Torment

When People Ask Me For Most Horrific Book I've Ever Read, This Is The Book I Name. I'm writing this review literally over a decade after actually reading this book - apparently I either never wrote a review or the places I posted it have lost it over the years. And yet I can still do an accurate review, perhaps even better since I can now speak to the lasting impact of this book. This is one that to this day is truly the singular most personally horrific book I have ever read. It produced nightmares for years any time I thought of it. And that is exactly what makes it so great. It is truly one of those books that will haunt you in unexpected ways and places, and this was one of Robinson's (then going by Bishop to try to protect his Robinson scifi brand) early works. His newer stuff is even better - and yet this one was so phenomenal I can remember details of it a decade later. Though to be clear, this is one that if you're not as steeped in conservative evangelical American Christian thought as I am (and was just leaving when I read it originally), perhaps all you really get from this is a kickass balls to the wall scifi horror thriller. Which is still awesome in its own way. But if you're familiar with that thinking, if you're familiar with Dante's Inferno or the 18th century retelling known as Jonathan Edwards' sermon Sinners In The Hands Of An Angry God... be prepared for another now-modern retelling of a lot of the same ideas. Truly phenomenal work. Very much recommended - with the lights on. ;)