Reviews

The Ghost That Ate Us reads like a true crime book. It's about the events that take place at Burger City in 2016 and 2017. A tragic event happens at the fast food joint and soon after that, things get weird. The book focuses on the crew that worked there and what happened to them during that time and also a few years later. I loved this book. Kraus really brought the story to life and it felt like an actual true crime book.

honeywine's review

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slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No

3.0

I love documentary style books in general but this one was overly verbose. It was written to make the reader think it actually happened but then the footnotes didn’t follow real-world writing styles. So many things that needed citations weren’t cited and so many things that wouldn’t need citations were (if this were an academic text). There were also many many many many many many many details that were not relevant to the story nor would they be included in a real-world text.

I did like how the author brought up the ills of small town and rural living.

bears_house_of_horrors's review against another edition

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slow-paced

Loveable characters? No

1.5

If you are triggered by the constant mention of peoples weight, this is not for you. The author mentions weight in pounds at least 21 times. Assuming I didn’t miss flagging any, that’s an average of it appearing every 14.3 pages. This is only the mention of weight given in pounds. This does not include the many other times weight is mentioned.

The last words in the book are literally “44 pounds”.

The author including himself with in the story also is so cringe.

It’s revealed early on that one of survivors wants to speak with the author because he’s a big fan of the authors books. He raves about them. It’s weird to have him hyping himself through this character. Later he has this same character ask a bunch of questions about his previous books. Idk if he’s trying to promote them or make them seem extra deep by talking about the metaphors/themes in the books but it is weird as heck. He complains about being summoned by one of these imaginary characters while hes on a book press tour for one of hia other books. He complains that he has to drive an imaginary long distance to speak to an imaginary character. Ick. Then at the end of the book it’s revealed that the main character (and his cult) specially chose Kraus to spread word of the murders through his writing. They cast a lil spell by chanting the first sentence of his first book which Kraus says no one knows and its soooo obscure. Why this cult chose him (besides him making the decisions of this imaginary cult of course) is confusing. He’s not that big of a name, personally I only know him through is co-authoring with George A Romero and Guillermo Del Toro, and he writes fiction. So why would he be their choice to write a “non-fiction” account of their story?.

Initially, I thought the actual ghost story was going to be enough to push past the above but upon reaching the end I can assure you, it’s not. The climax left a lot to be desired.

Ultimately I would not recommend this novel.

Content Warnings

bmwilson38's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

pilarmae's review

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dark sad tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

rlbitt's review

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3.0

Our book club pick for January was The Ghost That Ate Us. Horror is not my usual genre (I basically only read it for book club 😅), and I read this one slowly, but did end up enjoying the ending and the book discussion. It was written like a true crime investigation and about half of the footnotes were actually true! I found this a bit frustrating at first because I wanted to google everything to figure out what was real and what was fabricated. Once I let that go, I was able to dive into the story a little more.

Strange Things are happening at Burger City in Johnny, Iowa. Nothing ever happens there except for some kids getting into meth and some getting the hell out of there. Some people want to believe that the unexplainable happenings are wonderful and miraculous; they are a part of something bigger than themselves. But as the book goes on, the writer’s “investigation” reveals that no one came out of the ordeal for the better, and some even lost their lives.

What I loved about the book was how it touched on bigger issues for small towns in the Midwest, and across the nation. This quote summed it up well: “ Iowa is full of ghosts: the specters of meth and opioid deaths; the plagues of missing parents or cruel partners; the slaughter first of American Indians, second of factory-farm livestock; the dead dreams of rural decay.” It shouldn’t have surprised me that a horror novel would have this kind of depth, but I underestimated the genre (like many people do with romance novels). Overall, it was an interesting book, and I love being challenged to read new things by my friends.

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