Could the sudden unexplained death of Sally Montgomery's otherwise healthy baby daughter and then the mysterious disappearance of her neighbor, Lucy Corliss' young son be an indication of something amiss in the otherwise peaceful small town of Eastbury, Massachusetts? Could the fact that those two children and other Eastbury children have been secretly monitored since birth by a covert medical research firm going by the unlikely acronym CHILD have anything to do with it? Ya think? It's another silly movie of the week plot from John Saul that is for some reason ever so much more entertaining than it has any right to be with a decent ending to wrap things up. Add an extra half a star if you enjoy Saul's brand of 1980's cheese as much as I do.

What an ending! Review to come.

What can I say? Best shlock horror of the 80's. Love this guy. :)

This was a thoroughly enjoyable book. I have a little bit of a problem deciding what the main genre is. It is certainly science fiction, but it is also a thriller and a suspense and a mystery. Children keep disappearing in a small town and there is an epidemic of crip death too. The mother of a crib death victim is completely unconvinced that her baby died of normal crib death and starts trying to find out what is really going on. That makes the story a mystery to be solved. Once she starts making some headway in her investigations she and her family and friends find themselves in mortal danger and they start having narrow escapes. That makes it a thriller. It is also a hard book to put down. On nearly every page there is the impression that another aspect to the mystery is about to be solved or that someone is going to get wiped out. That makes it a suspense. I also found some of it amusing too, but in ways that were not intended to be that amusing. I found that in the fact that it is kind of outdated. The mystery under investigation has to do with genetic engineering and a lot of the woman's detective work involves searching computer data bases. The book was published originally in the early 1980's and, let's face it, there have been a lot of progress in both genetics and computer science since then. The quaintness of how these fields were perceived at that time kind of stands out and brings an occasional smile, but it does not in any way detract from the suspense and excitement in the story. If you like science fiction and if you like a fast paced thrilling mystery then do read this book.

I read this one over 20 years ago, but the ending still sticks with me. The writing is so-so, but I feel the ending was so awesome that it deserves 4-stars.

Saul takes you on a journey through a seemingly normal small town, introducing you to a place ideal to raise young children, or so it seems. But beneath this pleasant village's facade lurks a dreadful secret. The book races along, pulling the reader on an adventure into a vast conspiracy involving the innocent children. This is a definite page turner. It grips you all the way to its very twisted end.

Interesting to read an 80s paperback horror thriller today. I’d put Stephen King & Clive Barker in the top of that class, then maybe Peter Straub & Ramsey Campbell, then third tier is Robin Cook, Dean Koontz, and John Saul. Saul’s writing is perfunctory – all story, not much jazz to go with it. Which works for a thriller – Stephen King is all story too, but he gives a psychological depth and detail to setting & the supernatural that puts him as a stepping stone to someone like Donna Tartt – still largely story (not stream of consciousness or something abstract like William Burroughs) but that’s pushing that psychological detail into the dense layers of an onion. John Saul isn’t quite there (of course) but if you want to read something like Donna Tartt, might as well read Donna Tartt.

This one reminded me of the evil children of Village of the Damned/Midwich Cuckoos (even getting into Arthur C. Clarke’s Childhoods End a bit) filtered through the suburbia of Spielberg or Stephen King. The government agency manipulating children has some standard anti-science slant but also resembles Firestarter or even Beyond the Black Rainbow. Dress this in super stylish looks and the bad guys are Dr. Barry Nyles…

One thing that’s quaint is the usage of computers – pre-internet. Essentially these are word processors with cryptic code numbers on files in schools – one of our main characters is a “computer whiz” which means she can essentially type quickly (from what I gathered). It’s funny how simple the world was back then. Even something like the isolated estate where the kidnapped children are kept – that shit would be found on Google maps these days.

This was my first John Saul, and it was more or less an easy to read book, I'd rank as an average to above average thriller in the same style and genre as Stephen King and Dean Koontz. If Koontz is sometimes referred to as the poor-man's Stephen King, then maybe Saul is the poor man's Dean Koontz? This is one of those easy "beach reads" that flies by quick and is filled with copious amounts of short paragraphs. It almost reads like a screenplay at times. That's not necessarily bad, just know what you're getting into.

The reason King is still the horror master in my mind (and I'd throw Robert McCammon and certain novels of Dan Simmons in there too) is the depth of his characters is so far superior and well developed compared to what I've seen in this one John Saul novel. There's even a poetry at times to King's prose or at least a "poetry-adjacent" vibe in King (and even Koontz once in a while), that was somewhat lacking in this book.

The leaps of logic and far-fetched nature of the plot will require some serious suspension of disbelief. At one point, one of the smarter characters in the book figures out a key password into an old-school early 1980s computer network by realizing it's the acronym of something else in the book that is super obvious (I'm deliberately being vague to cause I like to write very clean spoiler free reviews). Mild almost spoiler: It just seems to me that perhaps the malevolent forces in the book maybe could've covered their tracks a little better?

Semi-spoiler: I did actually enjoy the ending, very dark!

Overall conclusion: I'll definitely read a couple of more of Saul's work. Maybe it's not great - but hey, a fast food cheeseburger once in a while tastes OK.

Beside the typos awesome

This was classic I was hooked from beginning till end, and the ending ,Wow!!!! Freaking classic!!!!! Highly recommend t top any fans of the author or any fans of horror in general

I read this book many years ago (early 80's), so I would not be able to give an accurate review. I had it listed in my records as a very good read. In my early teen years I loved horror stories. My taste in books has changed a lot over the years.

A disturbing idea of manipulation and experimentation, but couldn't help feeling I'd read the story before in another form. A couple of twists at the end that were fairly predictable but an OK read.

This is the first John Saul book I have read and I have another eight of his books on my shelves so I went into this hoping I enjoyed it and not have nine books by an author I don’t like.

Turns out that I am looking forward to reading more John Saul.

I have bought all nine John Saul books as he is a popular 80’s horror writer whose stories I want to read. Every time I have come across one of his books in my second hand/charity bookshop hunting I have bought it. All Fall Down is also known as The God Project. I would like to know why the name change. It is the only John Saul book that has a different title.

The book has dated as it features those new deadly machines called computers and the information they conceal which is found by one of the characters. For me, this adds to the story. It takes me right back to the 80’s when computers first entered our lives.

For others, the book may be considered out of date and a relic of its time but for me it takes me back to that time and immerses me in the 80’s. It reminded me of Jericho Falls, a book that had the same 80’s vibe and also featured a conspiracy.

The story features two families whose two children are involved in a vast conspiracy of genetic engineering which changes them and makes their lives frightening and scary. As the story progresses those behind the secret terror are revealed.

There is one sub-plot involving the death of a infant which is never explained. Is it related to the main story or something else? This should have been explored as it has implications for the other two children and the secret goings on. This sub-plot was not returned too after its early appearance in the book and was too open ended.

Having said that, I thought the ending fitted the book perfectly. A sense of creepy, bleak, nasty horror.