James Herbert
James Herbert thriller, science fiction | |
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| Notable works | The Rats series, The Fog |
James John Herbert,
Biography
Born in London,[3] Herbert was the son of Herbert Herbert,[4] a stall-holder at London's Brick Lane Market. He attended a Catholic school in Bethnal Green called Our Lady of the Assumption, then at 11 won a scholarship to St Aloysius Grammar School in Highgate. He left school at 15 and studied at Hornsey College of Art, joining the art department of John Collings, a small advertising agency.[citation needed] He left the agency to join Charles Barker Advertising where he worked as art director and then group head.[4]
Herbert lived in
On 20 March 2013, Herbert died suddenly at his home in Sussex at the age of 69.[8] No cause of death was given and a spokeswoman for the publisher said that he had not been ill. He is survived by his wife, Eileen, and three daughters.[11][12] His estate was valued at £8.3 million.[citation needed]
Work
His first two books,
With his third novel, the
'48 is an alternative history novel set in 1948 in which the Second World War ended with the release of a devastating plague by the defeated Hitler and, like The Spear, features British characters who sympathise with the Nazis. Others narrates the story of a physically deformed private detective. Herbert had previously tackled the theme of reincarnation in his fourth novel, Fluke, the fantasy story of a dog who somehow remembers his previous life as a human being. Rumbo, one of the characters from Fluke also turns up in The Magic Cottage. Once... includes another reference to the character of Rumbo (along with an in-joke of elven folk having names of reversed titles of Herbert's previous novels; 'Hanoj', 'Niamod', 'Noom', etc.).
Nobody True continues the theme of life after death, being narrated by a ghost whose investigation of his own death results in the destruction of his illusions about his life. Herbert described Creed as his Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein. The character Joe Creed is a cynical, sleazy paparazzo who is drawn into a plot involving fed-up and underappreciated monsters.
The novel The Secret of Crickley Hall, originally scheduled for release in April 2006, was eventually released in October. A long novel about a haunted country house in England, it examined the relationship between religious zealotry and child abuse. One of the characters in this novel is named after a real person, who won the honour by having the winning bid in the 2004 BBC Radio 2 Children in Need Auction. Various biographical and critical pieces by and about Herbert have been collected in James Herbert: By Horror Haunted, edited by Stephen Jones, and also in James Herbert – Devil in the Dark, written by Craig Cabell.
Herbert released a new novel virtually every year from 1974 to 1988, wrote six novels during the 1990s and released three new works in the 2000s. "I am very insecure about being a writer", he stated in the book Faces of Fear. "I don't understand why I am so successful. And the longer I stay that way, the better it's going to be, because that's what keeps me on the edge, striving if you like."
Herbert's final novel has an eerie political edge. Ash imagines
He was the subject of a This is Your Life programme in 1995, when he was surprised by Michael Aspel at the London Dungeon.[citation needed]
Reception
"Herbert was by no means literary, but his work had a raw urgency," said Stephen King. "His best novels, The Rats and The Fog, had the effect of Mike Tyson in his championship days: no finesse, all crude power. Those books were best sellers because many readers (including me) were too horrified to put them down."[16]
"There are few things I would like to do less than lie under a cloudy night sky while someone read aloud the more vivid passages of Moon," Andrew Postman wrote in The New York Times Book Review. "In the thriller genre, do recommendations come any higher?"[16]
List of works
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Adaptations
- The Survivor (1981 film)
- Deadly Eyes (1982 film adapted from The Rats)
- The Rats (1985 computer game for the Commodore 64 and Sinclair Spectrum)
- Fluke (a 1991 five-part BBC Radio 4 reading; a 1995 film adaptation)
- Haunted (1995 film)
- The Magic Cottage (1998 BBC Radio 4 Dramatisation)
- The Secret of Crickley Hall (2012 three-part BBC One television serial)
- The Unholy (2021 film adapted from Shrine)
See also
Notes
- ^ Illustrated by Ian Miller.
