The Luminous Dead reads like a mix between The Descent and Buried: High tension, low character count, and plenty of thrills. On top of the mind’s eye’s visuals, Starling engineers an atmosphere that I think would do well onscreen. In a setting that is mostly rock and darkness, the things which arrest Gyre’s attention are the necessary focal points and never tangential or unessential. You get a strong sense of what Gyre is seeing and details vary depending on how much attention GYRE is paying, not how much Starling is. Instead, what Starling tells you is enough. I don’t need to know the intricate designs of the lacy frill at the cuff of the king’s shirt, you know?! In fact, I think some authors spend too many letters on detail and in the process pull you away from the narrative. So cinematic in this case hits the nail on the head.Īnd it’s not just because she is detailed in her descriptions. You never see that kind of quality off the line!īut as I read, I discovered that Starling writes The Luminous Dead in such a way that every image of every scene comes to the mind’s eye vividly. You know the move: It is the equivalent of the picture of the Bic Mac in an ad. And I’ll be honest here: The press release used the word “cinematic,” and I wrote it off as pure hyperbole for the sake of hype in marketing. One of the qualities of this book that struck me over and over again as I read through The Luminous Dead was its cinematic quality.
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