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Factory Town
Russell Carver, an enigmatic and tortured man in search of a young girl gone missing, has come to Factory Town, a post-industrial wasteland of abandoned buildings, crumbling asphalt, deadly characters, hidden secrets and unspeakable depravity. Wandering deeper and deeper into the dangerous, dream-like and darkly mysterious labyrinths in town, Russell stumbles upon clues that not only lead him closer to the missing girl, but to his own troubled past as well. Because in Factory Town nothing is what it seems, no one is safe, and there's no such thing as a clean escape.
From Jon Bassoff, author of Corrosion, comes a dark, gritty and surreal novel that is at once a compelling mystery and an exploration into the darkest recesses of the human soul. Welcome to the haunting, frightening and disturbing experience that is Russell Carver's search for the truth...
Welcome to FACTORY TOWN.
From Jon Bassoff, author of Corrosion, comes a dark, gritty and surreal novel that is at once a compelling mystery and an exploration into the darkest recesses of the human soul. Welcome to the haunting, frightening and disturbing experience that is Russell Carver's search for the truth...
Welcome to FACTORY TOWN.
212 pages, Paperback
First published October 4, 2014
5 people are currently reading
270 people want to read
About the author
Jon Bassoff
16 books317 followersJon Bassoff is the author of nine novels. His mountain gothic novel, CORROSION, has been translated in French and German and was nominated for the Grand Prix de Litterature Policiere, France’s biggest crime fiction award. His psycho-noir novel, THE DISASSEMBLED MAN, has been adapted for the big screen with a filming date set to begin within the next hundred years. He also wrote the screenplay for BIZARRE LOVE TRIANGLE, which was named semi-finalist at the New York Cinematography Awards and a finalist at the Seattle Film Festival for best short film.
His novels have been lauded by authors like Craig Johnson (LONGMIRE series), James Grady (SIX DAYS OF THE CONDOR), Rob Hart (THE WAREHOUSE), Paul Trembley (A HEADFUL OF GHOSTS), S.A. Cosby (RAZORBLADE TEARS, Ramsey Campbell (THE HUNGRY MOON), Tom Piccirilli (LAST KIND WORDS), and Marcus Sakey (BRILLLIANCE Trilogy). His work has also been featured several times in New York Magazine. For his day job, Bassoff teaches high school English where he is known by students and faculty alike as the deranged writer guy. He is a connoisseur of tequila, hot sauces, psychobilly music, and flea-bag motels.
His novels have been lauded by authors like Craig Johnson (LONGMIRE series), James Grady (SIX DAYS OF THE CONDOR), Rob Hart (THE WAREHOUSE), Paul Trembley (A HEADFUL OF GHOSTS), S.A. Cosby (RAZORBLADE TEARS, Ramsey Campbell (THE HUNGRY MOON), Tom Piccirilli (LAST KIND WORDS), and Marcus Sakey (BRILLLIANCE Trilogy). His work has also been featured several times in New York Magazine. For his day job, Bassoff teaches high school English where he is known by students and faculty alike as the deranged writer guy. He is a connoisseur of tequila, hot sauces, psychobilly music, and flea-bag motels.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 37 reviews
August 11, 2014
First off, I was really looking forward to this, I thought Corrosion was fantastic and recommended it to several friends, even voted for it in the Darkfuse reader’s awards.
First thoughts I had to agree with the surreal voyage bit, only problem, it just got weirder and weirder to the point where 40% in I’d lost all hope and just batted out to the end, which couldn't come quick enough.
The story follows Russell Carver, seemingly new in Factory Town as he searches for Alana, his daughter, in a town of sin, a town of madness and a town of debauchery. It soon became apparent that this trip involved various random encounters with various random people and a tale that spends more time going sideward, backward, in fact any direction except forward.
The gist of the story is that the city is run by someone called the cowboy, whose edict is too kill all the children, so that this town of scum can die with this generation. You see this town was built by the worst of the worst, the murderers, the rapists and the pedophiles and it must die with them.
There was several Alice in Wonderland moments as Russell whose insomnia ridden fragmented memory chances upon a woman he recognises, turns out be his wife and they meet on top of a building as a bunch of people commit mass suicide by hurling themselves off it. They then crawl through a crack in the wall and come out in, wait for it, suburbia, back to his street and his house. I was seriously lost at this point.
Another one was when he eventually gets inside the main factory of Factory Town, hot on the trail of Alana and discovers a passage in the depths of the place, he descends a ladder that goes on forever and comes out in a valley where the sun is just rising. I thought I was losing my sanity never mind the bloke in the story.
There’s loads more of that sort of stuff as Carver flits back to his childhood and gets drilled through the head along the way but sorry to say, at the end of the day this story was just too weird and totally mad. I was massively disappointed and still feel quite strongly about it now.
This is my personnel opinion and reflects the feelings I had as I got further into the story.
I received Factory Town from Darkfuse & Netgalley in exchange for an honest review and that’s what you’ve got.
http://paulnelson.booklikes.com/post/...
First thoughts I had to agree with the surreal voyage bit, only problem, it just got weirder and weirder to the point where 40% in I’d lost all hope and just batted out to the end, which couldn't come quick enough.
The story follows Russell Carver, seemingly new in Factory Town as he searches for Alana, his daughter, in a town of sin, a town of madness and a town of debauchery. It soon became apparent that this trip involved various random encounters with various random people and a tale that spends more time going sideward, backward, in fact any direction except forward.
The gist of the story is that the city is run by someone called the cowboy, whose edict is too kill all the children, so that this town of scum can die with this generation. You see this town was built by the worst of the worst, the murderers, the rapists and the pedophiles and it must die with them.
There was several Alice in Wonderland moments as Russell whose insomnia ridden fragmented memory chances upon a woman he recognises, turns out be his wife and they meet on top of a building as a bunch of people commit mass suicide by hurling themselves off it. They then crawl through a crack in the wall and come out in, wait for it, suburbia, back to his street and his house. I was seriously lost at this point.
Another one was when he eventually gets inside the main factory of Factory Town, hot on the trail of Alana and discovers a passage in the depths of the place, he descends a ladder that goes on forever and comes out in a valley where the sun is just rising. I thought I was losing my sanity never mind the bloke in the story.
There’s loads more of that sort of stuff as Carver flits back to his childhood and gets drilled through the head along the way but sorry to say, at the end of the day this story was just too weird and totally mad. I was massively disappointed and still feel quite strongly about it now.
This is my personnel opinion and reflects the feelings I had as I got further into the story.
I received Factory Town from Darkfuse & Netgalley in exchange for an honest review and that’s what you’ve got.
http://paulnelson.booklikes.com/post/...
August 14, 2014
2.5 stars, rounded up.
This is a really tough novel for me to review without giving away the entire plot of the story.
What we have here is a very surreal trip to Factory Town, where Russel Carver is trying to locate a missing girl, Alana. You immediately get that there is something wrong here.....in fact, the entire town is wrong. For those that believe in the concept of hell, I imagine this town was based upon it.
There are clues throughout the novel as to its purpose; however, I felt that many of the scenes and sudden changes came off as being just "too much" to get these points across. After about 40%, I'm sorry to say that I had begun to lose interest in what I felt was the central storyline. The chaotic, random scenes were simply too distracting.
I understood what was happening in the novel, but I honestly felt that this would have been conveyed much better through a shorter work--as many of the excess scenes ultimately detracted from the central concept. (Perhaps a novella-length work?)
As a much better example of Jon Bassoff's writing style, I'd look to his first novel, CORROSION.
*I received an advanced e-version of this title through DarkFuse/NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.*
This is a really tough novel for me to review without giving away the entire plot of the story.
What we have here is a very surreal trip to Factory Town, where Russel Carver is trying to locate a missing girl, Alana. You immediately get that there is something wrong here.....in fact, the entire town is wrong. For those that believe in the concept of hell, I imagine this town was based upon it.
There are clues throughout the novel as to its purpose; however, I felt that many of the scenes and sudden changes came off as being just "too much" to get these points across. After about 40%, I'm sorry to say that I had begun to lose interest in what I felt was the central storyline. The chaotic, random scenes were simply too distracting.
I understood what was happening in the novel, but I honestly felt that this would have been conveyed much better through a shorter work--as many of the excess scenes ultimately detracted from the central concept. (Perhaps a novella-length work?)
As a much better example of Jon Bassoff's writing style, I'd look to his first novel, CORROSION.
*I received an advanced e-version of this title through DarkFuse/NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.*
December 19, 2015
Russel Carver comes to the Factory Town, to find a young girl called Alana. He has been looking for her for six years and all he has is a computer-generated photo of how she would look today. Factory Town is a post-industrial wasteland of abandoned buildings. But in his quest for finding Alana he also finds clues to his own past.
This book was not my cup of tea, too weird. I kept on reading to the end in hope to find some answers to, well the whole story. But honestly, I found the story too messy and confusing to enjoy it. On the plus side, I liked the mystic of the town, the whole “Fallout” feeling over this domed town.
Thank you Netgalley for providing me with a free copy for an honest review!
This book was not my cup of tea, too weird. I kept on reading to the end in hope to find some answers to, well the whole story. But honestly, I found the story too messy and confusing to enjoy it. On the plus side, I liked the mystic of the town, the whole “Fallout” feeling over this domed town.
Thank you Netgalley for providing me with a free copy for an honest review!
October 27, 2014
A surreal menagerie of the depraved and the grotesque, FACTORY TOWN is an exploration of horror itself. It's very well-written and highly disturbing. I enjoyed it, but it's not for everyone. It's dark and there's no redemption here. It has a sort of I-can't-look-away quality (you know, like spending a night alone on rotten.com or something).
*SPOILERS TO FOLLOW*
The reason, I believe, some have not enjoyed FACTORY TOWN as much as CORROSION is because its plot is self-defeating. It begins with a man shooting himself in the head and then follows this man's delusional fever dreams. The problem with this structure, is that it renders everything that happens in the story meaningless from the beginning. Some things about Russell's life become clear as the delusions progress, but there may not be enough for many readers to grasp onto.
But, take FACTORY TOWN for what it is and there's genius here. Sure, it may be a degenerate, corrupt, psychotic genius, but genius just the same.
I will also say that with the right production and a large enough budget, this could make an excellent movie.
*SPOILERS TO FOLLOW*
The reason, I believe, some have not enjoyed FACTORY TOWN as much as CORROSION is because its plot is self-defeating. It begins with a man shooting himself in the head and then follows this man's delusional fever dreams. The problem with this structure, is that it renders everything that happens in the story meaningless from the beginning. Some things about Russell's life become clear as the delusions progress, but there may not be enough for many readers to grasp onto.
But, take FACTORY TOWN for what it is and there's genius here. Sure, it may be a degenerate, corrupt, psychotic genius, but genius just the same.
I will also say that with the right production and a large enough budget, this could make an excellent movie.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 6, 2014
After reading Corrosion by Jon Bassoff, this book became an immediate must read. Now, the author has found his way on my "auto-buy" list. It's not a long list.
Factory Town is a dream like state of a novel. Surreal, but not overly artistic. The prose is written more matter of fact and dead-pan which made the darkness inside even that much more brilliant. There were so many moments that I wanted to highlight a passage but I had to stop since it happened too often. The imagery was incredible, the surprises often, and the dialogue that appears inside the chapter rather than seperated by quotes I have found is now pulling me deeper into the consciousness of the characters.
There is a lot here, it is deep, and I am quite sure that I didn't 'get' it all, but here's a bit of what's inside the absurdist world of Factory Town: There is the question of if innocence can be saved, if our "God" is dead, or is he alive and 'mad' and hooked up to some bizarre, almost steam-punk life support system? ARe we all in Factory Town? When we fight monsters, do we also become one? Are we doomed to repeat the sins of our father? Deep subjects, yet plenty entertaining. I looked forward to reading this every time I picked up my kindle.
Not sure which I like better, Corrosion or Factory Town. FT tackles bigger issues, is more cosmic, yet at the end it came down to something very personal indeed. It reached for the stars and then came down and touched your heart. I started to read as if I was looking through a telescope at a distant land, but it ended up more as a mirror reflecting back the world we live in. As a father, the last 20% were intense.
Bravo, to both Bassoff and Darkfuse. Can't wait to see the movie, and looking forward to this writers next work.
Factory Town is a dream like state of a novel. Surreal, but not overly artistic. The prose is written more matter of fact and dead-pan which made the darkness inside even that much more brilliant. There were so many moments that I wanted to highlight a passage but I had to stop since it happened too often. The imagery was incredible, the surprises often, and the dialogue that appears inside the chapter rather than seperated by quotes I have found is now pulling me deeper into the consciousness of the characters.
There is a lot here, it is deep, and I am quite sure that I didn't 'get' it all, but here's a bit of what's inside the absurdist world of Factory Town: There is the question of if innocence can be saved, if our "God" is dead, or is he alive and 'mad' and hooked up to some bizarre, almost steam-punk life support system? ARe we all in Factory Town? When we fight monsters, do we also become one? Are we doomed to repeat the sins of our father? Deep subjects, yet plenty entertaining. I looked forward to reading this every time I picked up my kindle.
Not sure which I like better, Corrosion or Factory Town. FT tackles bigger issues, is more cosmic, yet at the end it came down to something very personal indeed. It reached for the stars and then came down and touched your heart. I started to read as if I was looking through a telescope at a distant land, but it ended up more as a mirror reflecting back the world we live in. As a father, the last 20% were intense.
Bravo, to both Bassoff and Darkfuse. Can't wait to see the movie, and looking forward to this writers next work.
December 16, 2014
Russell Carver enters Factory town, a dystopian hell hole, to find a missing girl, Alana. As he goes deeper into the industrial wasteland he confronts his own troubled past, reliving scenes from an abusive childhood that continue to haunt him as an adult.
This is the second book by Bassoff and it's safe to say he has an incredibly distinctive literary voice. Whilst Corrosion was a dark and depressing tour through a broken mans psyche, this is surreal, disjointed and jarring to read but for me it worked.
This book is definitely not for everyone but I found it a fascinating read and it's good to see publishers take a chance on work that doesn't fit a genre mould.
August 13, 2014
Man, this one was tough for me. A very hard to follow surreal trip to Factory Town. The writing was good, but the story was confusing. I get “surreal”, but this one pushed it a wee too far for my reading enjoyment and I was continually lost throughout the story. Maybe that was the point…but it just did not work for me. I even ended up skimming through certain parts, which I never do. Bummer.
*As a member of the DarkFuse / NetGalley Readers Group, I received this e-book in exchange for an honest review.
*As a member of the DarkFuse / NetGalley Readers Group, I received this e-book in exchange for an honest review.
August 27, 2014
I received an ARC copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review.
Darkfuse is not a cookie cutter publisher. They do not trot out one formulaic horror or noir story after another. To be sure, every book is not a piece of experimental literature—they do publish their fair share of traditional genre fiction. But they also take chances on stories that are a bit different and may not appeal to all readers. Factory Town is such a novel.
Reading it reminded me of watching some indie movies where you have to pay close attention or you can quickly get lost. Amores Perros, Memento, even Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels come to mind. A reader friend mentioned David Lynch—which is really a spot-on comparison.
Factory town does not give you a linear plot. The story line reveals itself through constant shifts in time from the protagonist’s horrific childhood, his adult breakdown, the last moments of his life, and this nightmarish journey of self discovery—a fugue sequence that embodies most of the story. Characters are shifting and many of the main characters are dually or triply represented at different times of their life (or potential life) by different characters.
Factory Town is both a real place and the fugue sequence stage which is entirely internal to the main character. It reveals rather than narrates. This is a “writer’s” book, if there is such a thing. It will appeal to fans of Borges or Garcia-Marquez and other magical realists. There are plenty that won’t like it at all.
Where do I fall on this spectrum? Frankly, I don’t know. I just finished the book and this is the type of novel that takes a few days or more to fully absorb. I am going to give it four stars. For now. I may come back and change my rating next week. I will say that I am glad that I read it, I found it challenging but also rewarding, and I appreciate the author’s seriousness and his talent, as well as Darkfuse for publishing such a challenging work that they knew might not appeal to everyone.
My only advice to a reader is to take it slow. The answers are all in there. Connect the dots and a very dark picture will appear.
Darkfuse is not a cookie cutter publisher. They do not trot out one formulaic horror or noir story after another. To be sure, every book is not a piece of experimental literature—they do publish their fair share of traditional genre fiction. But they also take chances on stories that are a bit different and may not appeal to all readers. Factory Town is such a novel.
Reading it reminded me of watching some indie movies where you have to pay close attention or you can quickly get lost. Amores Perros, Memento, even Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels come to mind. A reader friend mentioned David Lynch—which is really a spot-on comparison.
Factory town does not give you a linear plot. The story line reveals itself through constant shifts in time from the protagonist’s horrific childhood, his adult breakdown, the last moments of his life, and this nightmarish journey of self discovery—a fugue sequence that embodies most of the story. Characters are shifting and many of the main characters are dually or triply represented at different times of their life (or potential life) by different characters.
Factory Town is both a real place and the fugue sequence stage which is entirely internal to the main character. It reveals rather than narrates. This is a “writer’s” book, if there is such a thing. It will appeal to fans of Borges or Garcia-Marquez and other magical realists. There are plenty that won’t like it at all.
Where do I fall on this spectrum? Frankly, I don’t know. I just finished the book and this is the type of novel that takes a few days or more to fully absorb. I am going to give it four stars. For now. I may come back and change my rating next week. I will say that I am glad that I read it, I found it challenging but also rewarding, and I appreciate the author’s seriousness and his talent, as well as Darkfuse for publishing such a challenging work that they knew might not appeal to everyone.
My only advice to a reader is to take it slow. The answers are all in there. Connect the dots and a very dark picture will appear.
October 4, 2014
Review copy
Words are failing me at the moment, but I'll try to find a few to use in this review of Jon Bassoff's follow-up to Corrosion from earlier this year.
Factory Town is a strange, surreal, dreamlike, stream-of-consciousness, at times extremely disturbing, yet oddly satisfying endeavor.
First, there's the unusual writing style. Although there is plenty of conversation in this novel, it is totally without quotation marks which, surprisingly, didn't bother me at all.
Russell Carver has come to Factory Town to find someone, her name is Alana, she went missing years ago, he has a computer generated image of what she might look like today. He's heard she might be in this godforsaken place.
"Factory Town. It was as if they had started demolishing the entire city, building by building, house by house, then had decided it wasn't worth the effort, let it die on it's own terms. There was crumbling concrete and collapsed fences, broken glass and discarded furniture. Brick buildings worn down from time and neglect, the windows boarded up and covered with graffiti. A bank clock, both hands missing. Dumpsters upturned. Fire escapes fallen to the ground. Rubble everywhere. A church, vandalized and rotted. And from somewhere, the strange echoes of a laugh track."
Ruled by the Cowboy and the Book of Edicts, Factory Town is not what it seems on the surface. Actually, nothing is what it seems in this bizarre story.
Will Russell find the girl he's looking for, will he even get out alive? Find out for yourself when Darkfuse releases Jon Bassoff's new novel on October 7th, 2014. Look for it in both paperback and for the Kindle. Plus, if you subscribe to Kindle Unlimited you can read this one at no additional charge.
Not for the faint of heart, but certainly recommended.
Words are failing me at the moment, but I'll try to find a few to use in this review of Jon Bassoff's follow-up to Corrosion from earlier this year.
Factory Town is a strange, surreal, dreamlike, stream-of-consciousness, at times extremely disturbing, yet oddly satisfying endeavor.
First, there's the unusual writing style. Although there is plenty of conversation in this novel, it is totally without quotation marks which, surprisingly, didn't bother me at all.
Russell Carver has come to Factory Town to find someone, her name is Alana, she went missing years ago, he has a computer generated image of what she might look like today. He's heard she might be in this godforsaken place.
"Factory Town. It was as if they had started demolishing the entire city, building by building, house by house, then had decided it wasn't worth the effort, let it die on it's own terms. There was crumbling concrete and collapsed fences, broken glass and discarded furniture. Brick buildings worn down from time and neglect, the windows boarded up and covered with graffiti. A bank clock, both hands missing. Dumpsters upturned. Fire escapes fallen to the ground. Rubble everywhere. A church, vandalized and rotted. And from somewhere, the strange echoes of a laugh track."
Ruled by the Cowboy and the Book of Edicts, Factory Town is not what it seems on the surface. Actually, nothing is what it seems in this bizarre story.
Will Russell find the girl he's looking for, will he even get out alive? Find out for yourself when Darkfuse releases Jon Bassoff's new novel on October 7th, 2014. Look for it in both paperback and for the Kindle. Plus, if you subscribe to Kindle Unlimited you can read this one at no additional charge.
Not for the faint of heart, but certainly recommended.
January 16, 2016
I was so excited to start FACTORY TOWN! CORROSION was fantastic, surely Bassoff could wow us again. Well, it seems he tried the same writing style as Corrosion - a sort of Twin Peaks drug dream type of tale. Problem is in Factory Town, unlike Corrosion, nothing makes sense.
There are problems. Seems Bassoff doesn't know a cappella from Acapulco. See this quote from the book. "The music that I'd assumed was coming from the radio was actually coming from a makeshift stage where four blacks in in matching purple zoot suits played a cappella.". Perhaps he's not aware that a cappella means 'singing without music.' He goes on in the next chapter to describe how the music changes to do-wop and swamp blues.
But, goofs aside, his style of story telling without punctuation that so grabbed me in Corrosion just didn't do it for me in Factory Town. Perhaps if he had used that style in a prologue then simply told his story complete with punctuation I would have preferred it. Then, again, maybe not. The tale was confused at best. It left me wondering if this was a first draft - it seemed nonsensical at worst.
But there's something here. I've read far worse books and don't want to lump this in with those. My final rating is 2.5 stars that I've rounded up to 3 stars.
I received an e-arc of this book from Netgalley in exchange for my unbiased review.
There are problems. Seems Bassoff doesn't know a cappella from Acapulco. See this quote from the book. "The music that I'd assumed was coming from the radio was actually coming from a makeshift stage where four blacks in in matching purple zoot suits played a cappella.". Perhaps he's not aware that a cappella means 'singing without music.' He goes on in the next chapter to describe how the music changes to do-wop and swamp blues.
But, goofs aside, his style of story telling without punctuation that so grabbed me in Corrosion just didn't do it for me in Factory Town. Perhaps if he had used that style in a prologue then simply told his story complete with punctuation I would have preferred it. Then, again, maybe not. The tale was confused at best. It left me wondering if this was a first draft - it seemed nonsensical at worst.
But there's something here. I've read far worse books and don't want to lump this in with those. My final rating is 2.5 stars that I've rounded up to 3 stars.
I received an e-arc of this book from Netgalley in exchange for my unbiased review.
September 1, 2014
This was the second book by Jon I have read. The first was Corrosion which I thought was very good. The main character of the story is a man named Russell Carver. Who is looking for a young girl named Alana in this beat down place called Factory Town. In his journey to find her he comes across a lot of weird people and situations. I not sure if it was just me but I had a hard time finishing this book. Could only read so much at a time. I was lost and confused at times while reading it. It seems that he could of shorten the story up. It might have made it a lot easier to read and not as confusing. I'm still looking forward to reading Jon's work in the future. That being said, I could only give Factory Town 2 1/2 stars.