- ^ Collection of works and interviews, edited by Stephen Jones. See Jones 1992.
- ^ Photographs by Paul Barkshire.
- ^ "Maurice and Mog", about a man living in his nuclear shelter with a cat, was originally a chapter of Domain that was excised from some editions of the novel. In: Williamson 1987, 1988 & 2001 and Jones 1992.
- ^ "Breakfast", about a woman who continues with her chores after Armageddon, was originally a chapter of Domain that was excised from some editions of the novel. In: Masterton 1989 and Jones 1992.
- ^ "Halloween's Child" was an original story first published in the Daily Mail. In Etchison 1991a & 1991b and Jones 1992.
- ^ "They Don't Like Us". In: Jones 1992 and Francis & Upton 1996.
- ^ "Extinct". In: Cabell 2003.
- ^ "Cora's Needs" is the restoration of a chapter of Sepulchre that was edited down before publication. In: Cabell 2003.
References
- ^ Williams, Charlotte. "James Herbert Dies". Retrieved 20 March 2013.
- ^ a b Plint, Alec (21 March 2013). "20 things you didn't know about James Herbert". The Daily Telegraph. London. Retrieved 21 March 2013.
- ^ Cabell 2003, p. 3.
- ^ Guardian.co.uk. London. Retrieved 24 March 2013.
- ^ "Sussex writer honoured – Heart Sussex News". Heart.co.uk. Retrieved 21 March 2013.
- ^ Kugler, Oliver (7 April 2006). "Kugler's people: Peter Herbert". The Guardian G2: 14–15.
- ^ "Miasma, madness and mutants". The Sydney Morning Herald. 21 March 2013. Retrieved 24 March 2013.
- ^ a b Schudel, Matt (22 March 2013). "James Herbert, Britain's Stephen King, dies at 69". The Washington Post. Retrieved 24 March 2013.
- ^ "No. 59446". The London Gazette (Supplement). 12 June 2010. p. 10.
- ^ Katy Rice (19 October 2012). "Spooky behaviour". The Argus.
- ^ "Obituary: James Herbert". The Daily Telegraph. London. 21 March 2013. Retrieved 24 March 2013.
- ^ "James Herbert: UK horror author dies aged 69". BBC News. 20 March 2013. Retrieved 20 March 2013.
- ^ a b "Herbert, James". The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. Retrieved 25 July 2019.
- ^ "Talking Terror: The James Herbert Interview". panmacmillan.com.
- ^ Potter, Adam Lee (5 September 2012). "James Herbert: My new thriller about Princess Diana's secret son". Daily Express. Retrieved 1 September 2017.
- ^ a b Weber, Bruce (24 March 2013). "James Herbert, British Horror Novelist, Dies at 69". The New York Times.
- ^ "Herbert, James, 1943-2013". British Library. Retrieved 7 October 2016.
Bibliography
- Sources
- Cabell, Craig (2003). James Herbert: Devil in the Dark. United Kingdom: ISBN 978-1-84358-059-1.
- ISBN 978-0-8125-1766-8.
- ISBN 978-0-88733-116-9.
- ISBN 978-0-333-65340-1.
- Jones, Stephen, ed. (1992). James Herbert: By Horror Haunted. London: ISBN 978-0-450-53810-0.
- ISBN 978-0-312-93156-8.
- ISBN 978-0-940776-24-1.
- ISBN 978-0-425-10693-8.
- ISBN 978-0-7860-1455-2.
- Further reading
- Spark, Alasdair (1993). "Horrible Writing: the Early Fiction of James Herbert". In Bloom, Clive (ed.). Creepers: British Horror & Fantasy in the Twentieth Century. London: ISBN 9780745306650.
External links
- James Herbert at IMDb
- James Herbert at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
- James Herbert page on DLS Reviews
- James Herbert discusses his novel Haunted with Neil Gaiman – a British Library sound recording
- Desert Island Discs appearance (14 September 1986)
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