Reviews with content warning for Fire/Fire injury - My Heart Is a Chainsaw

Honestly kind of overhyped in my opinion. I wish we had more slasher and less whatever 90% of this book was. I don’t recommend for people who get bored easily and like quick reads.

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foldingthepage_kayleigh's review against another edition

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challenging dark tense medium-paced

4.75

This is the 4th book I’ve read by Stephen Graham Jones (SGJ) and I think it’s my favourite so far.

While it was full of slasher references to movies I hadn’t seen, it didn’t make me feel lost for not having seen them, if anything it was a crash course in the genre. As someone who doesn’t watch horror movies, SGJ made me want to delve into the lore, and convinced me to watch Halloween!

Jade is my hero and I loved hearing her soliloquies on horror as she tried to piece together what was going on in Proofrock. There were so many red herrings that I couldn’t possibly guess what was going on, and was very surprised with how it ended on a cliffhanger. Luckily, the next book is coming out in a few months so I don’t have to wait that long.

Overall, this book was scary, slasher-y, colloquially academic, with an exploration of systemic racism and trauma that I keep ruminating on. Loved it and I can’t wait for more to come in this trilogy!

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janeanger's review

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adventurous dark funny mysterious sad 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? No

5.0

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aformeracceleratedreader's review

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challenging dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.5

CHECK CONTENT/TRIGGER WARNINGS
I sorta loved this. I will def be checking out more from this author.
I know some people didnt like Jade info-dumping about slashers (quite a few people said it was annoying or unnecessary), but as someone who is neurodivergent, I thought it was kind of nice to read, and I didn't think it detracted from the story or flow.
There was a scene towards the end at the big town party that made me a little teary eyed and quite a few scenes throughout the book that really sucked me in where I didn't want to stop reading but I had to.
Final girls are no joke and Letha plus

Jade and to an extent Shooting Glasses whom I'm actually not sure if he survived or not but I'm counting him anyways

were great finals girls who would not go down without some sort of fight.
I have mixed feelings on who the "slasher" was though, and that's why I don't think I could say this was a perfect book.

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readundancies's review

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dark funny 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? No

5.0

Uhm, fuck me, cuz this was QUALITY.

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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cinderrunner's review

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad 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

2.5

PLEASE CHECK TRIGGER WARNINGS FOR THIS BOOK

This book is just okay. Its very slow moving and long winded. The action doesn't pick up til about 50 pages from the end. The suspense to get there and the buildup felt very weak. I do think its important to note that (according to a google search) the author is native american. The book features a lot of negative stereotypes that would feel very racist coming from an author who was not indigenous. I find this grown man's way of handling writing a story about underage girls to be uncomfortable. When we get introduced to our "final girl" he uses weirdly sexual language when describing her (who again, is only a HS student). There is also a very weird gay baity vibe with Letha and Jade that I don't appreciate. Jade's tragic backstory felt like it came out of left field and felt entirely unnecessary, especially comint from a grown man writing about an underage girl. The SAME effect, that one could try to use to justify why it was valid to have Jade have been through that, could have been achieved by with different less vile means. I think its an authors responsibility when writing about marginalized groups they don't belong to to check themselves on if this story is really theirs to tell and if using these plot points is just exploitative instead of genuinely adding to the story or shedding light on what that group (in this case women and young girls) go through. 100% Jade did not need to be

sexually abused by her father when she was fucking 11. Taking it from general child abuse to the level of rape in a society where females are so disproportionatelyimpacted by rape culture isnt warranted by anything in this plot.

The book does have good bones. It offers interesting themes around stuff like self victimization, accountability, how society will vilify and refuse to help people who function on the outskirts of it, and so on. I like what the author was trying to do and succeeded in doing to a degree. I get what having a heart that is like a chainsaw means and i find it rather poetic. A lot of this book could have been rather poetic and beautifu. But the execution just went flat bordering into being offensive.

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