Assembly Point Peninsula Friday, August 18, 12:01 A.M. Then a noise. Something that sounds like a thick strip of metal slapped against hardwood. The slap is not something that goes bump in the night. The slap vibrates from out of the stormy darkness; from out of the lower regions of the log home. It penetrates the density of the humid summer air. At the same time the foreign noise acts like a spring. It triggers eyelids, drawing them wide open. Just a quick solid slap that, should it occur during daylight hours might not register a second thought. But that now in the deep night becomes cause for serious alarm. The slap comes and goes so swiftly that by the time the first wave of adrenalin rush passes, Jude begins to believe he must have imagined or dreamt it in the first place. It only makes sense to believe that after falling asleep, the subconscious took over, decided to play a dirty trick on his brain. Because who really wants to believe that someone or something is breaking into their home in the middle of a blacked-out night?
A glance at his watch tells him he's been asleep for almost two hours. He throws a glance over his shoulder at Rosie. She hasn't stirred an inch. So it seems. But then the darkness of the night is so absolute he can't see ten feet in front of his face even with the now fading candlelight. Or perhaps it's just the effects of having been asleep—the eyes not yet adjusted to light no matter how dim. Get a hold of yourself, Parish. Don't let the demon get the best of you. He almost feels himself smiling at the stupidity of it all. Smiling at the overactive thump, thump, thump of his carotid artery and the moist sweat that coats the skin beneath the down comforter. All is well, he attempts to convince himself. Until a second sharp slap rings out in the night.
I wasn't prepared for Zandri's Scream Catcher. I'd read this author before, but had never experienced the darkness, the blackness of the darkness, the inevitability of awareness that you are not alone. The awareness that you are so scared that you could not move, yet knew you must... Memories when you had previously failed came to stand beside you, cringing, as you did then, knowing that you should try to save the two people... Knowing that you didn't then... And when the screams came, for you knew that they would come, that you would not also scream. You would be silent, listening, hoping that you would escape once again, even if you hated yourself. But you'd be alive! Was it enough? He still wasn't sure. He had used a book to provide him the catharsis that they said would help him come back to his former self. All that book had done was to share his secrets to those who could now take advantage of his fear, his stone-cold fear that left him hiding in the dark, even while listening to the screams. The screams that haunted him... And, now, again, the screams that were now surrounding him, he was frozen, unable to move... Could anybody ever help him? Certainly not the Scream Catcher...
Mack lights another cigarette, exhales the smoke through his nostrils. "This is the part of the backstory where the weird takes a turn for the surreal," he goes on. "Lennox is a militarily trained computer hacker. A talent he's incorporated into the design and development of first-person video kill games." "Kill games," Jude repeats, his son's numerous video game systems flashing through his mind. "Video kill games meaning violent video games." "Video games that kids play precisely because of that violence. The plots are all the same: shoot and destroy; stalk and destroy; fight and destroy; Kung Fu and destroy. In clinical terms, impersonal perspective stealth action games that thrive on intense graphic violence. Their popularity is growing so large and fast that kids now spend more money on them than they do the movies. A fact that hasn't gone unnoticed in Tinsel Town."
"Wow Mack, for an old timer, you've been studying up." "You have no idea." Immediately Jude pictures his son Jack sitting up on his bed, big brown eyes glued to the TV, a plastic game controller in his hands. When was the last time they had gone to see a movie together? "With kill games," Mack goes on, "the aggressor characters and their victims are modeled on real life human beings. At least in the physical sense. But what the thrill-kill game can not possibly convey is the sensitive nature of the human condition. Therefore, gone is the sense of fear, anger, adulation, panic, love, guilt . . . all those emotions one might naturally take for granted especially when associated with a man or woman in grave danger—a person fearing for his or her own life." "Computers trying to mimic human beings," Jude adds. "And failing miserably," Mack insists. "First-person kill games lack the human element. They lack emotion and most of all a conscience. Let's face it, they're interactive cartoons. No one knows this better than Lennox. In his world, the killing of an innocent man or woman is not an act against civil and social mores. It represents a payoff, plain and simple. The more kills a player accomplishes, the more satisfied the player feels about him or herself, the more he or she desires." "Okay so Lennox designs violent video games and at the same time he likes to kill people. But where do the two come together, Mack? How exactly does a make-believe video game make the leap to becoming a real life murder?" Pulling the spent cigarette from between his lips, Mack drops it into the coffee cup, stares into it, waits for the dousing hiss. "Through his Black Dragon alter ego, Lennox has sought out a way to capture the elusive human
"Home again, home again," sings the beast. "Jiggidy jig."
~~~
Oh, Scream Catcher is just a game! Sounds cool, where can I get it? Are YOU a gamer? Indeed, the main character realizes that his son plays games so often that he appears to have some type of addiction for certain ones... And then realizes what the creator has done to ensure that more and more games are being sold... Instead of children seeing that it is not real, that kills are merely being a winner on this game... the creator is trying to make it much more real... By catching screams...
I honestly don't know whether to declare this book a thriller like no other... Or, to point out that it is adult only content, hoping it will be a lesson for readers to pay more attention to game content!
All I can say is... Be Prepared...
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