I received an e-arc of this book from DarkFuse/NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
I received an e-arc of this book from DarkFuse/NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
October 11, 2014
Discussing Factory Town is a bit difficult, since its plot hinges so directly on an early action taken by the book's central character, Russell Carver. I'm going to give you a great big SPOILER WARNING for this whole damn review, and it begins now.
The book opens with Carver's suicide with a bullet to his temple, and what follows is a mental sojourn through the shattered mind of a man in his death throes. The material is part nightmare, part memory, part remembrance, all of it filtered through a dying, gunshot shattered brain.
Told in first person point-of-view, author Jon Bassoff takes us through the surreal, fluid dream-scape of Factory Town and its ever-shifting landscape. For instance, Carver enters a run-down, abandoned theater, but exits a hospital. He hears music playing from a radio, but discovers it's actually an a cappella band. These aren't errors of the author or a failing of the editor, so much as it's an effort to capture the "logic," such as it is, of a lucid, waking nightmare. Things shift - people, buildings, the entire town - with the impermanence of a truly screwy dream.
The characters that exist beyond Carver are representations of figures in his own life, stand-ins from his own abusive childhood and the living traumas that were his parents. During Carver's urgent search for Alana, a lost runaway, the narrative is rife with figments of the things that could have been in Carver's own life. Virtually everything in Factory Town is shaped by Carver's personal history and experiences, both the things he remembers and that which he is trying to hide or escape from.
Bassoff uses all of this as a template to explore the repercussions of abuse, and how the sins of the father are inherited by the son. It's a story of the nature of evil, and whether or not we can actually control our destinies. How much of our inner demons are genetically encoded, and how much of is learned behavior? A lot of the horror in this book is buried in symbolism or tucked away in inferences, but there's a few shocks to be had for sure.
I found Factory Town to having a surprising amount of depth, and the writing is crisp with a few fun turns of phrase. One of my favorite lines in the book explains the strangeness of this disturbed city with "All them chemicals leaking into the town's hippocampus..." I also expect this book to be a rather divisive read, depending on one's patience for a rather non-straightforward narrative. This one is a far cry from conventional horror, but rich in character and environment. If you're curious what an abstract, hellish, industrial What Dreams May Come by way of David Lynch might look like, this one is well worth the investment.
The book opens with Carver's suicide with a bullet to his temple, and what follows is a mental sojourn through the shattered mind of a man in his death throes. The material is part nightmare, part memory, part remembrance, all of it filtered through a dying, gunshot shattered brain.
Told in first person point-of-view, author Jon Bassoff takes us through the surreal, fluid dream-scape of Factory Town and its ever-shifting landscape. For instance, Carver enters a run-down, abandoned theater, but exits a hospital. He hears music playing from a radio, but discovers it's actually an a cappella band. These aren't errors of the author or a failing of the editor, so much as it's an effort to capture the "logic," such as it is, of a lucid, waking nightmare. Things shift - people, buildings, the entire town - with the impermanence of a truly screwy dream.
The characters that exist beyond Carver are representations of figures in his own life, stand-ins from his own abusive childhood and the living traumas that were his parents. During Carver's urgent search for Alana, a lost runaway, the narrative is rife with figments of the things that could have been in Carver's own life. Virtually everything in Factory Town is shaped by Carver's personal history and experiences, both the things he remembers and that which he is trying to hide or escape from.
Bassoff uses all of this as a template to explore the repercussions of abuse, and how the sins of the father are inherited by the son. It's a story of the nature of evil, and whether or not we can actually control our destinies. How much of our inner demons are genetically encoded, and how much of is learned behavior? A lot of the horror in this book is buried in symbolism or tucked away in inferences, but there's a few shocks to be had for sure.
I found Factory Town to having a surprising amount of depth, and the writing is crisp with a few fun turns of phrase. One of my favorite lines in the book explains the strangeness of this disturbed city with "All them chemicals leaking into the town's hippocampus..." I also expect this book to be a rather divisive read, depending on one's patience for a rather non-straightforward narrative. This one is a far cry from conventional horror, but rich in character and environment. If you're curious what an abstract, hellish, industrial What Dreams May Come by way of David Lynch might look like, this one is well worth the investment.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
September 5, 2014
I would have to give this one 2.5 stars.
Like many others, this one was lost on me. Jon Bassoff is a good writer but the lack of punctuation that simply annoyed me in Corrosion left me feeling completely incoherent in Factory Town. I am assuming that the story was supposed to be something akin to an acid trip to hell but the acid must have been laced with Fentanyl because I just couldn't figure out what was going on through the entirety of it.
I know he was looking for a girl. I know that something was wrong from the people of the town. I know that he seemed to have grown up there? That's where things get fuzzier for me. There are a lot of scenes in the book that just seem random and chaotic and that I don't think added to the storyline.
I'll admit that I dislike a lot of books. I do. Usually though I have a particular reason for my disdain. I can't hate this one because I'm not even sure how it ends. I read the ending twice and perhaps I'm not smart enough for this one...
Like many others, this one was lost on me. Jon Bassoff is a good writer but the lack of punctuation that simply annoyed me in Corrosion left me feeling completely incoherent in Factory Town. I am assuming that the story was supposed to be something akin to an acid trip to hell but the acid must have been laced with Fentanyl because I just couldn't figure out what was going on through the entirety of it.
I know he was looking for a girl. I know that something was wrong from the people of the town. I know that he seemed to have grown up there? That's where things get fuzzier for me. There are a lot of scenes in the book that just seem random and chaotic and that I don't think added to the storyline.
I'll admit that I dislike a lot of books. I do. Usually though I have a particular reason for my disdain. I can't hate this one because I'm not even sure how it ends. I read the ending twice and perhaps I'm not smart enough for this one...
September 18, 2014
This next one is something you should be pre-ordering now.
It’s called [=Factory Town by Jon Bassoff=]
‘This here is a town of sin, a town of sadness, a town of hatred. Every dam person is guilty of something.’
I’m sure we all think about what the moment before death will be like from time-to-time. I’m hoping that when it’s my turn, my body will be pumped full of natural hormones and chemicals designed to take as much fear, pain and anxiety from the process as possible.
For the man who walks into a stranger’s house at the beginning of Factory Town, his journey into oblivion most certainly isn’t a pleasant experience. At three minutes to twelve, he puts a bullet in to his brain. The time is important as it is the device Bassoff uses to help us settle in to what is about to happen and the book takes a huge leap into a new space.
We meet Russell Carver. Essentially he’s in a living hell. He’s landed in Factory Town charged with the duty of finding a girl whom he believes is in imminent danger. All he has to go on to help find her is a small picture printed from the computer.
As he goes about his search, he walks down one dead end after another.
Wherever he turns, he arrives in a place populated by the grotesque. The town is described vividly, as are the characters, and the sense of darkness and depravity is really powerfully created.
The dream-like quality to the piece is superbly crafted. It allows for unusual events to take place and for sudden shifts in time and place. The people populating Factory Town are often those who are familiar to Carver from his life. His school friend, Charlie, pops up to give him a helping hand of sorts. With friends like Charlie, Carver certainly doesn’t need any enemies, but unfortunately that’s something he’s not in control of.
Like any dream, however, it always feels real and entirely plausible when you’re in it, which only adds to the nightmare.
Carver limps from one unpleasant experience to another. He finds that there are no children in Factory Town. He comes to understand that The Cowboy is a sinister figure who controls the area. He witnesses the slow corrosion of the population and infrastructure caused by the factory that is the centre of it all:
‘Strange things are happening, he said. It’s all because of the factory. All the chemicals leaking into the town’s hippocampus.’
