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3.62 AVERAGE
3.62 AVERAGE
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
slow-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
slow-paced
the writing and plot are not like anything i have ever read, its just so dark but also not nihilistic. jade is such an interesting character and you really are like damn she crazy but also rooting for her. so many people died but i guess it makes sense with the whole slasher thing. i also was gagged by the supernatural element but i liked how it all tied together in the end with stacey graves. i absolutely LOVED the ending with the bear
medium-paced
challenging
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence, Blood
Minor: Child abuse, Child death, Sexual assault
i’ve said it before and i’ll say it again, i really hate reading book series i’m a one and done type of girl. this book tricked me, didn’t know it was going to be part of a series until i started it.
that being said, i will definitely read the second one when it comes out. i do really love this author and this was great, but i still love the only good indians more.
that being said, i will definitely read the second one when it comes out. i do really love this author and this was great, but i still love the only good indians more.
adventurous
challenging
dark
mysterious
sad
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Well, that was certainly a unique reading experience.
Let's start with the writing style. It's so...dense. Dense in a way I'd expect from lit fic, not a slasher pastiche. The writing is slow-paced, it's characterful, and there's no "telling" here. Everything is shown, which is in many ways the writing ideal, adding to the literary feel. Objectively this is a good thing, but it's a bit of a headache too, trying to parse what's actually happening in any given scene, always having to read between the lines.
For me, sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't. The writing alone will scare many readers off, especially anyone expecting a fast-paced, easy read, which is usually what I expect when I pick up a horror - not because horror can't be literary, far from it, but because that style suits the genre well. (And quick and easy doesn't equate to "not literary" either, for that matter - Of Mice and Men is a quick and easy read, stylistically, but it is literary). I think the problem for me is that sometimes the story got lost in the relentless prose.
What I won't complain about is the slasher references. Don't get me wrong - they didn't help with the denseness of the text, especially since I reckon even a hardcore slasher fan wouldn't get all the references (and I am not that) - but they add so much character to the story and to Jade, our protagonist.
Jade is, unapologetically, a weird girl. She has a huge amount of trauma, but as she says herself, she was always going to be a horror fan, always going to be bit odd, regardless of that. Jade isn't some quirky Disney princess type - she's that kid that even the weird kids find weird, who doesn't socialise in a normal way, who dresses in a way that makes sense only to her, and who probably smells a bit bad (maybe because she's dyed her hair with whatever she can find in the house again). She's also a sweetheart, and deep down is looking for connection and protection.
Which leads me onto the mood of this book - it's really, really bleak. There is a degree of horror campiness, but the first half of the novel in particular is a heavy read. Jade has not had an easy life, is not currently living an easy life. Thankfully, she does have a few people looking out for her, but even that is kind of complicated. Her relationships with both her parents are honestly more horrifying than any of the actual horror in the book.
If you're here for that kind of horror - the slasher-y gore - the last few chapters have it in spades. It's horrible and it's great. A bit messy, too, narratively - while I could get behind the sudden change from what was almost mis-lit realism to something a lot less realistic and a lot more fun/camp (it gave me Hot Fuzz final act vibes - the switch up from folk horror/slasher to full on buddy cop movie) I wasn't so convinced by how the "reveal" was handled(by that I mean, there was a basis for a supernatural reveal, and thematically it worked, but it felt maybe a step too far from where we started. Then again, maybe there is a slasher genre precedent for this too - I guess it's kind of Jason Voorhees, from what I know from my limited slasher-knowledge?) . The final chapter is particularly interesting, very open-ended, perhaps not satisfying, but I did love the very last paragraph - it was beautiful.
How do I feel about this book, though? I found it very slow-going, even as someone who enjoys a slower-paced read. I'm also not a fan of bleak stories, I have to admit. Give me any emotion but bleak. And yes, the writing was a slog at times. But I also enjoyed a lot of what it was doing? And I did love Jade. I was rooting for her. I might even read the sequel, because the ending did leave me curious.
A weird read, ultimately. And that's weirdly fitting.
