Reviews with content warning for Death of parent - My Heart Is a Chainsaw

The slasher vibes were real, the trope subversion was immaculate and Jade was a fucking fantastic lead character with the Author Notes just validating that sentiment to me even more when I read them.

I immediately went and purchased a copy for my own collection and will be waiting in avid anticipation for the sequel.

This bloody delivered in every way I wanted it to and every way I didn’t know I needed it to.

Go read this.

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robinsong's review

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adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

If I knew anything about horror movies this probably would be 5 stars lol

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rachelunabridged's review

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dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

2.0

I just could not get into this read, unfortunately. For something that is a homage to slashers, it was incredibly slow, and I found myself literally falling asleep as I tried to read it. Ultimately, I had to borrow the book in audiobook format just to finish it.

The main reason this ended up being such a slog fest is the POV character, Jade. So much of this read is bloated by her inner monologue where she explains to the reader all of the slasher tropes happening around her. In addition to her constant chattering, every other chapter is a selection of her history class papers that also explain how slashers work. This felt like overkill to me because it slowed the action of the book soooo much.

Additionally, I don't understand the constant holding of the reader's hand through the whole thing. Is this book written for people who are fans of slasher horror or no? If it's for people who already into slashers, the genre doesn't need to be explained to them, however, if it's not for people who already enjoy slashers, who is all the nostalgia for?

By the end, I felt like all of the interesting subtext and commentary was completely overshadowed by the nostalgia mining. I finished this read feeling like it suffers from the same issues that a lot of nostalgia-driven media has: the author leaned so hard on it that they forgot to write a proper story.

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lh_reads's review against another edition

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dark tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

This was definitely a rollercoaster to listen to but I loved it. I really loved Jades character

my favorite parts when she explained slasher lore between chapters. At some points it felt like a friend telling you about there hyperfixation which I loved.

it really kept me in the edge of my seat and didn’t expect the ending 100% I really love the authors writing and definitely will be adding only good Indians to my tbr. It’s really cool especially if you aren’t into slashers it still a fun read.

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perthalus's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

My Heart is a Chainsaw is a chainsaw that just can’t quite cut it. With a strong setup and a vivid image of the book’s location and its inhabitants, it’s main set back is it's characters, which despite being fairly strong, are hard to understand. I wish that was a positive in that it is complex, but it feels more misguided and confused.

It is not clear whether our main character Jade, is an unreliable narrator or not. She is written as a suicidal, delusional “horror chick”, but her backstory is filled with harmless high school pranks, and pretty much everyone but her father’s circle is welcoming to her. This makes the loner “nobody likes me” archetype unbelievable, and furthermore makes her delusional thoughts blurred, am I supposed to believe her or not?

At the end of the book I did like Jade and many of the other characters, but the confused intentions combined with the endless, sometimes unnecessary referencing of other slasher stories felt frustrating. I myself love slasher movies and knew pretty much every film mentioned in this book, but it didn’t do much for me and I can’t imagine it does anything to someone who doesn’t know them. It felt like the story was trying to be better than the slashers mentioned, whilst only being in their shadows. Also, Just Before Dawn sucks and it’s a crime it’s mentioned so many times in this book.

There was an attempt of elevating the slasher genre and subverting it, but it ultimately disappointed me, turning a grounded story into something that looked ridiculous in my head. There were many unanswered questions too, I’m confused why many different things happened in this book, but none of it is explained by the end. I’d read how the ending of this book was great and how it was surprising, but it was only surprising because it wasn’t set up well. It made the climax feel weightless, the story was no longer down to earth.

Somehow though, despite all of this, I was excited to read the book. I read chapters at a time and felt invested enough to get to the end because of how strong the town of Proofrock felt. It didn’t reach it’s potential, but the potential is what kept me reading it. The strongest point of this book is the atmosphere, how the characters look, the lake at night and the rampant gore described during is darker moments. It is satisfying to visualise, and though the characters didn’t fully connect, the world they were in did.

Besides that, I didn’t enjoy some the writers decisions here, such as including themes of sexual assault. With a book subverting the tropes of horror movies, you’d think the writer would avoid the problematic tropes of female sexual assault victims in horror stories. To me it’s a touchy subject that at this point should be left alone by male writers.

I truly hope that as this trilogy continues, Stephen Graham Jones improves on his characters and shortcomings to make an even stronger sequel. Hopefully there will be answers to the unsolved mysteries in this too, otherwise I will be quite disappointed.

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maregred's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark informative mysterious slow-paced

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

2.5

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demon_catheter's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

Really fun read, a bit confusing at times but not in a bad way. Keeps you asking questions right along with Jade and really sucks you in. Also loved how fleshed out the setting was, I’ve never been to a town at a high elevation in Idaho but My Heart is a Chainsaw makes me feel like I have.

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saintyeehaw's review

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dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

2.5

I loved the premise of this book going in but found the writing style difficult to enjoy--just not my cup of tea. It was also hard to feel any positive feelings while reading because everything just seems to go so unfairly wrong for Jade. This kept me from getting overly invested because it was just too painful to read about her continued misfortune at the hands of willful misunderstandings.

I also really did not appreciate Mr. Holmes being framed so endearingly--this is a man who withheld graduation from a student for missing homework due to her SUICIDE ATTEMPT.

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