The Look by Lee Coates

 

270 pages

Rating... 3⭐

You can buy The Look...Here

You can find out more about Lee Coates...Here

• The Blurb...

Jim is a self-employed web developer living in Cardiff. Successful professionally, the future also looks rosy for his personal life, having recently proposed to his girlfriend, Ffion. However, when the couple decide to celebrate their engagement with his much-loved dad, Callum, Jim’s world is tilted on its axis.

Jim is convinced he spotted his dad staring at him – just for a split second – with a look of pure hatred. Did he imagine it? However, when a series of bizarre and catastrophic events strike Jim’s life in quick succession, he starts to wonder if the look he received from his father could mean something.

Eventually, Callum makes a confession that will lead to the total collapse of Jim’s life as he knows it…

• Our Review...

I read this novel as part of the 52 books in 52 weeks challenge. For more info click here. This weeks prompt was a novel whose blurb you hadn't read prior to reading. 

The Look is an intriguing and attention holding first novel by Lee Coates, which augers well for future projects. The story is a cross between The Wicker Man and The Omen but set in the very middle class and pretentious Cardiff Bay.  It leaves you with an itch you want to scratch.. Partly because of the ending and partly due to the structure. 

The first half of the book is Jim and Callum's back story. However the main driver for the plot isn't introduced until 70% of the way into the book.. This leaves little time then for the second and third acts. The narrative felt a little front end heavy. A few potential plot strands are laid down but not followed. e.g. the mysterious potential employers, the missing mother, even The Look of the title.  If they are false trails they should still be followed and answered in the climax of the book. As I was hungrily devouring the final chapters I distinctly recall thinking There's only a few pages left, he has got a lot of strands to pull together to get a satisfactory end. 

This is a dark horror/supernatural story that somehow doesn't feel too dark despite some really horrific scenes. I've been wracking my brains as to why it feels 99% but not quite 100%, because as I've said the scenes which are intended to be horrific are indeed very horrific (gonna cancel my opticians appointment! 😟). So not the scenes then. I sort of came gradually to the idea (and this is difficult to articulate for me.) that it feels to me (with the usual caveat, that my opinion is irrelevant) that the authors writing style is slightly out of sync with what he is trying to achieve. I wrote in my notes. " Authors style is light and bouncy, with a use of vocabulary that is varied. It is engaging and just on the right side of the entertaining/verbose border."(see first selected quote for an example.) When reading the narrative it felt sort of...perky. Unlike when I read Cormac McCarthy which makes me feel dread and despair. However I don't know if this perky/bouncy fits with theme of the book.. Like using a precision scalpel, when the job needs a lump hammer.

By the by, one thing that did make the hairs on the back of my old swede jump up. The neighbour in the book is called Steven Staite. Very unusual name. However it was also the name of my neighbour for the first 22years of my life! arrggghhh!!!

There is a lot to admire in this debut novel.

One point which I did think worked out well was that it was written in the !st person from Jim's point of view. Given the (possible) revealing ending, this was a well placed strategy. In addition the author does have a well developed turn of phrase and some of his descriptive lines are very juicy indeed, see selected quotes. With just a few well turned words he can make pictures in your mind.

All in all, I found the novel entertaining and an excellent first step on what will hopefully be a long writing career. It's a good start. He has all the ducks, in this first attempt, next one to line em all up, and knock em dead.

• Selected Quotes...

I can't imagine there was any grisly facet of the atrocities that wasn't overseen by an impromptu documentarian. Anyone with a ghoulish curiosity could easily find out what was happening at any point in the continuum and at most locations within the marquee.

The bruised and pendulous clouds above had descended further,

...the sky was a watercolour artist's paradise, pregnant with varicose-veined purples.

I struggled to comprehend how every single car on display had at least one occupant with their own life and innumerable worries. Some concerns would be major. Others less so. But each and every individual was expected to cope with the constant state of flux inflicted on them from an exponential number of outside influences. Billions of particles inexorably linked by gossamer thin threads. The world was such a complex place. Chaotic.

• If You Liked This Then You May Like...

Rosemary's Baby by Ira Levin

The Omen by David Seltzer

Audrey Rose by Frank D Fellita

• About The Author..

After having two kids, Lee Coates had almost given up on ever fulfilling his dream of writing a novel, spare time being so precious. However, a light-bulb moment occurred during one of his sons’ extracurricular activities. These interminable minutes needn’t be dead time. Lee can be regularly found writing at the side of football pitches, swimming pools and tennis courts in his hometown of Cardiff.