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3.81 AVERAGE
3.81 AVERAGE
challenging
dark
emotional
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Great horror, will never read it again so help me God.
Did NOT expect the biggest horror on this book to be Shelley
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Child death, Death, Self harm, Violence, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail, Pandemic/Epidemic
Moderate: Bullying, Vomit
Minor: Cursing
Gory, a bit shocking and very disturbing!
As a reader, if you’ve heard of The Troop, you’ll have an idea this book is not for the faint of heart or squeamish.
In fact, if you’ve been meaning to lose a few pounds and can’t seem to quit eating, go ahead and pick up this twister of a book. You might have some success finally losing those last 10 pounds!
As a reader, if you’ve heard of The Troop, you’ll have an idea this book is not for the faint of heart or squeamish.
In fact, if you’ve been meaning to lose a few pounds and can’t seem to quit eating, go ahead and pick up this twister of a book. You might have some success finally losing those last 10 pounds!
challenging
dark
emotional
sad
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
This book was disgusting. It made my skin crawl-- at points I had to just skim over full sections to avoid reading something that would nestle itself into the crevices of my brain and come back to me at night. I read this quickly so I could get it over with, and having read Nick Cutters "The Deep" I knew it would not end easily. The quicker I got through with it, the quicker it would end.
This book was also about radicalization.
Said to be a darker version of "Lord of the Flies", the Troop follows 5 boys and their scoutmaster as their weekend scouting trip is turned upside down by an appearance of very sick, emaciated, and hungry man among them on the island they isolated themselves on. While his interactions with the kids is very little, his presence is a catalyst for insidious and downright awful events that are to come. One by one, the Scoutmaster and the Scouts are pulled into this horrific spiral of rot and horror, until no one knows what, or who, to trust.
Each of the characters in this book are well fleshed out, real in this actions and thought processes, and very clearly independent of each other; this is what makes the story so compelling, and so difficult to read at times. As the parasite rocks through the island and it's temporary inhabitants, each individual deals with it differently; similarly, the parasite deals with each infected individual differently.
Beyond the dichotomy of devourer and conqueror, there is a sliding scale of how aggressive the parasite works in their bodies-- this is the same of how people become radicalised. Where it is mild in some due to the efforts of the host to purge and restrict it's control -- with Newts attempting to physically purge himself by eating laxatives that work as an emetic-- the other end of the spectrum is completely consumptive; Shelley becomes nothing more than a vehicle for the parasitic worms that -- as detailed in the paper describing the different types of hydratids-- mutate his body beyond recognition and he feels all the more powerful for it, happy for this mutation and change in himself. Kent begins confident but becomes scared and small, emaciated and weak. Tim, the scoutmaster, has the horrors of further mutation stripped from him after he's locked away in a cupboard and then killed by an errant tree uprooted by a cyclone that hits the day of their planned return. Though never infected, Ephraim dies convinced that he is filled with a parasite, driven to self mutilating insanity by Shelley who eggs him on over the walkie-talkie and then in person, adding to the physical mutilation he had done to himself. Ephraim believes he is infected and Shelley sees that fear in him; he feeds into it until it is real for Ephraim and he cannot escape the reality of this horror unless he is dead.
Shelley's final form as an eldritch arachnid-like parasite host is almost a reflection back onto him as a character, how he's described through out the book as "something" rather than "someone" in a passing thought of one of the characters -- for all of his neutral behaviour, he is not a boy that the other boys know much about, and a boy they want to get to know more about either. So when his behaviour ramps up, and he drops the mask he's been putting on to conceal his twisted internal monologue, no one really notices-- not only because there are bigger fish to fry, but because no one wants to actually notice that Shelley has changed. It is bad enough that they have to be stranded on an island with a parasite running rampant in their Scoutmaster and now one of their fellow scouts, to acknowledge that the creepy and threateningly calm boy among them seems excited about the ongoings would tip it all into hysterics.
Max and Newt spend a day trying to find food and shelter, trying to find a way off the island, trying to find any semblance of hope in what becomes Hell for them, and they are, in contrast to Ephraim who cuts himself to pieces, calm and collected. Their reduced proximity to the cause of infection -- like reduced proximity to sources of radicalisation ala internet forums and group chats with false information -- allows for them to act rationally, if restricted by their lack of autonomy and general knowledge of the world. They are children, boy scouts-- their boy scout training provides them the basis for things like recognising edible foods and identifying animal tracks and even making sure they do not die of hypothermia. But they are still children. Newt has a moment where he realises as a child he can just leave-- he doesn't have to be responsible for whats happening because children don't have to be. But then he steps back from that; even if he doesn't have to be usually, he does because he is all there is now that can fix it. Sometimes you have to do things that you don't want to, and you shouldn't have to. But you do them.
The end is bitter and painful, because even when Max does survive-- and is the lone survivor of this horrific experience, he finds himself returning to the island. He returns to that traumatic space-- both physical and mental-- because no one can help him. No one knows what to do, not a therapist, not his parents, not the community he returns to. What happened to him and his friends cannot be undone so simply -- radical ideology hooks it's claws into you like fishhooks and pulling them out in a rush merely leaves open wounds . Max will never be well again because what he's sick with, no one knows how to fix-- because people, max included, do not know what he is sick with. Obsession? Perhaps. Anger? Probably. Fear? Certainly. But once a door is opened it is hard to keep closed, and even when it's locked, its harder still to ignore the doors presence in the corner of your eye.
