The Painted Darkness

Highly Recommended

If you want a shor novella that will garb you from the start and leave you thinking at the end, this is the book . It is totally enetertaining and I suggest any reader who enjoys the unknown pick it up

2 out of 3 people found this review helpful.

creepy little page-turner

This is a creepy little page-turner that explores the boundaries between reality and imagination.

Freeman tells dual stories surrounding Henry, an artist with a dark imagination. Henry's story is told through chapters that alternate back and forth between "The Present," when Henry is an adult artist who paints to master his dark imagination, and "The Birth of the Artist," when Henry is five and experiences a trauma that shapes the remainder of his life.

Although the novella is short, it is replete with details that create an ambiance of danger, mystery, and threatening darkness. Freeman effectively uses this interplay to drive the narrative forward and urge his readers to uncover the mysteries of the past and the present.

I definitely recommend for readers who like to be a little creeped out.

2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

Chilling

I sat down to read this book and couldn't stop until I got to the end. This was the first book I'd read by this author but it won't be my last. This story is written in alternating present and past chapters. The present gives us a look at the artist who "paints against the darkness" or the demons that seem to haunt him. The Past gives us a look at the artist as a child and how he came to be haunted by these demons. The fear I have of basements made this book even more scary for me as it seems the monster he must face lurks in the basement of his house. This was so good that I can foresee his books sitting on the shelf next to the names of Stephen King and Dean Koontz. This is a must read for anyone who loves horror. Just don't read it at night.

2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

One of my favorite reads this year

The Painted Darkness is one of the best books I have read this year in my opinion. I first started reading this when it was initially offered as a free eBook from Cemetery Dance. I knew when I was only a short way into it that I really wanted to buy the physical book and read it that way instead of in an electronic format. Instead of finishing up reading a free book I waited until I had the money available to buy a physical copy so that I could read it in that format instead. While the switch between the child and adult versions of the books main character, Henry, isn't something I was used to and not something that I ever would have imagined liking before, for this story I liked it and feel it served a purpose, though if this had been a long novel I am sure the switches would have had the opposite effect and ended up taking me out of the story.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

it will keep u guessing

This is another book I couldn't put down. Great storytelling. scary/weird at the same time. Kind of sad at end.

1 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

This is an entertaining but frightening ride filled with heart wrenching moments

Everyone knows five years old Henry has a vivid imagination so when his parents are away and his babysitter preoccupied, he decided to have an adventure. This was a disaster from the time he climbs on an old tree-house. He sees a skeleton falls to the ground, follows rabbits with red eyes and falls into the frozen river. He can't swim against the current, but he becomes caught on a tree branch. He follows the rabbits, which leads to the school where his father is eaten alive by monster rabbits. He gets home to see his father is okay, but tells him what happens as a way to release his fears.

Twenty years later, married with a son Henry is having another adventure. There are things in the basement where there are three graves and his furnace starts to talking to him. Henry is scared to death as he hears noises throughout the house. He chalks it up to his imagination, but he is an adult not a preadolescent child.

Henry's fear and imagination lead to his painting chilling but brilliant art. The chapters alternate between the past and present; enabling the reader to see the similarities between Henry the child and Henry the adult as he makes choices. This is an entertaining but frightening ride filled with heart wrenching moments as the readers wonders whether Henry is psychotic or an oracle.

1 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

I truley loved this story. It was dark and scary without being g

I truley loved this story. It was dark and scary without being gory and full of predictable circumstances. For a while I thought I had predicted the end just to have the rug pulled out from under me. I really liked how the author went back and forth between child Henry and adult Henry to tell the story also because it allowed the reader to experience the circumstances that shaped adult Henry into the man he became with out just hinting at small details from his past. I highly recommend this book to every one who enjoys a touch of the bogeyman and things that go bump in the night.

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