Let's start with the writing style. It's so...dense. Dense in a way I'd expect from lit fic, not a slasher pastiche. The writing is slow-paced, it's characterful, and there's no "telling" here. Everything is shown, which is in many ways the writing ideal, adding to the literary feel. Objectively this is a good thing, but it's a bit of a headache too, trying to parse what's actually happening in any given scene, always having to read between the lines.
For me, sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't. The writing alone will scare many readers off, especially anyone expecting a fast-paced, easy read, which is usually what I expect when I pick up a horror - not because horror can't be literary, far from it, but because that style suits the genre well. (And quick and easy doesn't equate to "not literary" either, for that matter - Of Mice and Men is a quick and easy read, stylistically, but it is literary). I think the problem for me is that sometimes the story got lost in the relentless prose.
What I won't complain about is the slasher references. Don't get me wrong - they didn't help with the denseness of the text, especially since I reckon even a hardcore slasher fan wouldn't get all the references (and I am not that) - but they add so much character to the story and to Jade, our protagonist.
Jade is, unapologetically, a weird girl. She has a huge amount of trauma, but as she says herself, she was always going to be a horror fan, always going to be bit odd, regardless of that. Jade isn't some quirky Disney princess type - she's that kid that even the weird kids find weird, who doesn't socialise in a normal way, who dresses in a way that makes sense only to her, and who probably smells a bit bad (maybe because she's dyed her hair with whatever she can find in the house again). She's also a sweetheart, and deep down is looking for connection and protection.
Which leads me onto the mood of this book - it's really, really bleak. There is a degree of horror campiness, but the first half of the novel in particular is a heavy read. Jade has not had an easy life, is not currently living an easy life. Thankfully, she does have a few people looking out for her, but even that is kind of complicated. Her relationships with both her parents are honestly more horrifying than any of the actual horror in the book.
If you're here for that kind of horror - the slasher-y gore - the last few chapters have it in spades. It's horrible and it's great. A bit messy, too, narratively - while I could get behind the sudden change from what was almost mis-lit realism to something a lot less realistic and a lot more fun/camp (it gave me Hot Fuzz final act vibes - the switch up from folk horror/slasher to full on buddy cop movie) I wasn't so convinced by how the "reveal" was handled
How do I feel about this book, though? I found it very slow-going, even as someone who enjoys a slower-paced read. I'm also not a fan of bleak stories, I have to admit. Give me any emotion but bleak. And yes, the writing was a slog at times. But I also enjoyed a lot of what it was doing? And I did love Jade. I was rooting for her. I might even read the sequel, because the ending did leave me curious.
A weird read, ultimately. And that's weirdly fitting.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Alcoholism, Animal death, Body horror, Child abuse, Death, Gore, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Blood, Suicide attempt, Fire/Fire injury, Abandonment, Sexual harassment
Moderate: Incest, Pedophilia, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Cultural appropriation
challenging
dark
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Animal death, Body horror, Death, Gore, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Self harm, Sexual assault, Suicide, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Suicide attempt, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail
**VAGUE SPOILERS WITHIN — YOU’VE BEEN WARNED**
This…wasn’t good. I love horror, but, I mean, c’mon… The protagonist is ridiculous, bordering on unlikeable, constantly referencing everything to slasher movies. Conversations with strangers? Slasher movies. People turning up dead? Let’s talk to the cops about slasher movies. Her internal dialog? A Friday the 13th here, a Nightmare on Elm Street there…and then plenty more — some slashers, some not. She’s literally being chased, running for her life, and she’s still thinking about slasher movies. It’s like Ready Player One levels of fan service, except that makes sense in that book’s logic because you’re in a virtual world where all those properties can be simulated. Here, Jade just comes across as a deranged teenager that we’re supposed to empathize with, and it really doesn’t work; at some point she should actually be scared and just thinking about surviving, not how “I have to be like Sidney was in Scream”.
Plus SGJ writes scenes that are never properly resolved/explained. There’s one where we see a certain character moving bodies and attempting to kill another character — doing everything to tell both us and Jade that he’s the killer — but then it turns out that person isn’t the killer; it’s not a “oh, you thought you were seeing this but in reality it was actually that” scenario: it’s a red herring that doesn’t work because as far as we know, he is actually a murderer, just not the murderer. It’s just never explained.
