Birthday

So I love Koji Suzuki's work and have almost read all of his works and just finished BIRTHDAY which is alot like DARK WATER in the sense it is a collection of smaller stories in one book only all the small stories in this one relate to the RING story.

            (1999)

We have three stories in BIRTHDAY which go into more detail of things that happened in the other books.

COFFIN IN THE SKY

Is about what happens to Mai Takano the student of Ruji in the first book, what happens when she vanishes and can't be found. It's a grim and sad little story about the pretty young woman's fate but a gripping story, the shortest of all three I believe but very much my favourite.

LEMON HEART

Is about Sadako's adult life when she was part of the theatre group soaring which is touched lightly upon in RING and is the story line of the movie RING 0. It goes into alot of detail about the woman who know as Sadako, how she lived in her later life and more about her. Another good story and it gives us more feelings towards her then the movies give us.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

Goes into detail about the wife of the main man in LOOP and about her and the child in her belly. I think this was the longest story but also not the best one. It's not creepy in anyway it's just a nice soft story that yet again fills in the blanks not mentioned. It is also the final conclusion of the RING universe story.

I think you need to have read the other three to enjoy this book, it's very much not a stand alone book like you could say for SPRIAL or RING. It's good at tying up loose ends not mentioned in the other three novels it's also not clustered or dragging like some parts of the other novels it's more to the point and gets to heart of it better as sometimes I find with Koji's work it can be a little waffling on.

So out of the three COFFIN IN THE SKY was my most liked one and the least interesting was HAPPY BIRTHDAY but not one of them was bad. It's a good book and again well written and gripping enough to keep you reading but casual enough you don't feel it's a task.

Plot: 4/5

Scares: 0/5

Gore: 1.5/5

Over all enjoyment: 4/5

To buy BIRTHDAY go here

XJigsawX

Horror Doesn't Have to Be Scary

While sat reading 'Dark Water' my partner asks me 'any good?' I reply 'Yeah.. not really scary though..' and their reply was simply 'Horror doesn't have to be scary' and it got me thinking. Why do people watch horror? I always thought people like to feel scared, we can make ourselves happy, upset, worried or angry on our own or from outside influences that happen to us in our every day lives...

But we NEED something to make us scared, we like to jump at things and be scared out of our minds if even for a few moments, the way it gets your heart racing and that feel, that rush when it happens, a feeling we can't always get.

At the same time, I find with myself that you get desensitised if your an avid horror fan. Less and less scares you, we might still jump even though we know it's coming but we are never 'scared' there's so many types of horror out there, pretty much anything for every niche but we get so used to it.

Phobia's are always a big part of fear, something that might scare other people like snakes or spiders might be nothing to another person and there for a horror to them is just a movie to us, we need something to scare us that's on a personal level.

For me, personally, it's super natural horrors that get me. Things with ghosts and spirits as I have always believed in that sort of thing, for someone who doesn't believe in the occult or life after death the thought of something like SAW or I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE might be their brand of fear, real people who can do harm.

 

 

 

I was always told, it's not the dead that can hurt you, it's the living and I think that saying is very true but that still doesn't change the fact it's still fucking scary. There's still some movies who can give me the proper creeps even after I've watched it like THE WOMAN IN BLACK the pacing and the things you don't see more then the things you do.

So phobia's are a large part of what makes us scared but some people have no phobia's or fears. My partner has no fears and they can sit there watching any horror movie with a stoney blank expression. So why do people like horror?

A large part of my enjoyment other then the rare chance I do crap myself or jump so high I launch popcorn clear across the cinema like an explosion of HOLYARGGGH I guess I have a sick sense of humour. I find FINAL DESTINATION amusing, how stupid the plots get.

Where horror is so damn cheesy or easy to read it becomes funny to those of us who are maybe a little less on the moral scale then other people, maybe some people just love seeing the make-up side of it, seeing all the awesome gore and effects that go into each movie.

Back to the point of 'Horror doesn't have to be scary' this is true I think. Now I am a firm believer in a scary horror is a good horror I also think there are some things that are a good balance of horror and comedy and no one does this better then the British, we have some amazing tongue in cheek horror movies.

If they didn't have say.. zombies or werewolves in them then they'd just be comedy but we have a dark sense of humour which merges with the horror genre beautifully.

Then again some bits which aren't designed to be funny could strike your funny bone, comes down to what someone finds funny and what someone finds scary.

Every culture also has it's own balance of fear and what they believe in. Movies like GRUDGE, RING, SHUTTER, ONE MISSED CALL and DARK WATER are based on woman who had suffered a horrid end and want to make their presence known, people to suffer and this I think comes from a nation where even in the modern world women are still repressed and it might not have the same impact in America or England where as it's more 'horror' to the Japanese then an old guy dying of cancer invoking traps on people to teach them 'to value their lives'

Some people just like to watch horror cus ghosts/vampires/werewolves/evil dolls are just fucking cool.

So whatever your reason for enjoying horror, have a think about your favourite movies. What about them do you enjoy? why do you like them? what gets you scared?

This is Jigsaw out, head hurts from an actual thoughtful piece of writing.

X6XJigsawX6X

Ring

Ring

By Koji suzuki

I've been reading alot of horror recenlty as me and my other half have decided to read a book a month and Ring was my Jan book. This novel has three more in the seriers Sprial, LOOP and Birthday. This novel has manga versions which I have also read and enjoyed, thinking of getting them again and also Japanese movies, American re-do's of Japanese movies and also a Korean take on it.

I can't remember much of the movies other then the American ones were terrible and bad and I wish I could forget every trace of them.. but would like to re-watch the Japanese ones as I remember enjoying them.

Anyway, this book is awesome, it's well paced and his style makes it an easy read, he really puts you in the mind of the characters and you can picture them in your head so easy, the story is as we know it blah blah watch a movie, die in 7 days but so fleshed out compared to the movie versions, we find out the real way it kills you among Sadako's real secrets and issues.

This book is not scary but it is a good read, sometimes it looks like it might be dragging or veering off but just as it gets to the dragging moment it sorts itself out and comes along greatly. I won't go into too much in this review as I really don't want to ruin a killer read.

It's a good read and I plan on reading the others, in fact LOOP is on it's way and Spiral is a story for another day!

4/5

X6XJigsawX6X