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The True Bride
This was a good read.
- GenresHorror
212 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1982
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
May 12, 2018
One popular trend in fiction at the moment is the nitwit woman who suspects that her husband is keeping secrets from her, and acts like a complete buffoon about it, rather than just asking him. Here's a version of that same story from 36 years ago! It goes to show that insufferable lead heroines haven't changed all that much since 1982!
Ellen Campbell is heavily pregnant and suffering the typical neuroses that afflict pregnant women. Things only get worse when weird things start happening - followed by a black car, a blue blouse stolen and then ripped up. On top of this, she uncovers a series of little white lies from husband Eric that start to build up. What secret is he keeping from her?
Ellen really did test my last nerve. This could have all been avoided if she'd just ASKED her husband for the truth. Good grief. Eric is no better. The pacing was initially slow, but eventually hit its stride. There's a strong suspense sequence with Ellen in her husband's deserted work building. But it's very exhausting being in Ellen's headspace. She was too neurotic and, frankly, too stupid, for me to have a great deal of sympathy for her.
I enjoyed the climax, and I'm giving this some allowances since it originally came out nearly 40 years ago. It's actually better (and better written) than many of the similar books coming out today.
Ellen Campbell is heavily pregnant and suffering the typical neuroses that afflict pregnant women. Things only get worse when weird things start happening - followed by a black car, a blue blouse stolen and then ripped up. On top of this, she uncovers a series of little white lies from husband Eric that start to build up. What secret is he keeping from her?
Ellen really did test my last nerve. This could have all been avoided if she'd just ASKED her husband for the truth. Good grief. Eric is no better. The pacing was initially slow, but eventually hit its stride. There's a strong suspense sequence with Ellen in her husband's deserted work building. But it's very exhausting being in Ellen's headspace. She was too neurotic and, frankly, too stupid, for me to have a great deal of sympathy for her.
I enjoyed the climax, and I'm giving this some allowances since it originally came out nearly 40 years ago. It's actually better (and better written) than many of the similar books coming out today.
March 5, 2018
I was doing one of my favourite pastimes, browsing second hand book shops and charity shops when I came across what I like to call the Altman Trilogy. The True Bride, Dark Places and The Intruder.
All three are the Corgi editions published during the 80’s with fantastic horror covers. What’s not to love? I picked all three off the shelves, smiled immensely and thanked my good luck. Would the reading experience live up to the finding them experience?
So I started the Altman Trilogy with The True Bride.
Ellen is expecting a baby with her husband Eric but this joyous time becomes more and more creepy, nasty, scary, frightening and horrific as someone stalks and terrorizes Ellen. Is this all in Ellen’s mind? Or is there a real person out there watching and haunting Ellen? Ellen also discovers that Eric has a dark secret from his past which slowly unravels.
I had preconceptions about the Altman Trilogy books. That they would be cheap horror pulp novels which I would enjoy reading but were not great stories. Even more so when my last two reads were The Shining and Carrie.
Well, my preconceptions were destroyed! This was well written with great characters and an excellent mystery which unfolds to reveal all. The downside was the ending. The final reckoning was over in a matter of minutes and rather too quick. I thought I was running out of pages for the final confrontation. It had a great build up and mystery to fathom but then just finished. Still giving it four stars.
I enjoyed the first of the Altman Trilogy and I am looking forward to book number two, Dark Places.
All three are the Corgi editions published during the 80’s with fantastic horror covers. What’s not to love? I picked all three off the shelves, smiled immensely and thanked my good luck. Would the reading experience live up to the finding them experience?
So I started the Altman Trilogy with The True Bride.
Ellen is expecting a baby with her husband Eric but this joyous time becomes more and more creepy, nasty, scary, frightening and horrific as someone stalks and terrorizes Ellen. Is this all in Ellen’s mind? Or is there a real person out there watching and haunting Ellen? Ellen also discovers that Eric has a dark secret from his past which slowly unravels.
I had preconceptions about the Altman Trilogy books. That they would be cheap horror pulp novels which I would enjoy reading but were not great stories. Even more so when my last two reads were The Shining and Carrie.
Well, my preconceptions were destroyed! This was well written with great characters and an excellent mystery which unfolds to reveal all. The downside was the ending. The final reckoning was over in a matter of minutes and rather too quick. I thought I was running out of pages for the final confrontation. It had a great build up and mystery to fathom but then just finished. Still giving it four stars.
I enjoyed the first of the Altman Trilogy and I am looking forward to book number two, Dark Places.