According to the townsfolk, there are no children in the town. No children shall be born there by decree. Carver is confused by this when he meets the torchbearer of hope in the town. He’s a young boy who dresses as a super-hero called The Annihilator. With his plastic swords he’s out to sort the world out, no matter how powerful the forces of evil are.
As the book progresses, it becomes clear that recurring themes are pulling Carver in one direction, which leads him to the truths of his own life. By the end of the read, we can understand a little about that life and about the pain and sorrow that abusive relationships can cause and how such abuse can be passed on from one generation to the next like a family heirloom.
There’s so much to like about this book. It’s relentless in its portrayal of the broken. It has a real raw power in the structure of sentences and worlds. There’s a gripping need to follow this man on his journey and as his quest unfolds and the need to understand becomes ever more pressing. I also thoroughly enjoyed Bassoff’s trademark style of ignoring speech marks as punctuation; this allows a flow and power to conversation that is hard to find.
Factory Town is a work of real weight. It has the impact and a hold that comes with all great books. It’s also sticking around in my head weeks after reading, which says a lot. It says more that those recollections still make me shudder.
Tremendous.
It’s called [=Factory Town by Jon Bassoff=]
‘This here is a town of sin, a town of sadness, a town of hatred. Every dam person is guilty of something.’
I’m sure we all think about what the moment before death will be like from time-to-time. I’m hoping that when it’s my turn, my body will be pumped full of natural hormones and chemicals designed to take as much fear, pain and anxiety from the process as possible.
For the man who walks into a stranger’s house at the beginning of Factory Town, his journey into oblivion most certainly isn’t a pleasant experience. At three minutes to twelve, he puts a bullet in to his brain. The time is important as it is the device Bassoff uses to help us settle in to what is about to happen and the book takes a huge leap into a new space.
We meet Russell Carver. Essentially he’s in a living hell. He’s landed in Factory Town charged with the duty of finding a girl whom he believes is in imminent danger. All he has to go on to help find her is a small picture printed from the computer.
As he goes about his search, he walks down one dead end after another.
Wherever he turns, he arrives in a place populated by the grotesque. The town is described vividly, as are the characters, and the sense of darkness and depravity is really powerfully created.
The dream-like quality to the piece is superbly crafted. It allows for unusual events to take place and for sudden shifts in time and place. The people populating Factory Town are often those who are familiar to Carver from his life. His school friend, Charlie, pops up to give him a helping hand of sorts. With friends like Charlie, Carver certainly doesn’t need any enemies, but unfortunately that’s something he’s not in control of.
Like any dream, however, it always feels real and entirely plausible when you’re in it, which only adds to the nightmare.
Carver limps from one unpleasant experience to another. He finds that there are no children in Factory Town. He comes to understand that The Cowboy is a sinister figure who controls the area. He witnesses the slow corrosion of the population and infrastructure caused by the factory that is the centre of it all:
‘Strange things are happening, he said. It’s all because of the factory. All the chemicals leaking into the town’s hippocampus.’
According to the townsfolk, there are no children in the town. No children shall be born there by decree. Carver is confused by this when he meets the torchbearer of hope in the town. He’s a young boy who dresses as a super-hero called The Annihilator. With his plastic swords he’s out to sort the world out, no matter how powerful the forces of evil are.
As the book progresses, it becomes clear that recurring themes are pulling Carver in one direction, which leads him to the truths of his own life. By the end of the read, we can understand a little about that life and about the pain and sorrow that abusive relationships can cause and how such abuse can be passed on from one generation to the next like a family heirloom.
There’s so much to like about this book. It’s relentless in its portrayal of the broken. It has a real raw power in the structure of sentences and worlds. There’s a gripping need to follow this man on his journey and as his quest unfolds and the need to understand becomes ever more pressing. I also thoroughly enjoyed Bassoff’s trademark style of ignoring speech marks as punctuation; this allows a flow and power to conversation that is hard to find.
Factory Town is a work of real weight. It has the impact and a hold that comes with all great books. It’s also sticking around in my head weeks after reading, which says a lot. It says more that those recollections still make me shudder.
Tremendous.
May 11, 2023
On the level of first reactions, it's mid. There's a lot of telling but not a lot of showing. I see the effort that went into the setting, but it doesn't quite feel cohesive enough, because the logic of the world and narrative skip around. A couple of the reviews draw comparisons to Alice in Wonderland, which are very accurate in terms of structure, but perhaps not in terms of character effects -- Alice is a fish out of water; Russell naturally fits his environment.
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But that's not quite it, is it? The kaleidoscopic world is fine if there's some interaction between it and the character, but somehow these interactions, including the unprompted violence, fall strangely flat. This may, of course, be part of the point -- the main character is, in one sense or another, beating his head against the asylum walls; he does not have agency, and his inability to impact the immediate environment simply reflects this.
--------
Though if we're on the subject of agency, about halfway through the book, I realized that it is thematically similar to Bioshock Infinite, and came out about a year after the game. The comparison to the game ends up somewhat unfavorable to the game: here we have a quest for the anima, the dark father/alter-ego, the light alter-ego, the child alter-ego, the temptress, the self-deception about the relationship to the setting.
--------
And saying it this way obscures the bigger point: the canonical archetypes are drawn with a broad brush, but their depth is limited; to some extent, the book relies on symbolism too heavily. It's fine if everything is a symbol, but if those subjects also have no independent existence, the narrative becomes weak. Yes, I get that them having no independent existence is the point of the plot. The goal of the book is to create an impact despite that.
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The violence against women is darkly gratuitous (but makes sense with regard to the themes), the violence against children is comically gratuitous (and thematically relevant in theory, but pushes the book into bizarro fiction territory), the racism is apropos of nothing and underbaked (I suppose it makes the main character look even more despicable, but he didn't really need the help).
--------
So what does it get? Well, I went in with no expectations (except maybe "Ligotti-esque setting"), I thought the execution was rather weak, but it was fairly fun to read, and I'd say I enjoyed it more than the 2-star books, and I would be fairly interested in reading Corrosion (which every other review says is more accessible) next time I try to get into modern weird fiction. So 3 stars it is.
--------
But that's not quite it, is it? The kaleidoscopic world is fine if there's some interaction between it and the character, but somehow these interactions, including the unprompted violence, fall strangely flat. This may, of course, be part of the point -- the main character is, in one sense or another, beating his head against the asylum walls; he does not have agency, and his inability to impact the immediate environment simply reflects this.
--------
Though if we're on the subject of agency, about halfway through the book, I realized that it is thematically similar to Bioshock Infinite, and came out about a year after the game. The comparison to the game ends up somewhat unfavorable to the game: here we have a quest for the anima, the dark father/alter-ego, the light alter-ego, the child alter-ego, the temptress, the self-deception about the relationship to the setting.
--------
And saying it this way obscures the bigger point: the canonical archetypes are drawn with a broad brush, but their depth is limited; to some extent, the book relies on symbolism too heavily. It's fine if everything is a symbol, but if those subjects also have no independent existence, the narrative becomes weak. Yes, I get that them having no independent existence is the point of the plot. The goal of the book is to create an impact despite that.
--------
The violence against women is darkly gratuitous (but makes sense with regard to the themes), the violence against children is comically gratuitous (and thematically relevant in theory, but pushes the book into bizarro fiction territory), the racism is apropos of nothing and underbaked (I suppose it makes the main character look even more despicable, but he didn't really need the help).
--------
So what does it get? Well, I went in with no expectations (except maybe "Ligotti-esque setting"), I thought the execution was rather weak, but it was fairly fun to read, and I'd say I enjoyed it more than the 2-star books, and I would be fairly interested in reading Corrosion (which every other review says is more accessible) next time I try to get into modern weird fiction. So 3 stars it is.
April 13, 2015
Book Review originally published here: http://www.iheartreading.net/reviews/...
