Review: The Rats

The Rats by James Herbert
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

My mother grew up reading all the big horror writers, leading to my appreciation of the greats. James Herbert is a shining example of my mother’s teenage years influencing my reading. For countless years I listened to her rant and rave about James Herbert’s books, telling me how wonderful they are. Thus, I dove in with eagerness. I started with the David Ash books, and loved them. From there, I have gone on to read a couple of other books – Portent, Fluke, and Creed. Other books have spent a while on my bookshelf waiting to be read. The one book my mother always references, however, was The Rats.

The Rats was the book my mother always told me to read when telling me about James Herbert. A favourite, it would provide all the creepy goodness of any worthwhile horror novel. Unfortunately, my mother could never find her copy. Thus, as I read more and more Herbert – enjoying all the stories I read – I found myself more and more intrigued by The Rats. It reached the point where my mother wanted me to watch the movie simply so I could understand what she was talking about – but I held out, knowing the book would provide all I wanted.

You can imagine this lead to some very high expectations. Endless talk from my mother left me believing this would be an amazing book, the best James Herbert novel I would read. I went in eager, hoping for the best.

Whilst I did enjoy The Rats, I feel as though my mother amped it up too much. I went in with too many expectations; I went in with the bar set way too high. It was a fun read, it provided me with another entertaining James Herbert read, but it wasn’t quite what I’d been anticipating.

The horror in this one was wonderful. It took something from the real world and made it into something terrifying. Turning the mundane into the truly terrifying is the best way to write horror, in my opinion. Ghosts and ghouls are a lot of fun, but causing people to be fearful of everyday aspects is even better. I cannot fault the way in which rats were made to be truly horrifying creatures.

However, I feel as though the story failed to give the same kind of impact as my other James Herbert reads. It was good for the creep factor, but everything seemed to be resolved far too easily. It seemed to come together much too quickly for me to be completely content. I realise this links in with the book being the first in a trilogy, but I feel as though it concluded far too quickly. Things happened, but I failed to connect in the way I did with other James Herbert books.

It was a fun read, yes, and I’ll certainly be reading more. It simply wasn’t quite what I had been imagining.

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