I assumed it was left over from the civilization the characters are investigating, but I also assumed it would have some original purpose beyond "creepily drive the plot."
Yeah, I don't really have an issue with not getting a full explanation (I mean, in a lot of the older horror it reminds me of, you don't really get an explanation beyond "it's creepy and alien"), but the problem is that there are several competing explanations the characters consider, but never have the data to choose between. It seems too advanced for the relative level of tech in the alien ruins and also doesn't really seem like anything else on the planet; it might have been what killed the aliens, but then again they might have died of environmental causes; and early on the characters find suggestions that someone else had gone around the alien ruins removing things after they all died - since objects are perfectly preserved in an Arctic environment and the ruins are weirdly empty - which doesn't really fit with either the "they made it themselves" or "it's a visiting space entity that needs hosts" explanations. I could have used another couple of chapters to at least give us more of a suggestion of the resolution to the book's various mysteries! Either that, or less mystery and more focus early on.
That being said, I would definitely read another book in this setting.
The need to stay awake in order to fend it off feels like a direct inheritance from the 1956 Invasion of the Body Snatchers, plus the Arctic paranoia of John Carpenter's The Thing.
It definitely feels like it was influenced by classic horror, especially The Thing (and also a touch of Alien and a few other things). That part, at least, was really excellent.
no subject
Yeah, I don't really have an issue with not getting a full explanation (I mean, in a lot of the older horror it reminds me of, you don't really get an explanation beyond "it's creepy and alien"), but the problem is that there are several competing explanations the characters consider, but never have the data to choose between. It seems too advanced for the relative level of tech in the alien ruins and also doesn't really seem like anything else on the planet; it might have been what killed the aliens, but then again they might have died of environmental causes; and early on the characters find suggestions that someone else had gone around the alien ruins removing things after they all died - since objects are perfectly preserved in an Arctic environment and the ruins are weirdly empty - which doesn't really fit with either the "they made it themselves" or "it's a visiting space entity that needs hosts" explanations. I could have used another couple of chapters to at least give us more of a suggestion of the resolution to the book's various mysteries! Either that, or less mystery and more focus early on.
That being said, I would definitely read another book in this setting.
The need to stay awake in order to fend it off feels like a direct inheritance from the 1956 Invasion of the Body Snatchers, plus the Arctic paranoia of John Carpenter's The Thing.
It definitely feels like it was influenced by classic horror, especially The Thing (and also a touch of Alien and a few other things). That part, at least, was really excellent.