Factory Town is a strange, eerie, surrealistic voyage into a town unlike any other. Protagonist Russell Carver is searching for a young girl who has gone missing, Alana. His quest brings him to Factory Town, a post-industrial, withering town with – as you guessed it – a factory. The town’s inhabitants are depraved, most of them hide secrets, others are more than willing to kill. It would be near impossible to ever come up with a more haunting and infested town than Factory Town. Everything there is dead or dying, from the characters locked up inside, to the buildings and factory. The farther Russell makes it into the labyrinth of town, the more clues he find that lead him to the missing girl, and to his own troubled past. Is Factory Town real, or a figment of Russell’s own depraved imagination?
The book is hard to rate. Overall, the writing is excellent. As can be said about most (if not all) of DarkFuse’s titles, they know talent when they see it, and all their authors are talented writers. Now, I don’t mind a little surrealism in books, but at least I have to have a general sense of where the story is leading. Alas, with Factory Town, no such luck. The story seems to go in circles, the surreal moments seemingly so random that even though I occasionally paused and tried to wrap my mind around what was happening, what was real and what wasn’t, I couldn’t. The book was too random, too chaotic, and after a while, I stopped caring about the characters because I had no clue what was going on with them anyway. I had a general idea of the storyline, sure, but the surreal scenes were just too many and kind of ruined it.
If you like surrealism, this book might be your cup of tea. The premise is a clever one, and the characters are interesting, particularly the protagonist. But if you want to have at least a general sense of what’s real and what isn’t, you’ll probably be as frustrated by this book as I am.
Factory Town is a strange, eerie, surrealistic voyage into a town unlike any other. Protagonist Russell Carver is searching for a young girl who has gone missing, Alana. His quest brings him to Factory Town, a post-industrial, withering town with – as you guessed it – a factory. The town’s inhabitants are depraved, most of them hide secrets, others are more than willing to kill. It would be near impossible to ever come up with a more haunting and infested town than Factory Town. Everything there is dead or dying, from the characters locked up inside, to the buildings and factory. The farther Russell makes it into the labyrinth of town, the more clues he find that lead him to the missing girl, and to his own troubled past. Is Factory Town real, or a figment of Russell’s own depraved imagination?
The book is hard to rate. Overall, the writing is excellent. As can be said about most (if not all) of DarkFuse’s titles, they know talent when they see it, and all their authors are talented writers. Now, I don’t mind a little surrealism in books, but at least I have to have a general sense of where the story is leading. Alas, with Factory Town, no such luck. The story seems to go in circles, the surreal moments seemingly so random that even though I occasionally paused and tried to wrap my mind around what was happening, what was real and what wasn’t, I couldn’t. The book was too random, too chaotic, and after a while, I stopped caring about the characters because I had no clue what was going on with them anyway. I had a general idea of the storyline, sure, but the surreal scenes were just too many and kind of ruined it.
If you like surrealism, this book might be your cup of tea. The premise is a clever one, and the characters are interesting, particularly the protagonist. But if you want to have at least a general sense of what’s real and what isn’t, you’ll probably be as frustrated by this book as I am.
February 13, 2016
(I received a free copy of this book from Net Galley in exchange for an honest review.)
Russell Carver, an enigmatic and tortured man in search of a young girl gone missing, has come to Factory Town, a post-industrial wasteland of abandoned buildings, crumbling asphalt, deadly characters, hidden secrets and unspeakable depravity. Wandering deeper and deeper into the dangerous, dream-like and darkly mysterious labyrinths in town, Russell stumbles upon clues that not only lead him closer to the missing girl, but to his own troubled past as well. Because in Factory Town nothing is what it seems, no one is safe, and there's no such thing as a clean escape.
Before writing this review, I had a look at some other comments just to see if I had missed something along the way...but it seems like I wasn't alone in having trouble following this book.
It starts out very promising - Factory Town was a really good setting that I could visualise really easily. It was easy to step into that world and see what Russell was seeing. I was enjoying the writing style and was turning the pages pretty quickly...
And then, about a third of the way through, it just started getting weirder and weirder. Surreal sequences that were more suited to Alice in Wonderland than a horror novel. I can "do" surreal, but this one went just a little far for me. I stuck with it, though, cos I thought there was going to be a cracking ending...but it just didn't deliver there, either.
So, for me, this was probably not my favourite story of the year - but it is worth a look for those who love this style of book.
Paul
ARH
Russell Carver, an enigmatic and tortured man in search of a young girl gone missing, has come to Factory Town, a post-industrial wasteland of abandoned buildings, crumbling asphalt, deadly characters, hidden secrets and unspeakable depravity. Wandering deeper and deeper into the dangerous, dream-like and darkly mysterious labyrinths in town, Russell stumbles upon clues that not only lead him closer to the missing girl, but to his own troubled past as well. Because in Factory Town nothing is what it seems, no one is safe, and there's no such thing as a clean escape.
Before writing this review, I had a look at some other comments just to see if I had missed something along the way...but it seems like I wasn't alone in having trouble following this book.
It starts out very promising - Factory Town was a really good setting that I could visualise really easily. It was easy to step into that world and see what Russell was seeing. I was enjoying the writing style and was turning the pages pretty quickly...
And then, about a third of the way through, it just started getting weirder and weirder. Surreal sequences that were more suited to Alice in Wonderland than a horror novel. I can "do" surreal, but this one went just a little far for me. I stuck with it, though, cos I thought there was going to be a cracking ending...but it just didn't deliver there, either.
So, for me, this was probably not my favourite story of the year - but it is worth a look for those who love this style of book.
Paul
ARH
August 19, 2014
Nightmarish!
Factory Town, by Jon Bassoff, is a hellish fever dream of a book. This is hard-edged, extremely dark, and you simply can't look away from the page.
The writing style manages somehow to be extremely literate, yet extremely readable all at once. Russell, our main character, was a puzzle to me. He's mysterious, haunted, and I loved reading him.
Now, as a warning, the story is surreal and the writing style breaks a lot of rules. This may not be the perfect book for those who like their stories concrete or who need books to follow convention. The style is unique and the story leaves you heartbroken and breathless all at once.
This was my first book by Jon Bassoff and his talent is unmistakable. A delectable - and dark - morsel for horror lovers!
*ARC Provided by Netgalley for review purposes.
Factory Town, by Jon Bassoff, is a hellish fever dream of a book. This is hard-edged, extremely dark, and you simply can't look away from the page.
The writing style manages somehow to be extremely literate, yet extremely readable all at once. Russell, our main character, was a puzzle to me. He's mysterious, haunted, and I loved reading him.
Now, as a warning, the story is surreal and the writing style breaks a lot of rules. This may not be the perfect book for those who like their stories concrete or who need books to follow convention. The style is unique and the story leaves you heartbroken and breathless all at once.
This was my first book by Jon Bassoff and his talent is unmistakable. A delectable - and dark - morsel for horror lovers!
*ARC Provided by Netgalley for review purposes.
March 13, 2021
Holy moly! Welch ungewöhnliches Erlebnis diese Geschichte zu lesen. Zuerst zweifelte ich am eigenen Verstand vor lauter verwirrender und geradezu phantastischer Ereignisse, später war ich sicher, der Autor befindet sich am Rande des Wahnsinns. Ich wollte schon aufhören zu lesen, aber ich konnte nicht ... ich wollte wissen, wie es endet. Und dann gingen mir Lichter auf – eins nach dem anderen. Wow, großartiger Aufbau und eine sehr ungewöhnliche Story. Ist allerdings nichts für Zartbesaitete.
January 29, 2022
This was a gripping page turner. Finished it in two days. It felt like walking through a world David Lynch and Clive Barker collaborated on, ending in Darren Aronofsky style. All that you could only imagine of what the depths of evil and hell on earth would be is conjured up venously in this book.
Not for the faint of heart.
The reason for 4 stars. I wanted Carver to read a bit from the Book of Edict....
Not for the faint of heart.
The reason for 4 stars. I wanted Carver to read a bit from the Book of Edict....
