Platforms

by John R. Maxim

In most ways, Peter Halloran is an average suburbanite, commuting each day from his home in Riverside, Connecticut, to his job in New York City. He lives with a wife he does not love and a son he cannot talk to. But his ordinary life begins to unravel on the day he sees a dead man standing on the train platform. The first sighting is followed by another...and then a third. And soon Halloran is trapped in a bizarre and brutal struggle he cannot begin to comprehend -- as a horrific web of violence and evil emanates from the train station that serves his quiet New England town. Because Riverside is home to dark secrets and lethal mysteries -- and a terror only Peter Halloran can see. Suddenly, one ordinary man is on the frontlines of a war like no other -- and fighting desperately for lives that may already be lost...including his own.

Genres: Horror, Fiction, Mystery Thriller

272 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1980

About the author

John R. Maxim was born in Greenwich Village, NYC, educated at NY Jesuit Schools (Xavier and Fordham) played all the street sports and most team sports.
Comes from a family of cops and a few Feds. After school, took up flying, skydiving and dirt-track stock car racing until the Military decided it could do without him. Then went into marketing and advertising. Several awards. Rose to Senior VP at major New York Advertising agencies. Work involved a great deal of international travel. Major hobby back then was sailing.
Always wanted to write, however, and, one night on the bar car, decided to give it a year, succeed or fail. Sold first novel at age 41. Wrote 12 more plus one non-fiction, averaging a year and a half each. Translated into ten languages. Several were optioned for film or TV. Still waiting.
Took up skiing. Many trips to Switzerland and Colorado. With the kids gone, sold our Connecticut house and moved to Hilton Head Island with his beautiful wife, Christine, herself a champion sailor.

Reviews

[Ben Loory · Rating 2 out of 5]

maxim builds an interesting metaphysical world around the idea of various levels of existence all happening at the same time at different vibrational rates, but then the story happens and it rapidly gets very confusing so then the characters start trying to explain the story to one another and then the story stops being a story and just becomes characters talking about how the story might actually make sense if you look at it in a certain light but then it ends, i think there's an explosion or something.

[Ellis · Rating 2 out of 5]

Good god, why did I waste a day reading this? Struggling to ignore the gaping plot holes: if these "path" people are so dangerous, why are we sitting around eating salmon noodles discussing them? If time is of the essence, why are we taking walks & drinking coffee (not at the same time) and chatting about spirituality? If you know your wife is murderous & unpredicatable, why did you send your son home to her? And what is with the ending?! And I quote: "She kicked again and there was blackness." There. That's how the whole plan ends, the one that they've been building up to the entire book. I just saved you the trouble of having to be disappointed yourself.

[Wayne · Rating 2 out of 5]

If I'm going to keep reading books about parapsychology and other kinds of psychic phenomena, I'm going to have to develop ESP myself so I can foresee if the book is worth the time or not. Unfortunately. I feel in to another one of these books that start off nicely, but teeters back and forth on tedium. This time tedium wins out.

I was hoping for one of those so bad, it;s good books in this. All I got was bad. Souls that are lost hang around a train station platform waiting to move on to the next level. A commuter is struck on his head and now can communicate with these spirits. This could have been much more, but it sort of turns out to be more "The Young And The Psychic" type soap opera. We put the spirits behind us to concentrate on a love triangle with the commuter, and a male/female medium. All I can say about this book is to just let it alone. Do Not Try To Contact It.

[I.D. · Rating 2 out of 5]

After an accident Peter can see ghosts at a train station. A medium named Jennifer comes to help him deal with an electrical force that’s going to drive people insane and cause spirits to get lost in purgatory. It seems that ghosts can get lost in an energy mist if they’re not guided properly so a team is formed to stop the killings of possessed people and help the trapped ghosts.
There was a semi interesting premise here locked away in page after page of exposition and explanatory dialogue. It felt like lots of set up and world building with no payoff or place to go. The romance was too forced and the concept of people who work for a living being dead inside and thus easily possessed by mist was… something. Overall it was okay at best and stupid at worst. Needed stronger characters, maybe more of a plot and less of the endless conceptual explanations. Probably a 2.5.

[Tamahome · Rating 3 out of 5]

I remembered as a kid reading the beginning. Something about a ghost making someone write in pencil to find Halloran, because he can "see them". Someone on Goodreads help me find it. I read the terribly formatted kindle edition with random red letters and no chapter divisions. I liked parts of it. It was nice to go back to the 80's with ghosts and psychics and the afterlife.

[Rowan MacBean · Rating 4 out of 5]

Even though the action and mystery in this book started up right away, it still took me a little while to get into it. Once I did, though, I had trouble putting it down. I'm not usually a very big fan of supernatural stuff (anymore -- it used to be my bread and butter) because I think stories that deal with the afterlife can get kind of preachy even when they don't mean to, but Platforms, to me, avoided this quite nicely. There was nothing distractingly outside my ability to suspend disbelief. There were almost no characters who made me feel indifferent; I either loved or loved to hate nearly everyone. And the ending was exactly the sort I like: it wasn't exactly happy but it put a smile on my face.

[Alexandra Bogdanovic · Rating 4 out of 5]

I must admit, I grabbed this book from the book bin at the Greenwich recycling center knowing nothing about the author or his work. The only hook for me was that I am familiar with the area where this book was set.
What I quickly discovered was a compelling, thought-provoking, and frankly disturbing book. Or perhaps it was just unsettling. At any rate, it was very good.
The only little nit I have is that most of the narrative took the form of dialogue in one form or another. There was little action until the very end. As an author, I understood why Maxim made this choice, but as a reader I found it a bit tedious. If you prefer a quick, action-packed read, this is definitely not the book for you.

[Hedgewitch · Rating 2 out of 5]

Couldn't finish this one--though it's witty and engaging, it's a about a man who sees the recently dead, and the doings in the afterworld sort of along the lines of Ghostbusters. Just not my style but if humor and ghosts and a romance and a plot by unspecified evil spirits to take over the local railroad station and subvert the townspeople sounds liek your thing, it's a well-written and intelligent book.

[Jessy245 · Rating 5 out of 5]

This one will surprise you. It is a real twist to the whole ghost/spirit scenario. First time I read Maxim and looking forward to checking out some others.

[Barb · Rating 1 out of 5]

couldn't get into book