The book Clive Barker fans waited for for decades, The Scarlet Gospels is, for better or worse, Barker's summation of his entire cannon. It features his talent for world-building and stunning imagery, his obsession with sex and violence, and his two most famous creations, detective Harry D'Amour and The Hell Priest a.k.a Pinhead.
But fans expecting this to be a no-holds-barred horror-action fest are in for a surprise. Yes, the book features a couple of lengthy action set-pieces, but Barker seems more interested in telling an epic tale of loss, hubris, and the eventual cost of dancing with the dark. This will undoubtedly be somewhat disappointing for many readers expecting the Pinhead of yore, as The Scarlet Gospels is more Everville (1994) than The Hellbound Heart (1986), and with a darker, more vicious version of Pinhead on display.
It's best not to reveal too much about the incoherent plot; suffice it to say, Barker sends D'Amour and his band of heroes (called The Harrowers, for some reason) on a direct path with Pinhead, who has been collecting arcane magical powers for a purpose darker and more devastating than anyone could have imagined, a purpose which will lead D'Amour straight into hell.
From the opening chapters, everything that is good and not so good about the book becomes clear. Barker's writing shifts from wondrous descriptions of darkly images and creatures, to self-indulgent and overlong scenes of mayhem, to stretches of subpar, profanity-laden dialogue, making for a read that is uneven, to say the least. As this is Barker at his most brutal and excessive, with his penchant for epicness producing instances of overwhelming excess, and also stunning sequences of biblical mayhem. The overall effect is a novel that is overly dark, under-plotted, and, despite the violence and gore, surprisingly elegiac in tone.
Ultimately, The Scarlet Gospels is pure Clive Barker, and fans of his work and the Hellraiser universe will want to give it a go. But casual readers will probably find it ponderous and confusing. Recommended, with reservations.
Text © Ahmed Khalifa. 2020.
Ahmed Khalifa is a filmmaker and novelist. He is the writer/director of the feature film Wingrave, released on Netflix, and the author of a number of novels and short stories, including the YA horror novel, Beware The Stranger, available on Amazon. Find him on Twitter @AFKhalifa and on Facebook @Dark.Fantastic.AK·Writer
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