It also tries too hard to be clever. Part of that’s in all the references it throws out — “ooh, look how many movies I can mention” — but it’s also nudging you to suspect this person or that person before it then has Jade call out that she is also suspecting this person or that person; eventually she just ends up suspecting everyone and there’s just so many misdirects that the waters get too muddied and it just becomes frustratingly dumb. Then there’s the plot contrivances, and the decision to add in a personal trauma aspect that feels gross and out of place (I get that can be a common factor in horror movies, but here it doesn’t really work — it feels tone-deaf and clumsily implemented).
Honestly, it’s pretty poorly written. Plotting and characters aside, technically speaking it’s also a mess. There were a couple times when I had to reread sentences multiple times because the words he used didn’t quite add up to anything coherent.
Finally, it sort of doesn’t have an ending so much as it just…stops? Which might be the only thing that’ll make me want to read the sequel — to see how he possibly follows this up (and if he improves upon it). I read Mongrels and didn’t love it, but it at least felt more cohesive and competent than Chainsaw; this not only feels like a different author, it feels like a first time author. I initially started out giving this book 3 stars just cause I wanted to like it so much more, me being the horror fanatic that I am, but constant references to movies that I love don’t make up for a poorly executed story and aggravating characters. This should have been good, and it’s all the more disappointing because it’s a swing and a miss on a topic I love.
- - - - -
P.S. sorry my writing is so sloppy in this review; I had to get all this out, but I definitely don’t feel like taking the time to refine what I put down.
This…wasn’t good. I love horror, but, I mean, c’mon… The protagonist is ridiculous, bordering on unlikeable, constantly referencing everything to slasher movies. Conversations with strangers? Slasher movies. People turning up dead? Let’s talk to the cops about slasher movies. Her internal dialog? A Friday the 13th here, a Nightmare on Elm Street there…and then plenty more — some slashers, some not. She’s literally being chased, running for her life, and she’s still thinking about slasher movies. It’s like Ready Player One levels of fan service, except that makes sense in that book’s logic because you’re in a virtual world where all those properties can be simulated. Here, Jade just comes across as a deranged teenager that we’re supposed to empathize with, and it really doesn’t work; at some point she should actually be scared and just thinking about surviving, not how “I have to be like Sidney was in Scream”.
Plus SGJ writes scenes that are never properly resolved/explained. There’s one where we see a certain character moving bodies and attempting to kill another character — doing everything to tell both us and Jade that he’s the killer — but then it turns out that person isn’t the killer; it’s not a “oh, you thought you were seeing this but in reality it was actually that” scenario: it’s a red herring that doesn’t work because as far as we know, he is actually a murderer, just not the murderer. It’s just never explained.
It also tries too hard to be clever. Part of that’s in all the references it throws out — “ooh, look how many movies I can mention” — but it’s also nudging you to suspect this person or that person before it then has Jade call out that she is also suspecting this person or that person; eventually she just ends up suspecting everyone and there’s just so many misdirects that the waters get too muddied and it just becomes frustratingly dumb. Then there’s the plot contrivances, and the decision to add in a personal trauma aspect that feels gross and out of place (I get that can be a common factor in horror movies, but here it doesn’t really work — it feels tone-deaf and clumsily implemented).
Honestly, it’s pretty poorly written. Plotting and characters aside, technically speaking it’s also a mess. There were a couple times when I had to reread sentences multiple times because the words he used didn’t quite add up to anything coherent.
Finally, it sort of doesn’t have an ending so much as it just…stops? Which might be the only thing that’ll make me want to read the sequel — to see how he possibly follows this up (and if he improves upon it). I read Mongrels and didn’t love it, but it at least felt more cohesive and competent than Chainsaw; this not only feels like a different author, it feels like a first time author. I initially started out giving this book 3 stars just cause I wanted to like it so much more, me being the horror fanatic that I am, but constant references to movies that I love don’t make up for a poorly executed story and aggravating characters. This should have been good, and it’s all the more disappointing because it’s a swing and a miss on a topic I love.
- - - - -
P.S. sorry my writing is so sloppy in this review; I had to get all this out, but I definitely don’t feel like taking the time to refine what I put down.
Maybe a bit too meta for me - good writing style but I found the narrator too annoying and the constant references were a bit much for me
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes