UK than his native country for writing taut, fast paced horror thrillers. His writing style is incredibly pared down to the bare essentials. Characterisation takes a back seat to increasingly breathtaking turn of events that push the story forward.Laymons novels invariably feature violence, rape and general depravity at regular intervals. While these passages are extreme in what they depict, they tread a fine line in the decriptive and stay just inside what most people would find acceptable in a modern Horror novel. Or so I thought. Other reviews point out the scenes of child rape as being beyond the pale but I don't see the problem. They make you feel revulsion towards the antagonist and are not prurient or titillating. Maybe the UK edition is still missing text and the other reviewers are reading a more extreme version?The Cellar is a 'monster in the old dark house' horror with gore, unflinching sex scenes, corny dialogue and minimal character development. However this is not just a tawdry piece of hackery as some would have you believe.The Beast House trilogy brings to our attention aspects of female sexuality that for a long time people found hard to discuss or contemplate without PC thinking getting in the way. Laymon didn't care for PC meddling in writing and his works are still unfashionable in the current SJW controlled world of genre publishing.That should be reason enough to warrant any horror fan to check out his work, which stands up to scrutiny better than Shaun Hutsons contemporary output or early James Herbert.Richard Laymon has better books than this in his canon and as with Stephen King I prefer to read his short story collections but this is the one that started it all and will let you know what you are in for if you decide to explore the rest of Laymons work.

I read this book years ago, reading it again years later, it reconfirmed my original opinion that Richard Laymon is fixated with sex and gore. His constant reference to the heroine's ( or "gals", as he likes to call them, book after book) various states of undress and how she's "gagging" for it,violence towards women and children , and strong sexual violence- rape regularly raises it's head, in this book, and others. There's no denying that Laymon can pen a good story, however once I have read the few books I bought, I really don't feel the need to re explore his work any further

Got a bit weird in the end but ok read

Great product and delivery time

Horrid read. Vulgar

I picked this up after a suggestion from a friend not knowing what to expect and I'm not disappointed. I'm not going to spoil anything but this book is not for the weak stomached. I was gripped from beginning to end and it never felt like the story dragged on, it's best going into this book not knowing anything so I'm going to end this review by saying be sure to check this book out!

Amazing - not for the faint hearted

I just loved this book. It really kept me on the edge of my seat, so to speak.The author really catches the mood and knows how to scare the pants off his readers