July 16, 2024
A beautiful, bizarre tale that leaves you saying, “What the Hell did I just read!?”
Fantastic story with twists and turns that will make you dizzy. And the poetic ending concludes this fantastic story.
I don’t want to give too much away, so I won’t. Overall I give this story 5/5 stars!
A stunning tale with so many turns, you think you are moving forward while still going in circles. Terrific read!
Fantastic story with twists and turns that will make you dizzy. And the poetic ending concludes this fantastic story.
I don’t want to give too much away, so I won’t. Overall I give this story 5/5 stars!
A stunning tale with so many turns, you think you are moving forward while still going in circles. Terrific read!
February 15, 2019
another irreal/surreal that was almost good, but too much nonsense and not enough cohesion to work for me. file under 'meh'.
October 19, 2014
Factory Town is an interesting book. I had certain expectations about it going in based on Bassoff's first book, Corrosion. Where Corrosion is pretty straightforward with regards to storytelling, Factory Town is all over the place. Where Corrosion is gritty and nihilistic, Factory Town is somewhat fanciful (in a messed up way) and, at times, hopeful.
The story opens with a man breaking into an old lady's house, demanding to know where "the girl" is. Accepting that she (the girl) is long gone, the man commits suicide. This is the point where the book leaves normal far behind and enters Factory Town.
It's hard to summarize the story from this point because it's unfolding on several different layers. There's the literal reading of the events as they take place, then there's Russel Carver's (the protagonist) shaky interpretation of what these events mean, and then there's the reader's interpretation. The most basic outline is that Russel has come to Factory Town to save a little girl and he's going to keep on trucking until he accomplishes that goal, but that's a very bare summary; every scene in jammed full of symbolism that, over the course of the book, reveals the real story behind Factory Town and Russel Carver.
Bassoff took a real chance filling the book with so much symbolism; that can easily backfire on an author if they don't follow the old adage to show and not tell. The gamble pays off, though. Bassoff takes readers on a journey that is at first very confusing, but as clues are dropped here and there, the picture comes together and it is here that the darkness, the nihilism I came in expecting from this book is hinted at. Factory Town is, obviously, not what it seems, but then neither is Carver. None of this is explicitly stated, however, and therein lies the beauty of the story. Bassoff showed us this fantastical nightmare world and left us to come to the proper conclusions based on what we've seen (though I should note that he has posted an explanation on his website; I don't think it was necessary, but that's his decision).
Factory Town is a very different story than Corrosion. If you come in, like I did, with a set of expectations, you run the risk of being disappointed. However, try to keep an open mind and enjoy the strange, horrific ride; I think you'll like where it takes you.
The story opens with a man breaking into an old lady's house, demanding to know where "the girl" is. Accepting that she (the girl) is long gone, the man commits suicide. This is the point where the book leaves normal far behind and enters Factory Town.
It's hard to summarize the story from this point because it's unfolding on several different layers. There's the literal reading of the events as they take place, then there's Russel Carver's (the protagonist) shaky interpretation of what these events mean, and then there's the reader's interpretation. The most basic outline is that Russel has come to Factory Town to save a little girl and he's going to keep on trucking until he accomplishes that goal, but that's a very bare summary; every scene in jammed full of symbolism that, over the course of the book, reveals the real story behind Factory Town and Russel Carver.
Bassoff took a real chance filling the book with so much symbolism; that can easily backfire on an author if they don't follow the old adage to show and not tell. The gamble pays off, though. Bassoff takes readers on a journey that is at first very confusing, but as clues are dropped here and there, the picture comes together and it is here that the darkness, the nihilism I came in expecting from this book is hinted at. Factory Town is, obviously, not what it seems, but then neither is Carver. None of this is explicitly stated, however, and therein lies the beauty of the story. Bassoff showed us this fantastical nightmare world and left us to come to the proper conclusions based on what we've seen (though I should note that he has posted an explanation on his website; I don't think it was necessary, but that's his decision).
Factory Town is a very different story than Corrosion. If you come in, like I did, with a set of expectations, you run the risk of being disappointed. However, try to keep an open mind and enjoy the strange, horrific ride; I think you'll like where it takes you.
October 13, 2014
Bassoff has written a book that defies a simple summary. He has birthed a book that speaks in riddles. He has crafted a book without meaning, yet has given us a novel that seems to speak to us on a deeper level. How can you review this type of book without speaking in riddles yourself? Is it horror? Is it noir? Is it science fiction? It is lunacy. It is genius. It is the future of writing.
While the book flows in a logicless manner and the plot is far from seamless, the plot makes sense in the larger picture and by time the story comes full circle from the prologue to the epilogue, you will be fulfilled as a reader. Bassoff shows he is a genius who creates a story in which each illogical plot twist fits seamlessly into the tapestry of madness and confusion he has woven for his main character. Factory Town, as a book and as a setting, is filled with confusion and chaos, murder and madness, bleakness and beauty, and death and destruction.
A plot summary is impossible. The book jumps, glides and soars in a million directions, but each one makes for its own beautiful trip into insanity. The book brought back memories of Into the Mouth of Madness. If that movie had a love child with American Horror Story, they would create this book. Yet this love child more than exceeds any accomplishment of its predecessors.
A trip through Factory Town is a trip into a mind that is rotting away. I have never read a book that contained so many twisted phrases and images, just randomly thrown together and seemingly out of place. The images of depravity that fill this book make the reader cringe, yet marvel at the genius that is Bassoff. This is the author that will take writing into the future. The book is that great.
The fact that I adored this book gives me chills, as I don’t quite like what that may hint about myself. The fact that I loved reading this book makes me feel sick to stomach. The fact that I loved this book makes me another member of the ever-growing legion of readers that hold our breaths awaiting a glimpse into the main of Bassoff and welcome every macabre word that emanates from his mind. I can’t find the words to say how much this book took hold of me. This book will blow your mind. Enjoy…
While the book flows in a logicless manner and the plot is far from seamless, the plot makes sense in the larger picture and by time the story comes full circle from the prologue to the epilogue, you will be fulfilled as a reader. Bassoff shows he is a genius who creates a story in which each illogical plot twist fits seamlessly into the tapestry of madness and confusion he has woven for his main character. Factory Town, as a book and as a setting, is filled with confusion and chaos, murder and madness, bleakness and beauty, and death and destruction.
A plot summary is impossible. The book jumps, glides and soars in a million directions, but each one makes for its own beautiful trip into insanity. The book brought back memories of Into the Mouth of Madness. If that movie had a love child with American Horror Story, they would create this book. Yet this love child more than exceeds any accomplishment of its predecessors.
A trip through Factory Town is a trip into a mind that is rotting away. I have never read a book that contained so many twisted phrases and images, just randomly thrown together and seemingly out of place. The images of depravity that fill this book make the reader cringe, yet marvel at the genius that is Bassoff. This is the author that will take writing into the future. The book is that great.
The fact that I adored this book gives me chills, as I don’t quite like what that may hint about myself. The fact that I loved reading this book makes me feel sick to stomach. The fact that I loved this book makes me another member of the ever-growing legion of readers that hold our breaths awaiting a glimpse into the main of Bassoff and welcome every macabre word that emanates from his mind. I can’t find the words to say how much this book took hold of me. This book will blow your mind. Enjoy…
January 30, 2015
I received a signed copy of this through a giveaway on GoodReads. The following is my honest opinion for the book.
As I read this book images of my watching the original “Escape From New York” staring Kurt Russell came to mind. In the movie, Kurt is sent in to rescue the President of the United States and the precious cargo the plane been carrying out of the island of Manhattan, which had been turned into a maximum security prison.
Instead of a prison the author gives us a town in which every manner of low life, criminals, murders and sex fiends has made it into what it is today; and where the guy who runs the damn place wants to sure it dies with everyone currently living there. But there’s no President for the hero of the story to rescue, instead it is his daughter he needs to find and to bring safely back home.
