-- Reviews by the Famous and well Known
Fans of the supernatural, the concept of it and the channel four series, will enjoy Cold Light of Day. It begins with a near fatal attraction in the dead of night between a man and a woman looking for comfort. They consume them selves in the passion of a ‘one night stand’. However, it becomes a battle of survival within a tangled web of violent murderous crime, protection and chase. The night of passion becomes a nightmare and the two characters become fugitives, hunted by evil and law enforcement agencies.
Suddenly and unexpectedly, you are taken back in time to 992 AD and Northern Russia, which is under Viking rule. This story within the main plot serves as an explanation to where the woman originates, what secrets she conceals and the evil that hunts her down in modern times. This creates the achievement of purchasing two stories for the price of one.
Eventually, the plot returns to the present time and the horrifying past caching up with the fugitives in a game of cat and mouse and murderous mystery.
I liked the introduction of Lieutenant Balooga of the Chicago Police Department. Although sounding like a cheese, there is nothing cheesy about this beefy American cop and reminded me of the like of Kojak from a distant era. He comes across as a strong central character in pursuit of the truth; having to believe in evidence of the paranormal to solve the case, which takes him on a treacherous chase of life or death. ‘Balooga’, the series. Um ... I wonder.
Paul Cave’s skilful writing makes you believe that there is a dark side to life. The plot concludes with pace and excitement; irritated by any outside interference interrupting your reading as you race with the characters, good and evil, to a cracking end.
Paul has followed up his first book, Something of The Night, with another classic. Enjoy! And wait with anticipation.
Mark S. Bennison, Author of 'Military Rule'
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Paul Cave has created a new sub genre in the horror sphere. A new and terrifying type of monster with absolutely no redeeming features whatsoever, Jonus.
Add to this an anti-hero in the form of Anna, you want to root for her, and you do most of the time, but ultimately she must do the same as Jonus to survive, kill and consume humans and their souls.
Josh Sawyer, a student, meets Anna by apparent chance and they are briefly consumed by an intense passion. Then the fun begins and author Paul Cave, takes you on a helter-skelter, roller coaster ride of blood soaked action and adventure as Anna and Josh are accused of a series of grisly murders. They flee Chicago, pursued by Police and FBI, and much more sinisterly, Jonus, an enemy from Anna’s past, who’s hunting her because she possesses something he desperately needs, her heart, which he must consume to further his apparently insane and incredible ends.
Briefly, in book two, we travel back a thousand years and delve into a time when Anna and Jonus rode together, and hunted together. And we learn something of their kind, super-human shape-shifters, who hunt humans and each other.
Echoes of Highlander here, and that’s not a bad thing. Cave replaces the lightening and explosions of a victory in that film, with a much more satisfying and grisly end for Horror fans.
Then back into the present and a series of bloody and incredible events bring us hurtling to a startling but satisfying conclusion. Good characters and an almost 3D view of the world with excellent descriptive prose. Action, adventure, and horror in equal measure, the single question left when you are finished is ‘when will there be a sequel?’
Robert Auty, Author of 'Trance Warriors: The Siege of Scarn'
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-- Newspaper and Website Reviews
COLD LIGHT OF DAY
Living Tenerife Magazine
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Two Immortal Creatures – One Age, Old Struggle
Anna is a beautiful woman who spends her days in the shadows, hiding from the sun. By night, she hunts and kills evil wherever she may find it, and she has been living this life for centuries. Jonas lives the same sort of life as Anna with only one slight difference: malevolence runs through his veins. He will kill anyone, regardless of whether they are murderers or saints. That is of no consequence to him; he needs them to feed, and feed he does. Although, like Anna, Jonas has a purpose, he still lacks the one thing that would fulfill his life’s destiny – he needs Anna’s heart. But Anna will not surrender her heart so easily because it now belongs to another.
Anna struggles to convince the world, and more importantly, Josh, the man she loves, that she is trying to do the right thing: ridding the world of the creatures that poison and pollute it. When she kills, however, the guise she transforms into only convinces people that she is a monster to be feared and not trusted.
Pursued by the police, Jonas and the FBI, Anna and Josh set off on a journey. Will they stay one step ahead or will they be captured? If they are captured and Jonas gets Anna’s heart, she is not the only one who will suffer- it could mean the end of Humankind.
