If he spent more time developing his characters and making me care for them then I would probably find their meaningless lives more tragic. I'm also more frightened of the bogeyman in my closet than I am of the vapory supervisor in the corner office. I suppose some people would find this "horrifying" and I understand and appreciate what he is trying to do but it's just not part of my belief system so it doesn't work as well for me as say Lovecraft, or better yet, Ellison does. Ligotti is definitely unique in his fictional translation of the ultimate meaningless of life. The atmosphere is more absurdist than horror. The stories were weird and somewhat disturbing but never creepy or scary. I'm in the Harlan Ellison camp where the best stories have flesh and blood characters that we actually care about. I didn't like this book as much as I thought I would because, although I love Kafka, I've moved on in how I think fiction should address the nihilistic worldview.
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