Yzabel / May 18, 2015

Modern Rituals by J.S. Leonard

My rating: [rating=2]

Blurb:

“A failed ritual annihilates modern life.”

Manhattan, NY: The E-Train slams into James Bixby, a strapping young artist on the rise, after a life-saving rescue attempt goes awry. Belfast, Ireland: A bullet severs Olivia Young’s spinal cord while she defends a doctor colleague–the second bullet pierces her heart.

Then they awaken–unharmed.

“Selected” and thrust into a deadly ritual, James’ and Olivia’s lives–along with the lives of five others–will decide humanity’s fate: surrender to the old Gods’ rule or live on in blissful ignorance. Follow their frantic struggle as Magnus–a secret organization of enormous reach and scientific prowess–directs the ritual to its gruesome end.

Dubbed as a Cabin in the Woods “remix,” Modern Rituals celebrates the movie’s ritual motif and compels readers with a rich universe propped upon science fiction and mythology. If you loved the fierce pace of Battle Royale and the fight to survive in Hunger Games, then Modern Rituals: The Wayward Three will quicken your heartbeat and leave your eyes red and bleary! Pick it up and strap in–once this story leaps off the page there’s no turning back.

Review:

I got a copy through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.

This book is so difficult to rate: because I enjoyed the story, I really did (I have a fondness for tropes when they’re openly exploited as such). However, it’s also so terribly close to The Cabin in the Woods in its concept and execution, and without any acknowledgment of the movie (or, even further, of the other book that the movie supposedly plagiarised) that everything is a muddled cluster here. I’m not talking “it’s about a boy who goes to a school of wizardry, so it’s like Harry Potter” inspiration. I’m talking something even more blatant than this.

I liked the use of technology, computers and science to fulfill the needs of elder gods, assuage them and put them back to sleep. I liked how the people behind the rituals had to resort to archetypes/tropes: the Knight, the Succubus, the Virgin, the Fool, and so on. It cast the characters into specific moulds, forced them to play roles they wouldn’t have played otherwise. Besides, the blend of magic and technology is something that’s always fascinated me—perhaps because both seem to be the antithesis of each other, yet, in the words of A. C. Clarke, isn’t any sufficiently advanced technology indistinguishable from magic?

On the other hand, the tropes didn’t go far enough to my liking, in that in the end, mostly the characters did stay in those roles, and didn’t subvert them, when it would have been the perfect opportunity to do so.

I liked the twists, how the characters who were supposed to die got given a second chance, how the one who wasn’t supposed to join them actually did more than one would have thought, how the one who was supposed to die didn’t. However, there were a few but glaring holes in that, including how exactly the seven were transported into the school grounds, and the survival of… let’s say characters that shouldn’t have been able to fake their injuries or death. I mean, Olivia’s a nurse: nothing should escape her in that regard. If she pronounces someone dead, then that person is definitely dead, or at least so close to it that no recovery should be possible in such a short time.

I also wondered about the parts the characters were supposed to play, not only within the ritual itself, but in a meta way. I thought Olivia would be on par with James, as the female main protagonist, yet she was quickly overshadowed. A shame.

And… I still can’t overlook the similarities I pointed to at the beginning of my review. There are too many of them. I don’t know if I’ve missed something; I looked in the first and last pages of the novel to see if this was addressed at some point, and it just wasn’t (although one of the character clearly mentions the rituals having different settings throughout the world, “even a cabin in the woods”). I honestly don’t know what came first. Basically, I’m not even sure I should touch that with a ten-foot pole. You just… don’t do that. Is all.