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3.2 AVERAGE
3.2 AVERAGE
adventurous
dark
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Holy shit, that was bleak.
I love dark stories from interesting perspectives, and this story delivered that beyond any expectations. Based off the author’s real life experience with home invasion, this story has a heavy and dark atmosphere. The beginning of this story that detailed the typical home invasion was eerie and reminded me of the disturbing movies Funny Games and The Strangers, only we were hearing the story from the invaders perspectives. I loved this this story explored the idea of invasion and what it means to be an invader. A home invasion is the most terrifying ordeal that can happen to someone, south of being visited by ghosts or targeted by a Satanic cult. In this story, a seasoned invader with multiple home invasions under their belt recounts their dark victories while offering tutelage to a new generation of ambitious home invaders eager to make their mark on the annals of criminal history. This creepy apprenticeship grows into a voyeuristic game of cat and mouse between the invaders and the family unlucky enough to be chosen. It has been said that writing has been used to exorcize our inner demons and inner pain, and it is clear that this story is a vehicle for the author to come to terms with his personal home invasion experience. The way that the author got into the mind of home invaders and the criminal ecosystem around home invasions was skillful and precise. I hope that writing this effective story was therapeutic for the author despite the dark content.
The psychology behind every action that the home invaders take is explained in detail, and it was chilling how these characters have boiled down the experience of a home invasion and effectively created a proper list of methods and techniques to a “proper” home invasion. Seeing how much the invaders found joy and excitement from invading a home was surreal and scary. This book was so realistic in showing how home invaders take pleasure of invading the privacy and safe space of other human beings by force. This book will absolutely make people who have a fear of home invasions even more paranoid and fearful.
Anybody Home? is told in the second person; you are the invader getting tips from the seasoned home invader. You are the one that’s about to destroy a whole family’s life for entertainment. Being placed in this position really adds to the horror of the story; making it a bit more psychological, as it makes you the villain. I love how the author makes the reader complicit in the invasion, it was an interesting storytelling format and it kept me engaged and made the story so much heavier. Another element of this one that sticks out is the fact that the characters are unnamed. The invaders are simply invader #1, #2, and so on, while the victims are victim #1, #2, etc. Again, proving that these roles could be filled by anyone, and allows the reader to project their own families and people they know onto these characters. It doesn’t matter who you are, it can happen to anyone. What’s worse, is the constant framing of the video cameras reinforces how this is all a performance, like a sick play for the invaders and their audience. For the families, the invasion is the worst night of their lives, but for some, these home invasions are just entertainment. That thought in itself was terrifying.
It was both horrifying and intriguing hearing about the different snuff films and invasion scenarios that previous invaders have made for audiences of underground snuff film viewers. There was even a reference to Saw’s Reverse Bear Trap, and this story may have implied that in this story’s universe, horror movies lift horrific situations from snuff films and plant them in real horror movies, both by and for snuff film enthusiasts. The silent moment where the victims all sit together with their wounds in the quiet as they ponder what has brought them here while avoiding thinking about what’s inevitably coming was so heavy and impactful, it felt too real. Even though the family is never named, they are given such humanity that most victims in horror stories aren’t afforded, and that made the horror all the more real. How many times has this happened in real life? How many more times will it happen? How many families has this happened to, and could it happen to you? These are the questions that permeate this story.
The aftermath and how it depicted the news cycle, true crime entertainment, conspiracy theories, CreepyPasta, memes, and movie rights was so bleak and true to reality, and it made me feel complicit for my role in enjoying that kind of entertainment. This is easily one of the bleakest and darkest stories I’ve ever read, and by the end, I was struggling to finish it, only because it was so effective in making everything feel hopeless and full of despair. This book was harrowing. I always told myself I rated my books by my enjoyment of them, but I can’t do that here. I rated this book highly, but only for how effective this story was at what it sought out to do. I did not enjoy this. But I admit that I used this book for entertainment, just like how the invaders used the victim family for entertainment. And I don’t know how to feel about that. This book made me look at myself and question the morality behind my enjoyment of true crime as entertainment. Am I not the same as these invaders who use the worst (and last) day of someone’s life for pure entertainment? I don’t have a clear answer for that yet. This book was something else. It made me feel a small taste of pure despair, and it made me feel dirty.