This second novel from Paul Cave is very different from Something of the Night, which was an apocalyptic story set in the distant future. Cold Light of Day is a contemporary novel, with an occasional reference to the past. There are no epic battles in Cold Light of Day, but the novel does not suffer because of this. If you enjoy stories like Highlander and Underworld, you will love this book.
Cold Light of Day is an exciting book that will renew your faith in heroic adventure and leave you waiting in eager anticipation for the next installment of this epic saga. The chase is only beginning…
www.spinetinglers.co.uk
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COLD LIGHT OF DAY
Christian Market Place Magazine
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COLD LIGHT OF DAY
Oldham Evening Chronicle
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COMPETITION!
The Shields Gazette
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Writer Paul is proving to be horribly good
by Lee Sykes
A LOCAL author is enjoying success on both sides of the Atlantic courtesy of a blood-filled imagination, prolific work rate and natural way with words.
Paul Cave, of Derker, has had two horror novels published over the last 12 months and a third is already said to be well on the way.
‘Cold Light of Day’ and ‘Something of the Night’ have both been selling well in Britain and America for the former Counthill Secondary School pupil.
Paul said: "I started writing about six years ago and decided to quit a mathematics degree that I was studying to concentrate all my efforts on my books.
"My second novel, ‘Cold Light of Day’, came runner-up in a book of the year competition and was in the top ten best sales in the US for a couple of weeks, which I was really pleased about."
‘Cold Light of Day’ follows student Josh Sawyer’s passionate encounter with Anna, a beautiful and mysterious young woman, that changes his life for ever and thrusts him into a horror nightmare of violence and bloodlust.
‘Something of the Night’ tells the story of Jacob Cain, one of the last surviving humans who finds himself pitched in battle with an enemy even darker than the shadows which surround him. As vampires push man towards extinction, two armies, both desperate to capture the human refugees, threaten to converge, and create an inescapable net.
Thankfully, neither is based on personal experience, but simply a vivid imagination. The same may not be true for parts of the next tome by the former North West schoolboy boxing champion of two years running.
"The third novel is a thriller, which centres on an African-American prize-fighter, who suffers a stroke in the ring, and then becomes the target of a ruthless killer whilst languishing in hospital," said Paul. "It is currently being edited by award-winning writer Greg L. Norris – who has worked on episodes of ‘Star TrekVoyager’ and ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’."
He added: "My first two books have been published through a small independent publisher based in Essex, but I’ve had quite a lot of interest by US publishers already for the third book, and hope it will be published later this year."
If all goes well, the test engineer for a company that delivers telecom systems to the Ministry of Defence may be communicating through print full-time at some point in the future.
For more information on Paul’s work log onto http://www.apexpublishing.co.uk. You can purchase copies of his books from http://www.amazon.co.uk
Oldham Advertiser
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Josh Sawyer, a student, is also a runner competing to win in the Chinese Olympics. He takes his running abilities very seriously and today he must make sure he wins the race. However, what he doesn’t know is that a beautiful young woman, Anna Privalova, is to step into his world. She is mysterious and too attractive to let go. She seems to be just the right girl with sensuous deep red lips Josh has only seen on women in glossy magazines.
Soon they are consumed by an intense and powerful passion. Josh is in ecstasy, he feels so attracted to his young female, not just in a physical sense but also on an instinctive almost animalistic level.
Yet is she really this perfect? Soon Josh finds out what secrets she is really harbouring as they both become suspects in a series of bloody and grizzly murders and have no option but to flee to Chicago. Not only this but Jonus, an enemy from Anna’s past, wants Anna for her heart to help give him the power he desperately needs and an ability that could possibly destroy Humankind. Will Josh and Anna manage to escape this cruel fate? If Anna dies it could be the end of everything.
Paul Cave is definitely made of the right stuff with his amazing abilities to create creepy worlds that are so believable with characters so realistic but also some so scary.
