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The Kills #2
The Massive
Rem Gunnersen needs work. His wife needs a vacation. Cathy won’t get her vacation. Rem’s job will kill him.
Down on his luck and desperate for money, Rem Gunnersen accepts an unusual proposition: to lead a team of seven men to Camp Liberty. A remote military base in the Iraqi desert, it is the place where the detritus of war is incinerated, buried, removed from memory. For a long time the camp has been unmanned. Rem and his men have no idea why they need to be there. Then Stephen Lawrence Sutler arrives.
The Massive is book two of The Kills.
The Kills is an epic novel of crime and conspiracy told in four books.
It begins with a man on the run and ends with a burned body.
Author Richard House has created audio and video content that takes you beyond the boundaries of the book and into the characters’ lives outside its pages.
Down on his luck and desperate for money, Rem Gunnersen accepts an unusual proposition: to lead a team of seven men to Camp Liberty. A remote military base in the Iraqi desert, it is the place where the detritus of war is incinerated, buried, removed from memory. For a long time the camp has been unmanned. Rem and his men have no idea why they need to be there. Then Stephen Lawrence Sutler arrives.
The Massive is book two of The Kills.
The Kills is an epic novel of crime and conspiracy told in four books.
It begins with a man on the run and ends with a burned body.
Author Richard House has created audio and video content that takes you beyond the boundaries of the book and into the characters’ lives outside its pages.
- GenresThriller
311 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 2013
2 people are currently reading
33 people want to read
About the author
Richard House
44 books18 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author with this name in the Goodreads database.
Richard House is an author, film maker, artist and university lecturer. As well as the digital-first novel The Kills, he has written two previous novels (Bruiser and Uninvited), which were published by Serpent’s Tail in the 1990s. He is a member of the Chicago-based collaborative Haha. He is the editor of a digital magazine, Fatboy Review: www.fatboyreview.net
Born in Cyprus, Richard House is an artist and writer. His first novel, Bruiser, was short-listed for the Ferro Grumley Gay Fiction Award in the USA. The Kills has been longlisted for the 2013 Booker Prize. He currently teaches at Birmingham University, UK.
Richard House is an author, film maker, artist and university lecturer. As well as the digital-first novel The Kills, he has written two previous novels (Bruiser and Uninvited), which were published by Serpent’s Tail in the 1990s. He is a member of the Chicago-based collaborative Haha. He is the editor of a digital magazine, Fatboy Review: www.fatboyreview.net
Born in Cyprus, Richard House is an artist and writer. His first novel, Bruiser, was short-listed for the Ferro Grumley Gay Fiction Award in the USA. The Kills has been longlisted for the 2013 Booker Prize. He currently teaches at Birmingham University, UK.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
September 28, 2013
Oh dear. I am now 50% into this project, and while I admire it, I'm not enjoying it as literature. The Massive is 400 pages devoted to proving that your paranoid conspiracy-theorist nightmares are true. I'm hoping the puzzle pieces come together at some point, but in the mean time, I'm left with 7 or 8 male characters (all 20 or 30 something civilian contractors in Iraq) who all seem exactly the same, and flat at that - there is very little to differentiate one character from another, and often the plotting and dialogue is enigmatic to the point of frustration.
There's also (intentionally?) little sense of class and ethnicity, those great American determinant signifiers - it irked me all book that a novel about the American working class being exploited as expendable "civilian contractors" in the Iraq theater because they want a decent wage and a chance to get ahead had no visibly African-American characters. Everyone may not be white (you'd never know in this book), but they all "seem" white (even Santo and Chimeno) in that they are all deracinated and have none of the individual cultural and familial specificity that, at the end of the day, makes Americans interesting. What makes Clark different than Watts? Watts different from Pakosta?
It all gets a little tiring despite the nightmarish landscape of secret toxic "burn pits" in Southern Iraq, where the Halliburton analog and the US government forces plot, scheme, double cross, and intersect in a dizzying way.
.
Still enjoying the enhanced ebook videos - wish there were more - they are all that gives the characters a voice. Hoping for better in the next 2 books.
There's also (intentionally?) little sense of class and ethnicity, those great American determinant signifiers - it irked me all book that a novel about the American working class being exploited as expendable "civilian contractors" in the Iraq theater because they want a decent wage and a chance to get ahead had no visibly African-American characters. Everyone may not be white (you'd never know in this book), but they all "seem" white (even Santo and Chimeno) in that they are all deracinated and have none of the individual cultural and familial specificity that, at the end of the day, makes Americans interesting. What makes Clark different than Watts? Watts different from Pakosta?
It all gets a little tiring despite the nightmarish landscape of secret toxic "burn pits" in Southern Iraq, where the Halliburton analog and the US government forces plot, scheme, double cross, and intersect in a dizzying way.
.
Still enjoying the enhanced ebook videos - wish there were more - they are all that gives the characters a voice. Hoping for better in the next 2 books.
November 1, 2013
It would be bad enough if the only problem facing Rem Gunnersen with regards to his self-owned and operated business was that of financial ruin. Yes, he’s drowning in debt. Yes, he’s desperate for money. Yes, he’s staring the very real possibility of bankruptcy in the face. Problems of cash flow, difficult as they can be, are fixable in a multitude of ways. Having to recover from any damage done to his professional reputation however is something that would prove to be a much more arduous task. At the start of The Massive, Rem finds himself in the unenviable position of having to deal with both issues, one as a direct consequence of the other.
It turns out that a longtime friend/employee has stolen property from the homes of several of Rem’s clients. Feeling a moral obligation to pay for that which has disappeared, Rem’s wallet quickly begins to lighten. His good deed won’t go unpunished. For even as he tries to do the right thing and make amends, he finds himself fighting a losing battle against the irreparable damage done to his name. As hard as he’s worked to contain it, word of the transgressions has spread like wildfire and as a direct result his business is drying up. Rem knows that he’s paying for the stolen items with money he can’t afford to spend.
READ MORE:
http://www.typographicalera.com/the-m...
It turns out that a longtime friend/employee has stolen property from the homes of several of Rem’s clients. Feeling a moral obligation to pay for that which has disappeared, Rem’s wallet quickly begins to lighten. His good deed won’t go unpunished. For even as he tries to do the right thing and make amends, he finds himself fighting a losing battle against the irreparable damage done to his name. As hard as he’s worked to contain it, word of the transgressions has spread like wildfire and as a direct result his business is drying up. Rem knows that he’s paying for the stolen items with money he can’t afford to spend.
READ MORE:
http://www.typographicalera.com/the-m...
July 4, 2015
The long, long backstory for Sutler. The amount of graft and deception by contractors stationed in Iraq is mind-boggling. Sadly, reality my prove to be more twisted and ambitious that what was so painstakingly laid out in this novel.
October 26, 2013
A very average follow-up to the superior Sutler, saved only by the realisation that this is an alternative perspective on that first story with an unexpected cliffhanger.
April 6, 2015
Certainly well-written, but cannot engage. Struggled. Don't quite understand the drama.
July 28, 2015
Die Gunnersen is een regelrechte idioot. En de korte inhoud klopt niet: gaat hij een stad bouwen? Hij zeker niet. Wat hij in Irak gaat doen, weet hij niet voor, niet tijdens, en niet erna....
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews