Well, first I need to start this off by saying that I am a HUGE Richard Laymon fan. Richard died a couple of years ago, just as America was starting to catch on to his writing skills. Personally, his stories are so well written and fast paced that you literally cannot put the books down.

That is to say, until I read Blood Games. This book starts off alright and sets up 4 women who are going to get together to relive their college years. The group formed a really tight bond early on and liked to go on a lot of adventures. All of their escapades are presented in flashbacks as events are starting to happen in real time. Laymon is known for his character development and then he takes his characters on a ride through hell. So you feel for the characters and sometimes those are the people that are "killed off" first. He normally leaves you guessing, but the problem in this book is that the constant flashing back and forth really gets distracting as the present story is moving ahead.

Most of the story involves one of the girls selecting a spooky run down lodge for all of the girls to meet and try to have an adventure. Of course, there is a sordid past in the story and without giving too much away, many people were murdered here a few years before.

The killers were never caught and that is the reason that this lodge was picked for this year's adventure.

There are many moments of suspense but the flashing back and forth really distracts from the current action in the book. You can tell that this is an earlier work from him and it doesn't have the payoff that some of his later books do.

It is worth a read but it is to me one of the weaker books that I have read from him. If I had to rate it on a scale of 1 - 10, I would say that it is a 5. That is really low for me, as I absolutely love this author. Another one of his older books just came out recently as well, it is called "Wake the Dead" as soon as I get a chance to read it, I'll post my comments.

For those who have not read Laymon, start off with "One Rainy Night" or "Among the Living" these are much more true to the types of books that he writes.