Secluded Canyon Estate: Subterranean Tiled Bonus Room Must Be Seen To Be Believed!

A number of years ago, I took a road less traveled in my local bookstore, and discovered the bizarre, brilliant and troubling world of English fantastical horror author, Clive Barker.

Learning that the prolific writer, was also responsible for such jaw-dropping films as the Hellraiser series, and one of my all-time favorite cult classics, Nightbreed, wasn't such a large stretch, after reading Books of Blood, Weaveworld and the like. Barker, however doesn't stop with novels, short stories, film scripts-oh no.

Recently we've been treated to cable television's twisted fright fest, Saints and Sinners, and there's currently over 300 large Barker acrylics on display in a Los Angeles gallery-all part and parcel of this Renaissance Man's creative outpouring.

Released last year, and now available in paperback, Coldheart Canyon, is an odd sort of book, that brings to mind Peter Straub. Barker's taken up residence in Southern California, and apparently the sordid secrets of Old Hollywood resonated with his fertile imagination, providing the kernel of truth that powers this novel.

It begins in an impoverished abbey in another part of the world, in an earlier time. The manager for a jaded silent screen actress, (Katya Lupi), is shopping unusual antiques and artwork, and like a hound on the hunt, has scented a most unusual find deep in the dank and musty bowels of this crumbling bastion of secrets; think: shades of F. Paul Wilson's The Tomb.

Fast forward to modern times, where a 30-something leading man, (Todd Pickett), has second thoughts on his success. Allowing himself to be guided by a cynical king maker, he decides to have a little touch-up around the eyes and jowls-just a freshening, mind you. Believing image, and a youthful appearance is everything, our protagonist goes under the knife of a well-known plastic surgeon to the stars.

The surgery is botched, and the A List star goes into hiding, generating rumors and causing frissons of worry and doubt in the heart and mind of his near-obsessed club president, (Tammy Lauper), up north in River City, Sacramento. With her sterile life of quiet desperation,
Todd's number one fan is going through her own personal hell and decides to come down south to seek out the truth, at all costs.

This is the mere backdrop for the lengthy tale, whose other main characters includes the former silent screen actress, and her once-glorious, now run-down estate, located somewhere up a dusty, oft-forgotten road into one of the canyons. Since the film star was noted for her chill demeanor, Coldheart Canyon fits like a hand in glove.

Is it fate, or a foully engineered 'coincidence' that Todd ends up practically barricading himself in this over-grown estate, whose graphically tiled basement happens to be the portal to both Devil's Country, and a sinister and lethal pursuit known as The Hunt?

Barker spends time fashioning his fantastical setting, letting his reader indulge all five senses in the seeing, feeling, hearing, touching and tasting of other worldly delights, and as always in a Barker epic, the strange and repellent side of this good/evil coin. Surely here, the artist's eye, and storyteller's ear conspire and approach the sublime.

The artwork that's been painstakingly transported from Central Europe, likewise has a special roll in this tale.
Readers who are offended by graphic acts of sex and violence probably already steer away from all things Barker, but just so you know, there are heaps and gobs and huge quantities of same in this novel, though possibly not as much as say, Imajica.

The concept of evil engulfing a house or property is well known from such affecting works as The Amityville Horror and The Shining. Also the idea of a strong willful presence, malevolent or otherwise, existing long after the corporeal remains have returned to dust, is a specter causing millions of horror fans to double-check their door locks, or pull the covers over quaking heads, with that sudden hollow thump at the foot of the stairs.

With Coldheart Canyon, Clive Barker fascinates as he sometimes alienates, and gleefully bids us closer, in a good old-fashioned spook fest that lingers long after the last page is turned.

Barker's language is fluent, if at times over the top. I imagine rafts of psychologists have attempted to dissect the burgeoning subconscious that is father to such oddly brilliant works. Of interest, is the author's assertion that not all the shenanigans and high jinx enjoyed as such palatial estates are the cloth of fiction.

4 stars, 88/100, a recommended read for those whose stomachs, and imaginations can handle it. The pacing, dialogue and characterizations would merit 5 stars, but the convoluted plot bogs things down a bit in this otherwise admirable thriller chiller that gives new meaning to the Roaring Twenties and a debauched generation.