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A review by beytwice
The House of Tongues by James Dashner
4.0
Coming from the writer of the Maze Runner, I didn't have high hopes for a horror novel: not out of any disdain for Dashner! The genres just seem so starkly different and to be frank the series wasn't entirely my cup of tea. It almost comes across then as two completely different authors and the range Dashner is capable of is firstly most impressive. While I wouldn't look twice at his dystopian works I'd be more than interested to read anything else in this vein of writing.
The House of Tongues has a Stephen King-esque eerieness while being entirely its own fiction. Exploring generational curses in a dual timeline, this never got boring or repetitive and was filled to the brim with creepy imagery that had a real impact on me as the reader. This is hard to achieve so colour me terrified! Dashner clings onto the mystery of David's family curse until the last section and I think this slow uncovering of repressed memories works really well. My only gripe was that in some ways the ending opened up more questions than it did answers and I don't get the impression that this was intentional. Other than that a seriously gritty horror that doesn't shy from gore and suspense without losing character development in the mix.
The House of Tongues has a Stephen King-esque eerieness while being entirely its own fiction. Exploring generational curses in a dual timeline, this never got boring or repetitive and was filled to the brim with creepy imagery that had a real impact on me as the reader. This is hard to achieve so colour me terrified! Dashner clings onto the mystery of David's family curse until the last section and I think this slow uncovering of repressed memories works really well. My only gripe was that in some ways the ending opened up more questions than it did answers and I don't get the impression that this was intentional. Other than that a seriously gritty horror that doesn't shy from gore and suspense without losing character development in the mix.