The 1981 edition from Warner Books was wrecked by the editor.

Richard Laymon ignored all of the changes from the US edition when his British publisher offered to publish the book.


The Woods Are Dark   September 5, 2001
 9 out of 9 found this review helpful

In typical Laymon fashion, this book starts out with a bang. One minute the characters are in a comfortable, familiar setting and before the first chapter is over they have dropped into a ghastly world populated by monsters and seemingly normal folks (who's in charge of whom?). As the story unwinds the motivations and origins of these ghoulish beings becomes clear and makes sense. The pace of the story is unrelenting. the horror never stops. There are no slow passages to tempt you to set this book down and catch your breath. The twists and turns pull you along to the last page. This is as good as the best of Laymon's writing.


Terrifying!!!   December 23, 2001
 8 out of 8 found this review helpful

A legless thing with powerful hairy arms dragged itself across the road. It paused for a moment in the car's headlights, in front of Neala and Sherri. It tossed a severed human hand which landed between the girls, and then scurried away into the dark forest . . .

This is the best Richard Laymon I have read. So compelling that I literally could not stop reading. It's an erotic thriller that will have your heart racing from the first page to the last.


Pretty darn good!   February 25, 2005
 8 out of 8 found this review helpful

I've been all about trying out new (or new to me, at least) horror authors recently. 3 or 4 names really stood out in my search, Ketchum, Lee, Little, and Laymon. People either seem to love them or hate them. I decided to give Laymon a try, so I hunted down the UK editions of Funland, The Cellar, and The Woods are dark. So far, I'm very impressed.

I won't write a synopsis of the story, you can read the dust jacket for that. I will say that The Woods are dark, has the feel of a cross between Off Season and Deep In the Darkness. There's nothing creepier than deformed cannabalistic Inbreeders! It's well written and contains twists and turns that are unexpected. I would like to have had a little more back story revealed but it doesn't diminish the story at all.

I don't know how I missed these guys as a teen-ager. I guess the American world of horror literature was too jammed up with King and Barker. No room was left for Laymon, his style must have been just a little to edgy for mass-marketability. It's true what they say about getting your hands on the UK prints of his books. It's worth it. The US editions are hacked to pieces, no pun intended.


Laymon does Cannibals   July 8, 2008
 7 out of 7 found this review helpful

First off this is a review of the newly released "Patched back together" version touted as "Restored and Uncut." I have never read the Warner Brothers version which I am told hacked the original story to bits. There is a short (as in 5 pages or so) intro at the beginning of this book by Kelly Laymon who stated that they put the book back together in its original form for this release. Apparently Richard Laymon was always upset at the treatment his novel was given by Warner Brothers.

The actual story in this book is very short, just over 200 pages. Then you have about 30 pages or so of "Beware" which is being re-released soon. The story itself starts off very quickly; within the first two pages the baddies make their first appearance. The book is very sparse as far as characterization, so even at the end you really don't know anything at all about these characters. The book follows two sets of tourists, a family and a set of two twenty something women, who are captured and set out as a sacrifice for the local cannibal tribe. They escape and the rest of the book is one VERY long chase scene. There really isn't much more than that... it's just a whole lot of running, hiding, getting caught, running some more. There is a little bit of characterization with one of the characters losing their sanity (don't want to give away who or how)... however the change that occurs happens in less than 24 hours so it's a bit of a stretch to buy into.

As with any Laymon book there is a lot of sex, and rapes, and some gore... but the gore was a bit disappointing. Perhaps I'm just war hardened after reading so many horror books, but I never once found myself cringing. I would have to think that Laymon was going for an "Offseason" type book with this, unfortunately the sheer terror of "Offseason" was not there, nor was this as gory. I also found this to be a bit sparse on "meat to the story." Generally Laymon has a pretty good plan with his books, true I've never been a fan of his characters, but generally he has a pretty interesting plot lined up for the reader. Unfortunately when the possibility of a really interesting turn in the plot comes up, it is downplayed and left unexplained. In the end I really felt that there should have been more to this book... another hundred pages would have worked well, and perhaps that hundred pages is out there but was missed when they put this book back together.

In all it's an okay book, just not one of Laymon's better works. I'm not sure that he would have released it the way it is had he been alive. Still, if you are looking for a short, quick read about a bunch of people running away and getting naked... this is the book for you!