I love dark stories from interesting perspectives, and this story delivered that beyond any expectations. Based off the author’s real life experience with home invasion, this story has a heavy and dark atmosphere. The beginning of this story that detailed the typical home invasion was eerie and reminded me of the disturbing movies Funny Games and The Strangers, only we were hearing the story from the invaders perspectives. I loved this this story explored the idea of invasion and what it means to be an invader. A home invasion is the most terrifying ordeal that can happen to someone, south of being visited by ghosts or targeted by a Satanic cult. In this story, a seasoned invader with multiple home invasions under their belt recounts their dark victories while offering tutelage to a new generation of ambitious home invaders eager to make their mark on the annals of criminal history. This creepy apprenticeship grows into a voyeuristic game of cat and mouse between the invaders and the family unlucky enough to be chosen. It has been said that writing has been used to exorcize our inner demons and inner pain, and it is clear that this story is a vehicle for the author to come to terms with his personal home invasion experience. The way that the author got into the mind of home invaders and the criminal ecosystem around home invasions was skillful and precise. I hope that writing this effective story was therapeutic for the author despite the dark content.
The psychology behind every action that the home invaders take is explained in detail, and it was chilling how these characters have boiled down the experience of a home invasion and effectively created a proper list of methods and techniques to a “proper” home invasion. Seeing how much the invaders found joy and excitement from invading a home was surreal and scary. This book was so realistic in showing how home invaders take pleasure of invading the privacy and safe space of other human beings by force. This book will absolutely make people who have a fear of home invasions even more paranoid and fearful.
Anybody Home? is told in the second person; you are the invader getting tips from the seasoned home invader. You are the one that’s about to destroy a whole family’s life for entertainment. Being placed in this position really adds to the horror of the story; making it a bit more psychological, as it makes you the villain. I love how the author makes the reader complicit in the invasion, it was an interesting storytelling format and it kept me engaged and made the story so much heavier. Another element of this one that sticks out is the fact that the characters are unnamed. The invaders are simply invader #1, #2, and so on, while the victims are victim #1, #2, etc. Again, proving that these roles could be filled by anyone, and allows the reader to project their own families and people they know onto these characters. It doesn’t matter who you are, it can happen to anyone. What’s worse, is the constant framing of the video cameras reinforces how this is all a performance, like a sick play for the invaders and their audience. For the families, the invasion is the worst night of their lives, but for some, these home invasions are just entertainment. That thought in itself was terrifying.
It was both horrifying and intriguing hearing about the different snuff films and invasion scenarios that previous invaders have made for audiences of underground snuff film viewers. There was even a reference to Saw’s Reverse Bear Trap, and this story may have implied that in this story’s universe, horror movies lift horrific situations from snuff films and plant them in real horror movies, both by and for snuff film enthusiasts. The silent moment where the victims all sit together with their wounds in the quiet as they ponder what has brought them here while avoiding thinking about what’s inevitably coming was so heavy and impactful, it felt too real. Even though the family is never named, they are given such humanity that most victims in horror stories aren’t afforded, and that made the horror all the more real. How many times has this happened in real life? How many more times will it happen? How many families has this happened to, and could it happen to you? These are the questions that permeate this story.
The aftermath and how it depicted the news cycle, true crime entertainment, conspiracy theories, CreepyPasta, memes, and movie rights was so bleak and true to reality, and it made me feel complicit for my role in enjoying that kind of entertainment. This is easily one of the bleakest and darkest stories I’ve ever read, and by the end, I was struggling to finish it, only because it was so effective in making everything feel hopeless and full of despair. This book was harrowing. I always told myself I rated my books by my enjoyment of them, but I can’t do that here. I rated this book highly, but only for how effective this story was at what it sought out to do. I did not enjoy this. But I admit that I used this book for entertainment, just like how the invaders used the victim family for entertainment. And I don’t know how to feel about that. This book made me look at myself and question the morality behind my enjoyment of true crime as entertainment. Am I not the same as these invaders who use the worst (and last) day of someone’s life for pure entertainment? I don’t have a clear answer for that yet. This book was something else. It made me feel a small taste of pure despair, and it made me feel dirty.
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
dark
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
An interesting twist on the home invasion story. I liked it a lot but felt it slowed down too much in the third act.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Torture, Murder
Moderate: Animal death
Minor: Rape
This book describes the graphic murder of a family, including children and a dog
It’s like a wannabe edge lord tried writing a book about preforming the “best” home invasion scenario. Boring and the tediousness of being lectured about how to do things *just* right is peak insufferable reading experience.
Yawn.
Yawn.
challenging
dark
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
There was a lot to like about this book. It's a smart premise, and a really interesting approach to the home invader genre. There are some moments, especially early on in the book, that are incredibly hair-raisingly creepy. The book fell short for me in its ability to tell a compelling story. The self-reflexive elements were interesting but could have been more effective if there was a lot less of them. And some of the author's choices, such as point of view and not naming characters proved distracting from what was going on once the action really gets going. Too many times I had to stop and try to figure out what was going on, and not in a compelling, though-provoking way, in a this-writing-is-not-clear-and-I-feel-annoyed way.
It was fine, but felt kind of impersonal (which made me not care about the characters or what was happening). I thought there was a lot of potential with the concept of home invasions that just wasn't executed effectively. Kind of a missed opportunity, and a little disappointing IMO.