While the clues he finds brings him closer to his quarry, it also brings back his troubled past he must now face again like running into his estranged wife.
With all the plot twists the author has skillfully written into the storyline it soon becomes apparent to Russell Carver it won’t be as easy as he had imagined. What might appear to be a simple hallucination to the unwary is in fact a stark reality which might be extremely deadly. It is through the author’s writing you’re sucked right in, accompanying Russell as he seeks to complete his mission, vividly envisioning the sights and sounds he does.
For the exciting, page turning experience I had in reading this book, I can’t hesitate but give “Factory Town” 5 STARS.
As I read this book images of my watching the original “Escape From New York” staring Kurt Russell came to mind. In the movie, Kurt is sent in to rescue the President of the United States and the precious cargo the plane been carrying out of the island of Manhattan, which had been turned into a maximum security prison.
Instead of a prison the author gives us a town in which every manner of low life, criminals, murders and sex fiends has made it into what it is today; and where the guy who runs the damn place wants to sure it dies with everyone currently living there. But there’s no President for the hero of the story to rescue, instead it is his daughter he needs to find and to bring safely back home.
While the clues he finds brings him closer to his quarry, it also brings back his troubled past he must now face again like running into his estranged wife.
With all the plot twists the author has skillfully written into the storyline it soon becomes apparent to Russell Carver it won’t be as easy as he had imagined. What might appear to be a simple hallucination to the unwary is in fact a stark reality which might be extremely deadly. It is through the author’s writing you’re sucked right in, accompanying Russell as he seeks to complete his mission, vividly envisioning the sights and sounds he does.
For the exciting, page turning experience I had in reading this book, I can’t hesitate but give “Factory Town” 5 STARS.
August 12, 2014
This book was strange and violent and surreal and I loved it. If you're looking for a straightforward narrative or mystery, this book will not be for you. If, however, you like dreamlike stories with narrative mysteries embedded in the plot, you'll dig this. I was reminded of some of David Lynch's movies, as well as Ishiguro's novel The Unconsoled.
The plot itself is straight forward enough. A man named Russell Carver finds himself in a very strange town (Factory Town) looking for a girl named Alana. But the town in which he finds himself is unlike any town you've ever seen. It is run by the mysterious cowboy who seems to have as his aim to rid the town of all children. As Russell continues searching for his daughter, he witnesses strange and terrible things: freak shows, mass suicides, an apathetic Messiah. But as we continue reading, and continue witnessing nightmarish image after nightmarish image, we start to understand that this town represents something else. It represents Russell's own past; his own traumas. I can't say that I understood all the symbolism and narrative completely, but I was still haunted.
As I said before, this book WON'T be for everybody. But if you want to challenge yourself, if you want to read something wholly unique, read FACTORY TOWN.
The plot itself is straight forward enough. A man named Russell Carver finds himself in a very strange town (Factory Town) looking for a girl named Alana. But the town in which he finds himself is unlike any town you've ever seen. It is run by the mysterious cowboy who seems to have as his aim to rid the town of all children. As Russell continues searching for his daughter, he witnesses strange and terrible things: freak shows, mass suicides, an apathetic Messiah. But as we continue reading, and continue witnessing nightmarish image after nightmarish image, we start to understand that this town represents something else. It represents Russell's own past; his own traumas. I can't say that I understood all the symbolism and narrative completely, but I was still haunted.
As I said before, this book WON'T be for everybody. But if you want to challenge yourself, if you want to read something wholly unique, read FACTORY TOWN.
August 12, 2014
This book was strange and violent and surreal and I loved it. If you're looking for a straightforward narrative or mystery, this book will not be for you. If, however, you like dreamlike stories with narrative mysteries embedded in the plot, you'll dig this. I was reminded of some of David Lynch's movies, as well as Ishiguro's novel The Unconsoled.
The plot itself is straight forward enough. A man named Russell Carver finds himself in a very strange town (Factory Town) looking for a girl named Alana. But the town in which he finds himself is unlike any town you've ever seen. It is run by the mysterious cowboy who seems to have as his aim to rid the town of all children. As Russell continues searching for his daughter, he witnesses strange and terrible things: freak shows, mass suicides, an apathetic Messiah. But as we continue reading, and continue witnessing nightmarish image after nightmarish image, we start to understand that this town represents something else. It represents Russell's own past; his own traumas. I can't say that I understood all the symbolism and narrative completely, but I was still haunted.
As I said before, this book WON'T be for everybody. But if you want to challenge yourself, if you want to read something wholly unique, read FACTORY TOWN.
The plot itself is straight forward enough. A man named Russell Carver finds himself in a very strange town (Factory Town) looking for a girl named Alana. But the town in which he finds himself is unlike any town you've ever seen. It is run by the mysterious cowboy who seems to have as his aim to rid the town of all children. As Russell continues searching for his daughter, he witnesses strange and terrible things: freak shows, mass suicides, an apathetic Messiah. But as we continue reading, and continue witnessing nightmarish image after nightmarish image, we start to understand that this town represents something else. It represents Russell's own past; his own traumas. I can't say that I understood all the symbolism and narrative completely, but I was still haunted.
As I said before, this book WON'T be for everybody. But if you want to challenge yourself, if you want to read something wholly unique, read FACTORY TOWN.
October 19, 2014
This is the story of Russell Carver, he is looking for his daughter Alana, who has gone missing. He ends up in Factory Town, a cesspool of mayhem and depravity, acting on a lead that she may be there. Once he arrives however, things get really strange.
This was a surreal, mad rush from beginning to end. Each of the characters was depraved in some way and that made the story creepy as well as trippy! I enjoyed this once I got into it, but it's not for everyone as it uses Jon's unique style of writing - speech with no speech marks. This alone can take some getting used to! The story itself is a surreal journey with nothing really making sense until the very end. We start off with a man shooting himself and then.....er no! I'm not going to spoil it for you, that you are going to have to find out for yourselves!
This was a surreal, mad rush from beginning to end. Each of the characters was depraved in some way and that made the story creepy as well as trippy! I enjoyed this once I got into it, but it's not for everyone as it uses Jon's unique style of writing - speech with no speech marks. This alone can take some getting used to! The story itself is a surreal journey with nothing really making sense until the very end. We start off with a man shooting himself and then.....er no! I'm not going to spoil it for you, that you are going to have to find out for yourselves!
September 10, 2014
This is a difficult book to rate. There is something of a storyline here, but it is deeply buried under a lot of surreal happenings, some of which did seem to tie in to the plot, and others that I just couldn't seem to tie in at all, but maybe I just wasn't paying enough attention. It was hard to tell what were legitimate continuity errors vs just being surreal. When looked at as a number of individual set pieces, it is brutal, unsettling and effective. Overall it is very well-written, though I personally find the lack of quotation marks to be an annoying and pointless gimmick, but I can be sort of a curmugeon that way. :-)
In the end I settled on 3 stars. While I applaud the effort, and I think it shows definite talent, in the end I felt like it should have held together better as a whole. If you want a linear, clean story line, this is not the book for you.
In the end I settled on 3 stars. While I applaud the effort, and I think it shows definite talent, in the end I felt like it should have held together better as a whole. If you want a linear, clean story line, this is not the book for you.
October 19, 2014
I just finished reading Michael Cisco's The Divinity Student before I read Factory Town and it wasn't much of a leap between the two. Factory Town was everything I like about the Fantasy aspect of fiction. It's not a real town but you can relate it to real life as you choose but everything in this world is created by Bassoff. There are no dragons or got girl on girl action, just depravity to the extreme. The story keeps you guessing. If you are fans of Brian Evenson and Michael Cisco then I think you will really enjoy this book. I read it in a 24 hour period because I couldn't stop reading. This book also reminded me a little of Jim Jarmusch's Ghost Dog. While Factory Town maybe desolate, reality can always trump it some how.
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