In the Night Room

In the Night Room - by Peter Straub

File this one under “weird”.  Maybe all of Straub’s books are somewhat bizarre, I’m not sure.  I’ve only read two, and the first one (‘Mystery’) seemed much more straightforward.  Although weird, I must say that I quite enjoyed this book.  Not only was the story fairly unique, but I really enjoy Mr. Straub’s writing.  When you read a lot of books in your spare time, like me, you notice little things that show you just how difficult the art of novel writing is, and how rare true geniuses actually are.  As much as I enjoyed this book, there too many little things that prevented me from truly loving this book and making me want to read everything by the author. More on that in a bit.  First, the plot:

Tim Underhill is a fairly successful writer.  The book he is currently working on is, coincidentally titled “In the Night Room”.  When we first meet Tim, he seems to be losing his sanity.  He’s seeing strange things, meeting ghosts, and experiencing things that no sane person should be undergoing.  The book alternates chapters with <I>another</I> successful author. Her name is Willy Patrick.  Willy’s primary genre is Young Adult books.  It seems that Willy, just like Tim, is also experiencing a recent bout of temporary madness.  Oh, and her new book is <I>also</I> called “In the Night Room”.

Well, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that the bouts of madness that these two authors are having are probably somewhat related, and as the story progresses, we do, in fact, see our two protagonists unite.  From here, the story seems to go a bit downhill.  I wonder if, when Peter Straub started writing this book, if he had his “idea” solidified, but he might not have figured out a very satisfying ending.

The book is filled with weirdness.  Sometimes the weirdness is explained, sometimes it is not.  I was annoyed that I was unable to figure out the name of one of the ‘supernatural creatures’, so I Googled it after I was done reading.  I figured someone out there must know the meaning.  Alas, I could never find it.  It seems Straub made the puzzle so complex, that only he knows the meaning, and doesn’t intend on sharing it.  This ticked me off slightly.  I don’t care to be left in limbo for something like this.

Then there’s the issue of this book not being the first book to feature the character Tim Underhill.  Apparently there’s another novel by Straub that sort of “sets this one up”.  I didn’t know that, and I again felt a bit gypped.  Apparently, it’s not necessary to read the other one before this one, but I still wish I would have known about it.  Maybe some of the parts of this story wouldn’t be quite so baffling.

This book was a great idea and an overall very good story.  I wish, though, that the destination was as enjoyable as the journey.  At least it would have been nice if the destination made a bit more sense.