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A review by bozzi1
The Ruins by Scott Smith
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
5.0
🌱Spoiler Free Book Review🌱
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The Ruins = Pure. Unadulterated. Horror.
I f*cking loved this book!
•
I’m not someone that can picture things in my head when I read, but I came as close to that as I ever have with this book. The descriptions are so real, so visceral, they leap off the page. The Ruins is not for the faint of heart or for those with a weak stomach & I can see why it’s compared to The Troop by Nick Cutter. The plot, characters, & even writing styles are different, but the feelings each book left me with are similar.
•
The Ruins has no prototypical ‘good guy/girl’ to root for, because all the characters are much too realistic. I was frustrated and/or fed up with each person at some point, but I couldn’t help but root for them as things progressed.
•
I’ve seen reviews that say it isn’t believable that a group of people would go hiking into a jungle so unprepared. That’s the only piece of the plot I’ll mention & only because I call bullshit.
•
A few years ago I found myself on a 6 mile hike in the mountains of Montana. That probably doesn’t sound terrible, but I was with 5 other out-of-shape, middle-aged women, there was no cell phone signal, & we had 1 mini bottle of water between us. We had no food, no supplies, weren’t dressed for hiking. We got back to our car several hours later, close to dark, and…it was bear season.
•
I thought then, & still believe, that there’s a chance I could have died if just a couple of things had gone wrong for us. Does that make me an idiot? Absolutely. It’s also why I have no problem believing that a group of twenty somethings on vacation in Mexico could do something similar.
•
I’ll also say this…I won’t do anything like that again & that’s as much because of this book as anything else. The Ruins isn’t for everyone, as evidenced by the average rating & varying reviews I’ve seen, but it’s easily one of the best horror books I’ve read this year, maybe ever.
•
The Ruins = Pure. Unadulterated. Horror.
I f*cking loved this book!
•
I’m not someone that can picture things in my head when I read, but I came as close to that as I ever have with this book. The descriptions are so real, so visceral, they leap off the page. The Ruins is not for the faint of heart or for those with a weak stomach & I can see why it’s compared to The Troop by Nick Cutter. The plot, characters, & even writing styles are different, but the feelings each book left me with are similar.
•
The Ruins has no prototypical ‘good guy/girl’ to root for, because all the characters are much too realistic. I was frustrated and/or fed up with each person at some point, but I couldn’t help but root for them as things progressed.
•
I’ve seen reviews that say it isn’t believable that a group of people would go hiking into a jungle so unprepared. That’s the only piece of the plot I’ll mention & only because I call bullshit.
•
A few years ago I found myself on a 6 mile hike in the mountains of Montana. That probably doesn’t sound terrible, but I was with 5 other out-of-shape, middle-aged women, there was no cell phone signal, & we had 1 mini bottle of water between us. We had no food, no supplies, weren’t dressed for hiking. We got back to our car several hours later, close to dark, and…it was bear season.
•
I thought then, & still believe, that there’s a chance I could have died if just a couple of things had gone wrong for us. Does that make me an idiot? Absolutely. It’s also why I have no problem believing that a group of twenty somethings on vacation in Mexico could do something similar.
•
I’ll also say this…I won’t do anything like that again & that’s as much because of this book as anything else. The Ruins isn’t for everyone, as evidenced by the average rating & varying reviews I’ve seen, but it’s easily one of the best horror books I’ve read this year, maybe ever.