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Once | 
 enlarge | Author: James Herbert
Publisher: Pan Books
Category: Book
List Price: £6.99
Buy New: £0.01
You Save: £6.98 (100%)
New (17) Used (10) from £0.01
Avg. Customer Rating:  77 reviews
Sales Rank: 66231
Media: Paperback
Pages: 300
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 7.7 x 4.9 x 1.3
ISBN: 0330451839
EAN: 9780330451833
ASIN: 0330451839
Publication Date: May 4, 2007
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: Brand new copies, with fast U.K. delivery. Delivering to Europe in 3-7 workings days. Delivering to U.S.A. in 7-12 working days. delivering rest of the world in 3 to 6 weeks
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Amazon.co.uk Review
Once is the latest in the welcome new phase of James Herbert's career after he distanced himself from the straightforward "horror" tag afforded to him by earlier novels such as the Rats trilogy and cannily reinvented himself as a writer with considerably more psychological insight and elegance of style. Trading on a grotesque reinvention of fairy stories, Herbert has his protagonist Thorn Kindred encountering witches, goblins and demons, and being obliged to turn to some very strange sources to save his soul. The new ambitiousness of Herbert's writing may be found in the underpinning of the narrative here: this is a grim and persuasively realised spin on Nietzsche's epigram: "When fighting monsters, beware of becoming one yourself." But long-time readers needn't worry about a lack of grisly chills: Herbert is too fine a writer not to keep us permanently on the edge of our proverbial seats. And he's better than ever at orchestrating his fear-filled climaxes, so that there is a carefully worked out structure to the book that never has the stop-and-start jerkiness of the early novels. Rather in the nature of Sondheim's musical Into the Woods, fairy tale motifs are exploded and reconstituted in this dark and erotic fable. After reading Once, fairy tales will never seem the same again. --Barry Forshaw
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| Customer Reviews: Read 72 more reviews...
 Not what I expected. October 19, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
Ok so basically I'll be honest and say that I've not read the entire book yet so it may get better, I'm only half way through, but I just have to make a comment.
I love the general theme about the book about fairy tale creatures being real etc, but I do think there are way too many descriptions and it's not as good and magical as I expected it to be.
Another comment I really have to make is that I really do believe there is too much sex within this book and it's really not necessary, I think the story has got lost through all the sex stuff, really disappointed with this I have to admit.
 Haunted Fairy Tale September 19, 2008
This James Herbert novel is very different to many of his others and introduces us to Thom Kindred who after a serious accident returns to his childhood home of Little Bracken set deep in the mysterious forest surrounding the stately home of Castle Bracken.
The narrative sets up quite a spooky feeling about the setting and also the both houses. The Characters of Hugo Bleeth and Nell Quick are not who they seem and then we find out that the forest is populated by a whole host of incredible mythical animals and elves and wicked evil creatures from our nightmares and fairy tales that interact with Thom.
The story is very original and sometimes erotic, sometimes menacing; I wouldn't exactly call it Horror, more a good old fashioned haunted love story. Very good none the less.
 Hopefully just a blip.. January 5, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
..but this is by far the worst of Hebert's books that I've read (and I've read most). It starts off as well as any other of his tales, but as soon as the fairies appear, it really does spiral into total drivel.
I was pretty dubious about the whole fairy idea to begin with, but I didn't realise quite how unlikeable they would turn out to be - it got to the point where they made me feel quite nauseous.
I can't imagine what JH was thinking when he came up with the idea for this book, but I share another reader's suspicion that he was suffering from writer's block - an example of his lack of imagination is when he throws in two almost identical and equally mind-numbing scenes with spiders.
However, I do think this is just a blip in JH's career - the excellent 'Others' and 'Nobody True' make this seem likely.
Read these instead and if you want fairies then read Peter Pan.
Fun but Forgettable December 29, 2007
The basic premise of this book is a good one - that traditional childrens' fairy tales can be spiced up to make them appeal to grown-ups. The Grimm Brothers' tales make sinister enough reading and it was a good idea to tweak some well-known images from childhood stories to turn them into disturbing adult fiction.
However, despite some graphic sex scenes and fairly shocking horror (you would expect no less from Mr Herbert) the story never quite grips the reader enough. The characters are a little, well, normal and both good guys and bad guys seemed decidedly hesitant to act with any decisiveness or even subtlety. They're all a bit nerdy to be honest. I found myself wondering why the hero doesn't just take a good piece of 2x4 to the bad guys and lamp them one. When the reader feels able to out-think, out-fight and basically out-hero the hero (with nothing more than stout timber) then something has probably gone wrong somewhere. It all seemed a little rushed and not particularly well thought out.
Having said that, 'Once' has a unique feel to it and is skilfully written. I found myself interested in the story and felt only faintly disappointed that a very good basic plot and flavour was slightly spoiled by the characters and their actions (or lack of). It's worth a read, but the title probably describes how often you'd want to.
A Good Example of a Rare Genre August 15, 2007
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
I must admit that I have not read much of James Hebert's fiction in the past, but this book sounded fascinating.
I have always been interested in the dark nature of fairy tales, so the chance to read an adult one seemed to be a good idea! The book paints some quite strong visual imagery and the plot ticks along quite nicely. The plot seems quite "basic" but the narrative was quite descriptive.
The only real clumsy element of the book were the sex scenes. I can understand the importance of them in the book (sex magic etc.) but the narrative really dragged when going through the scenes. Some of the narrative seemed to be grabbed straight from a Mills and Boon novel.
Any reservations that I had about the book were put aside though and I did find it an enjoyable read. I think that the world that he creates in this novel merits a sequel, as it has potential to be expanded on further.
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