A review by sarah1984
The Ward by S. L. Grey
4.0
11/2 - I'm already getting a disturbing feeling from the idea of this hospital. Full of gruesome patients, nurses who could care less and might kill you if you annoy them and the underlying feeling that something evil is going to happen to you at any moment - just my kind of horror hospital story. To be continued...
12/2 - This would be a great horror movie. It's definitely creeping me out as a horror book. The idea of a disgusting hospital where you go in for a procedure or an emergency and something goes wrong and you end up as an unwilling body part donor to the rich and famous is not a rational fear, but it's hidden deep down at the bottom of my psyche - enough that anything featuring this kind of storyline is quite disturbing. The whole situation really plays into my fears of what can happen while you're under anaesthetic and unaware of what the doctors are doing. South Africa is a perfect setting for this kind of hospital, I think it would be less believable in a city the world sees as more modern and civilised like New York or London or Sydney. I wouldn't be able to suspend my disbelief at the idea of a hospital like this hidden away in a back alley that the media, if not the government, had exposed and closed down. To be continued...
SPOILER ALERT
14/2 - I was surprised by the revelation that aliens were the bad guys as opposed to humans with evil intent or ghosts (sort of House on Haunted Hill style). I was surprised when Lisa and Farrell managed to escape the hospital and there was still 100 or so pages of the book left to go. I expected the final climax of the book to be one escaping and not the other, and so the ending was different to the usual horror-have-to-escape-book/movie that you see in the average storyline. Other reviewers have said that this wasn't quite as good as the author's first book, so since I'm giving The Ward 4 stars, I'm really looking forward to reading their previous book - I'm expecting big things from it now.
12/2 - This would be a great horror movie. It's definitely creeping me out as a horror book. The idea of a disgusting hospital where you go in for a procedure or an emergency and something goes wrong and you end up as an unwilling body part donor to the rich and famous is not a rational fear, but it's hidden deep down at the bottom of my psyche - enough that anything featuring this kind of storyline is quite disturbing. The whole situation really plays into my fears of what can happen while you're under anaesthetic and unaware of what the doctors are doing. South Africa is a perfect setting for this kind of hospital, I think it would be less believable in a city the world sees as more modern and civilised like New York or London or Sydney. I wouldn't be able to suspend my disbelief at the idea of a hospital like this hidden away in a back alley that the media, if not the government, had exposed and closed down. To be continued...
SPOILER ALERT
14/2 - I was surprised by the revelation that aliens were the bad guys as opposed to humans with evil intent or ghosts (sort of House on Haunted Hill style). I was surprised when Lisa and Farrell managed to escape the hospital and there was still 100 or so pages of the book left to go. I expected the final climax of the book to be one escaping and not the other, and so the ending was different to the usual horror-have-to-escape-book/movie that you see in the average storyline. Other reviewers have said that this wasn't quite as good as the author's first book, so since I'm giving The Ward 4 stars, I'm really looking forward to reading their previous book - I'm expecting big things from it now.