I loved this book with its rollercoaster ride of sick, gory nightmares that will guarantee to leave you unnerved and fulfil your thirst for blood. This second book by Paul Cave is filled with everything a horror fan should need. From bloody events to dark, terrifying secrets that will have you up all night with the lights on. Absolutely disturbing yet brilliant stuff. 9 out of 10.
www.booklore.co.uk
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COLD LIGHT OF DAY
Oldham Evening Chronicle
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When I reviewed Paul Cave's first novel, Something of the Night, I described it as being "like the Biblical flood." The story, I opined, "washed over the reader unceasingly and warned us of dark things to come if we didn’t get a grip."
Paul, thankfully, did get a grip and has now penned his second novel. Without hesitation I can say that it measures up very well indeed when compared to the first.
Oscar Wilde once said that, "there is no such thing as a moral or immoral book. Books are well written or badly written, that is all."
The Cold Light of Day is, as Wilde said, neither moral nor immoral. It simply takes the reader on a journey into the darkest recesses of the human psyche, and then some. Its genius lies in the way it transforms innocence into horror, normality into nightmare. One minute the hero is a track runner, the next he is crippled in a car wreck. In the throes of sexual passion, a man transforms into a monster. Nails become claws, teeth mutate into fangs. You just never know when Paul Cave will wrench you from the real world into an altogether darker environ that Dean Koontz at his best might have trouble envisaging.
Of course, the scenario in which man takes on monster has been well rehearsed. The X-Files did it well. Paul Cave does it brilliantly. Lovers of horror novels become seasoned to their diet. They just know – sense – when the next bit of bloodletting is just around the corner, just over the page.
Paul Cave affords the reader no such luxury. Every scene – every situation – may begin life wrapped in innocence and end up covered in body parts. The transition hits you like a train, judders the senses unnervingly.
In a novel which speaks of such diverse phenomena as police detectives, soul-theft, bloodhounds, giant bats, FBI agents and shape-shifting wraiths one should not expect a comfortable ride. Goldilocks and the Three Bears it is not.
And yet, there is something redeeming about The Cold Light of Day. Through all the human weakness, rising loftily above the torrid sexual encounters, there is an overriding feeling that, no matter how bad things get, the good guys will eventually do in the interloper from God-knows-what dimension.
Ah, but do they? You just never know with writers like Paul Cave. Like the bloodletting denizens of his novel, he cannot be guaranteed to do the right thing just because it makes the reader feel better. His craft is terror, not therapy.
Fear, said Ralph Waldo Emerson, is a teacher of great sagacity. Paul Cave, to our voluntary discomfort, has learnt that lesson very, very well.
Read greedily and enjoy, but expect not to sleep soundly.
Mike Hallowell, The Shields Gazette - Written the Foreword
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Having read Paul Cave’s first published attempt at a horror novel (my review of which you can read here (but only once you’ve read this one, of course) I was certainly interested to turn to his second.
One night Josh has a most thrilling encounter with a gorgeous girl that changes his life. Never before has he had the ease and opportunity to invite her for drinks, and back to hers for a night of instantly passionate sex. He’s so excited it hardly seems strange he’s kicked out before daybreak.
Walking home through the wrong side of town, he has a most thrilling encounter with three hoodlums trying to mug him, who are dispatched with bloody ease by a monstrous creature.
Of course, said beauty and said beast are the same character – Anna. Romantic Eastern Europe feel, superhuman strength, inability to be in the sun, ability to torn vulpine and feed on humans – these are attributes anyone like Josh, an Olympic-level sprinter, would desire. He certainly does, and when the crime scene Anna leaves in defence of him is investigated by the police, the pair match up and go on the run.
But the couple do not only have the cops to avoid – Anna is not unique. She and Jonus are the last of her species, and Jonus has a certain need to reunite with the woman who thought she had killed him a thousand years ago…
Several things in the narrative need to be convincing, coming as they do from an author from North West England. The US police procedural needs to be accurate, and there are times when it seems to be cribbed from crime TV, but on the whole it comes across as intelligent and factually sound. Balooga, the dodgily-named lead cop is a reasonable character, working with his colleagues in a common-sense way, until his unlikely epiphany and run to research vampire stories mid-way through.
The more important aspect, though, remains the nature of Anna, and Josh’s love for her. Cave has given himself the unenviable task of getting inside Josh’s head and portraying how he can be repulsed by her occasional bloodlust (and who wants a hairy girlfriend, after all?) and yet adore the human side to Anna. It is because of this, I think, Anna has become a complete mish-mash of different horror creatures – werewolf, vampire, shape-shifter, even succubus, as she has a sexual appetite to match her cravings for the claret.