This book was also about radicalization.
Said to be a darker version of "Lord of the Flies", the Troop follows 5 boys and their scoutmaster as their weekend scouting trip is turned upside down by an appearance of very sick, emaciated, and hungry man among them on the island they isolated themselves on. While his interactions with the kids is very little, his presence is a catalyst for insidious and downright awful events that are to come. One by one, the Scoutmaster and the Scouts are pulled into this horrific spiral of rot and horror, until no one knows what, or who, to trust.
Each of the characters in this book are well fleshed out, real in this actions and thought processes, and very clearly independent of each other; this is what makes the story so compelling, and so difficult to read at times. As the parasite rocks through the island and it's temporary inhabitants, each individual deals with it differently; similarly, the parasite deals with each infected individual differently.
Beyond the dichotomy of devourer and conqueror, there is a sliding scale of how aggressive the parasite works in their bodies-- this is the same of how people become radicalised. Where it is mild in some due to the efforts of the host to purge and restrict it's control -- with Newts attempting to physically purge himself by eating laxatives that work as an emetic-- the other end of the spectrum is completely consumptive; Shelley becomes nothing more than a vehicle for the parasitic worms that -- as detailed in the paper describing the different types of hydratids-- mutate his body beyond recognition and he feels all the more powerful for it, happy for this mutation and change in himself. Kent begins confident but becomes scared and small, emaciated and weak. Tim, the scoutmaster, has the horrors of further mutation stripped from him after he's locked away in a cupboard and then killed by an errant tree uprooted by a cyclone that hits the day of their planned return. Though never infected, Ephraim dies convinced that he is filled with a parasite, driven to self mutilating insanity by Shelley who eggs him on over the walkie-talkie and then in person, adding to the physical mutilation he had done to himself. Ephraim believes he is infected and Shelley sees that fear in him; he feeds into it until it is real for Ephraim and he cannot escape the reality of this horror unless he is dead.
Shelley's final form as an eldritch arachnid-like parasite host is almost a reflection back onto him as a character, how he's described through out the book as "something" rather than "someone" in a passing thought of one of the characters -- for all of his neutral behaviour, he is not a boy that the other boys know much about, and a boy they want to get to know more about either. So when his behaviour ramps up, and he drops the mask he's been putting on to conceal his twisted internal monologue, no one really notices-- not only because there are bigger fish to fry, but because no one wants to actually notice that Shelley has changed. It is bad enough that they have to be stranded on an island with a parasite running rampant in their Scoutmaster and now one of their fellow scouts, to acknowledge that the creepy and threateningly calm boy among them seems excited about the ongoings would tip it all into hysterics.
Max and Newt spend a day trying to find food and shelter, trying to find a way off the island, trying to find any semblance of hope in what becomes Hell for them, and they are, in contrast to Ephraim who cuts himself to pieces, calm and collected. Their reduced proximity to the cause of infection -- like reduced proximity to sources of radicalisation ala internet forums and group chats with false information -- allows for them to act rationally, if restricted by their lack of autonomy and general knowledge of the world. They are children, boy scouts-- their boy scout training provides them the basis for things like recognising edible foods and identifying animal tracks and even making sure they do not die of hypothermia. But they are still children. Newt has a moment where he realises as a child he can just leave-- he doesn't have to be responsible for whats happening because children don't have to be. But then he steps back from that; even if he doesn't have to be usually, he does because he is all there is now that can fix it. Sometimes you have to do things that you don't want to, and you shouldn't have to. But you do them.
The end is bitter and painful, because even when Max does survive-- and is the lone survivor of this horrific experience, he finds himself returning to the island. He returns to that traumatic space-- both physical and mental-- because no one can help him. No one knows what to do, not a therapist, not his parents, not the community he returns to. What happened to him and his friends cannot be undone so simply -- radical ideology hooks it's claws into you like fishhooks and pulling them out in a rush merely leaves open wounds . Max will never be well again because what he's sick with, no one knows how to fix-- because people, max included, do not know what he is sick with. Obsession? Perhaps. Anger? Probably. Fear? Certainly. But once a door is opened it is hard to keep closed, and even when it's locked, its harder still to ignore the doors presence in the corner of your eye.
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
sad
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
challenging
dark
sad
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
My first Nick Cutter novel, definitely not my last. Extremely brutal body horror that manages to homage Lord of the Flies in some unexpected ways--bleak as hell, but with enough sympathy for all the characters involved to keep it from being outright nihilistic. There is some animal cruelty to watch out for; I don't typically get bothered by it (especially not in print), but at least one scene made me intensely uncomfortable. Good, nasty stuff.
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
N/A
Diverse cast of characters:
N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
have not been able to stop thinking about the second half of this book since i finished
Was very much a sausage fest. Interesting concept, cool framing, and I appreciate the narrator's comfort with killing off pretty much everyone in gruesome ways. That said, Newt deserved better. And even though I know this is a story that focuses on a boy scout troop, I really felt the lack of femme characters here. Don't know--it's been a while since I read something by a new-to-me white dude.
Great horror story! Truly! However, I rated it 3 instead of 4 because… well… do you ever run across a word when you’re reading that stands out to you and then you keep seeing it so many times it loses all meaning? Mewling.