December 2, 2025
Als de miscommunicatie nou achterwege was gebleven en een derde verhaallijn vanuit Eric erbij hadden gekregen, had ik het verhaal net wat sterker gevonden. De dader kwam uiteindelijk ook uit de lucht vallen, nergens krijg je ook maar een specifieke hint wie het zou kunnen zijn. Daarvoor blijven de stukken vanuit de dader te algemeen, dat vond ik jammer. Het voelde alsof de auteur tegen het einde dacht: oja shit ik moet nog iemand daadwerkelijk aanwijzen als dader... Daardoor was het einde nogal anticlimactisch. Dus kortgezegd heb ik me ermee vermaakt, maar er had meer ingezeten.
O en nog een specifieke opmerking tegen hoofdpersonage Ellen: Bladzijden scheuren uit een biebboek doe je niet! GRR!
O en nog een specifieke opmerking tegen hoofdpersonage Ellen: Bladzijden scheuren uit een biebboek doe je niet! GRR!
May 3, 2021
Read this years ago, but I recall it as pretty suspenseful. I went on to read several more books under the "Thomas Altman" byline including Black Christmas.
July 27, 2018
It was slow to get into at first but got more interesting in the middle. It's like reading a Lifetime thriller movie on paper. The characters are your typical Lifetime players: the terrorized pregnant wife who gets more paranoid and suspects everyone, the husband with a tragic past, the kooky best friend, the cold mother and her long-suffering caretaker, the weary but friendly cop. The climax and ending was rushed, but for an 80s psychological thriller you could do much worse.
October 30, 2022
The more I read of genre fiction from this era (the 1980s), the more I realize how easy it is for male authors to aim for writing that builds sexual tension only to miss the mark and end with passages that are flimsy excuses to fetishize women’s bodies. So I, first of all, appreciate that in The True Bride, a work from this very era, Thomas Altman (a.k.a. Campbell Armstrong) is able to convey the intimacy of his female protagonist’s feelings without becoming exploitative. She–and other women in the story–grapple with their changing bodies, getting older, and the irreparable aches and pains of pregnancy, but the descriptions always feel like they are serving a purpose rather than simply leering.
And this is what helps make this book pretty effective overall. Ellen, our protagonist, has many insecurities, which feed into the sense of paranoia she begins experiencing when little things seem off. The pretty young blonde girl next door is a little too eager to cozy up with her husband. Her best friend is a little too lax in her morals, sleeping with a series of married men. Her otherwise perfect husband may be telling her some white lies that could amount to something more sinister.
So it also makes sense that the book would become as introspective as it is, as Ellen withdraws further and further within herself when it feels like there is no one else she can trust. And Altman’s language is fairly poetic, capturing Ellen’s fluctuating feelings of doubt and betrayal. But, at some point, the internalization overwhelms everything else. For all of Ellen’s current concerns, we never really find out much about her past, making her existence feel less believable than it should.
Such a heavy focus on her inner monologue also leaves little room for the climax, which whizzes by with little fanfare and allows a number of issues to quickly resolve themselves. It’s a shame because all the many red herrings (even if they’re never fully explained in the end) worked to distract me from the big reveal, and with a smoother pacing, this could have been a very solid little thriller.
And this is what helps make this book pretty effective overall. Ellen, our protagonist, has many insecurities, which feed into the sense of paranoia she begins experiencing when little things seem off. The pretty young blonde girl next door is a little too eager to cozy up with her husband. Her best friend is a little too lax in her morals, sleeping with a series of married men. Her otherwise perfect husband may be telling her some white lies that could amount to something more sinister.
So it also makes sense that the book would become as introspective as it is, as Ellen withdraws further and further within herself when it feels like there is no one else she can trust. And Altman’s language is fairly poetic, capturing Ellen’s fluctuating feelings of doubt and betrayal. But, at some point, the internalization overwhelms everything else. For all of Ellen’s current concerns, we never really find out much about her past, making her existence feel less believable than it should.
Such a heavy focus on her inner monologue also leaves little room for the climax, which whizzes by with little fanfare and allows a number of issues to quickly resolve themselves. It’s a shame because all the many red herrings (even if they’re never fully explained in the end) worked to distract me from the big reveal, and with a smoother pacing, this could have been a very solid little thriller.
March 11, 2019
This book definitely has you guessing until the very end.
February 26, 2016
- My Description -
Ellen Campbell is very pregnant.
She's also being stalked by an unknown shadow.
Is she crazy?
A case of pregnancy hormones getting the best of her?
Or is she actually being watched by someone?
- My Review -
February 6, 2015
Read this years ago ... and it still haunts me.
Read
February 10, 2017Ned. Titel: Nachtmerrie
April 15, 2019
This is a really great book. This is an older author but a great book. This author hasn't written many books, but I like his writing. It is spooky like Strphen King.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews