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A review by traceynorman
Heart-Shaped Box by Joe Hill
3.0
I saw someone online mention that they were reading this book and it was so creepy that they could only read for a few minutes at a time, so I immediately picked up the Kindle edition. One person's "Meh" is another's "Oh my GODDDD..." so I had an open mind as to whether or not I would find it a chilling read.
I was quite willing to go along with the concept of an ageing, jaded rocker with more money than sense "buying a ghost". It fitted with the character, what little motivation in life he had left and his need to maintain his "image". As I read, however, I found that the concept of buying a ghost was one of the more realistic parts of the book. I'm not a hardened horror fan and hadn't read much in the genre for the last few years, but I didn't find it particularly creepy. There were some events which threatened to pull me out of the story, because of the unrealistic (or absent) reactions of some of the incidental characters to the outlandish happenings. There were a few cliches and I never truly warmed to either Jude or Georgia/Marybeth, even though I tried and really wanted to be rooting for them. If something pulls me out of the story from within, that's usually a bad sign.
I wanted to find this book creepy and unnerving, but sadly, it didn't really do it for me.
I was quite willing to go along with the concept of an ageing, jaded rocker with more money than sense "buying a ghost". It fitted with the character, what little motivation in life he had left and his need to maintain his "image". As I read, however, I found that the concept of buying a ghost was one of the more realistic parts of the book. I'm not a hardened horror fan and hadn't read much in the genre for the last few years, but I didn't find it particularly creepy. There were some events which threatened to pull me out of the story, because of the unrealistic (or absent) reactions of some of the incidental characters to the outlandish happenings. There were a few cliches and I never truly warmed to either Jude or Georgia/Marybeth, even though I tried and really wanted to be rooting for them. If something pulls me out of the story from within, that's usually a bad sign.
I wanted to find this book creepy and unnerving, but sadly, it didn't really do it for me.