I on the whole appreciated this invention (at least, I hope such a character is an invention), as Cave has stated his intention to recreate horror staples, and has succeeded here. His first effort was more of an action adventure story, but this one falls much more firmly into horror, and although providing no goose-flesh for this reader, it features enough gore, killings, mutilation and transformation scenes to make it quite gruesome.
I still have a few reservations about Cave’s writing, and the length of his books. The extended flashback to Jonus and Anna’s back story is too long, too full of jump-cuts between narratives, and the ending, as inconclusive as it needs to be, just doesn’t work.
Also Cave’s writing is still too dense for my personal taste, with well over half his nouns having adjectives (“a thick jet of crimson sprayed from the torn flesh, which covered the raised dais in a red veil” for instance – is there any other kind of dais?), but this floweriness is not that off-putting.
The opening two scenes, both featuring graphic sex, might make one think they’d stumbled upon the wishful writings of a teenage mind, but by the end of the book you’re aware of having been entertained by this interesting mix of police chase, romance and horror. It is only to fans of the last genre that this would really appeal, but I am sure they would enjoy it, and consider like me the length of time before Paul Cave has a third novel published.
www.thebookbag.co.uk
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OLDHAM author Paul Cave has been hitting the keyboard hard again.
Oldham Evening Chronicle
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COLD LIGHT OF DAY
Pick Me Up Magazine
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-- Readers Comments
Regardless of genre, all fiction needs a stage set on which to play out the act. Paul Cave delivers his set of Cold Light of Day with apparent ease. David Bowie once wrote a lyric describing “a set so amazing it even smells like a street. Paul Cave doesn’t fail to deliver and his set certainly convinced my senses from the outset, I was there amongst the action. The characters are well developed and each has their own identity which remains believable throughout. In many ways this is a traditional story of `Hope Springs Eternal` but it can never be accused of being soft. If perhaps the body count doesn’t overwhelm, it should satisfy the bloodlust of the majority, for those that it doesn’t, perhaps may be the subject matter of Paul Cave’s next book rather than mere reader! As for the horrors, there are plenty of those, with each delivered eloquently and to a schedule known only to the characters and author. Just as I was satisfyingly second guessing the next twist I was dumped on my ass as the whole thing would suddenly swerve off track, leaving me back where I started – glued to the page and back out of control.
The storyline draws upon established conceptions from the classic horror genre but that’s not a problem as the way it’s presented is both refreshing and uncomplicated. There is even a trip back in time where were treated to a generous glimpse of a life long since forgotten by the characters of the main story thread. None-the-less it’s in context and helped me as the reader position in my mind how and why to most of my questions.
So does this book achieve all that it sets out to deliver? – In my opinion absolutely it does and without over statement or compromise. The page count neither exceeds nor conspires to deceive, delivering the conclusion satisfyingly so.
….To close on the theatrical theme of which I began I need to state that in my opinion Paul Cave writes with a style that is more Strong leader than Dictator. Don’t expect him to answer every question raised and to neatly tidy away all those loose ends. The audience at the very best of stage shows must take some responsibility for providing the atmosphere and then sit back and enjoy what is a very satisfying bloody and bumpy ride...
Anthony Gee
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-- Book Signings and Events
'Cold Light of Day' on sale at Waterstone's, Colchester (Culver Square).
Waterstone's, Colchester (Culver Square)
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Paul Cave with his book in Waterstone's, Manchester (Deansgate).
Waterstone's, Manchester (Deansgate)
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Paul Cave signed copies of his books at the 'Spring Fair 2007: The World's Essential Gift and Home Showcase'.
Spring Fair 2007: The World's Essential Gift and Home Showcase
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Paul Cave signed copies of his books at the 'Spring Fair 2007: The World's Essential Gift and Home Showcase'.
Spring Fair 2007: The World's Essential Gift and Home Showcase
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Paul Cave signed copies of his books 'Something of the Night' and 'Cold Light of Day' at Waterstone's, Oldham.
Waterstone's, Oldham
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