Eren by Simon P. Clark

Eren

by Simon P. Clark

'Tell the story to its end,' says Eren with a grin. His yellow eyes are glowing like embers in the night.
'When I reach the end,' I say, 'what happens? You’ll have the whole story.'
'Hmm,' he says, looking at me and licking his lips with a dry, grey tongue. 'What happens then? Why don’t we find out?'

People are keeping secrets from Oli. His mum has brought him to stay with his aunt and uncle in the countryside, but nobody will tell him why his dad isn’t with them. Where is he? Has something happened? Oli has a hundred questions, but then he finds a secret of his own: he discovers the creature that lives in the attic…

Eren.

Eren is not human.
Eren is hungry for stories.
Eren has been waiting for him.

Sharing his stories with Eren, Oli starts to make sense of what’s happening downstairs with his family. But what if it’s a trap? Soon, Oli must make a choice: learn the truth – or abandon himself to Eren’s world, forever.

Reviewed by celinenyx on

3 of 5 stars

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Eren. This review is incredibly hard to write, because I barely have any thoughts on this book. Unlike the characters in Eren, I'm not much of a storyteller.

Suddenly Oli is whipped away from his home and friends in London, and has to go live with his uncle in a small town. The grown-ups keep telling him lies, and when Oli discovers the creature in the attic he decides to keep a secret himself.

Eren subscribes to a rather particular brand of meta-fiction. The core of the book is talking about stories and what stories are and how important they are (mainly in conversations between Eren and Oli), but I honestly just didn't get it. I have to disclaim though that for me stories are just that, things people tell each other. Fictions. I don't think there is anything magical or special about it at all - telling stories is natural to humans, just like eating or sleeping. If you do want to philosophize about the nature of stories, Eren might be very interesting for you.

The story itself was good. It had a beginning. Solid middle. Strong ending. There was some foreshadowing and a grand finale. The ending itself is rather vague, but it's not "open ended". Depending on your expectations, it might not be very satisfying though (as several other reviewers have pointed out).

Overall my feelings towards Eren are decidedly neutral. It didn't grasp my attention, nor did it bore me. It had some nice creepiness going on at times, but it was never truly scary. If the premise interests you, I'd say, go for it.

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Reading updates

  • Started reading
  • 1 September, 2014: Finished reading
  • 1 September, 2014: Reviewed