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Hell Followed With Us by Andrew Joseph White - blurrypetals review

originally posted nov. 15, 2024 - ★★☆☆☆

[read for my book club, Prose and Cons]

This book was not an enjoyable experience, but for once, I don't mean that entirely as an insult...but I don't mean it exactly as the most glowing praise, either.

I'm feeling firmly in the middle about this book. The concept is incredibly interesting. It reminded me at first of Angelfall by Susan Ee, which is one of my favorite series with its angelcore body horror and post-apocalyptic setting, but I think where the two differed greatly was both in execution and characters.

I simply never grew attached to any of the characters in this book, not even Benji, who we spend the most of the book with. It felt like, beyond killing the people responsible for infecting him, he doesn't have much direction as a character, and this applies to the whole novel, really. What's the goal? What's the direction?

I don't know anything about any of the other characters besides that they're here, they're queer, and neurospicy. I am not queer, I am not autistic, but I do have queer friends and autistic friends, some who are both. Their queerness and autism defines them, yes, there is so much more to them as people as well as that. I feel like all I know about any of the side characters (and even Benji, too) is that they are queer or autistic or both. I was really excited to read a book with a character who used neopronouns, but I didn't know anything else about zem by the end of the book.

We sat with Benji for several hundred pages and I don't know a damn thing about him other than that he's gay and trans. Does he like like to read? Does he enjoy music? At least Nick had a hobby, even though it wasn't the most interesting or fleshed-out hobby with his beads, but Benji didn't have any interests or really even a personality. It brought me straight back to May the Best Man Win by Z.R. Ellor where the trans main character there was just an angry trans man and basically nothing else.

That all said, since I'm not queer or autistic, this book was not written for me, and I do understand that. I do, in fact, find the trans and autistic aspects of the novel to be some of the most interesting and well-written parts of the whole thing.

I really thought the idea of turning into a diseased monster as a metaphor for growing up in the wrong body was awesome. Living without the hormones you need, with your body actively fighting against you with the wrong hormones...I think this was easily the strongest aspect of the whole novel. As much as the gore itself bothered me, it was very well-written and I think this whole aspect is why this book is so highly rated.

I thought the imagery itself was kind of weak, however. I had an extremely hard time picturing things, even when the gore was described in truly excruciating detail, I always felt like Benji was fully transformed...but he wasn't. More skin and sinew would fall off and he still would be...human enough to get laid? I don't get it! I'm so lost as to what Benji looks like at any given time and I had no clue what the Graces were supposed to look like until I saw the Italian cover on here.

Also...how in the literal hell did this get marketed as YA? Beyond the basic, predictable plot, this has gore and body horror more extreme than most horror movies I've watched, but it's still marketed toward folks under eighteen? Make that make sense.

I didn't care for the romance, either. I can't say I felt like Benji and Nick have any chemistry beyond the scene with the bead lizards, so when Benji admits to having feelings for Nick, it really hit me like a freight train, feeling like the admission came completely out of nowhere.

In the end, this book simply wasn't written for me, nor was it impactful for me regardless. I think there is a lot of good writing here and just as much poor writing. I really wish I'd enjoyed this more, but it missed the mark for me in the end. I'll still probably read The Spirit Bares Its Teeth but with my expectations better tempered this time.

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The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides - blurrypetals review

originally posted nov. 12, 2024 - ★★★☆☆

Is a pretty incredible twist ending enough to save an ultimately otherwise boring book? No, I don't think it is.

I just think this was nothing but buildup. Each time Theo spoke with someone, they were always so forthcoming and honest, it left very little actual mystery to the process. Things were just...revealed with little to no unraveling needed. No slow burn to most of it, even if the twist is a good, slow burn.

Really, I was just so bored throughout, even though the twist was genuinely great, I just didn't feel like it mattered because the journey there was so bland. How is this possibly classified as a thriller? It's almost all told after the fact, so we know how most of the novel will end up: with Alicia silent and her husband dead. Even after the twist, I didn't feel much imminent danger. No thrills or chills.

And really, who keeps such a detailed journal? Most of the novel I figured it was something she kept only before the incident, but once we find out it's something she's still actively keeping, I just couldn't buy it.

I didn't hate this book, but I think it has a lot of spoiled potential. It was a great idea, a great reveal, but the execution was simply too straightforward, too tedious. Not a fan.

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Secrets of Blackthorn Hall by Cassandra Clare - blurrypetals review

originally posted nov. 9, 2024 - ★★★★★

Um, a whole book about Julian Blackthorn and Emma Carstairs being domestic and trying to break a curse? Sign me up!

I'll admit, I've been it withdrawals almost 2 years now ever since Chain of Thorns was released in January 2023, which I'm sure is not shocking at all to people who know me. The Shadowhunter Chronicles is one of my all-time favorite series and it feels like I'm home whenever I'm reading anything from them. Seasons of Shadowhunters was made for readers like me, and I'm so glad it's here!

I held off reading this on Tumblr, though, and I'm glad I did so I could see everything in print, especially all the gorgeous illustrations by Cassandra Jean. It's also nice I didn't have to wait for each letter to release and could just read them at my own pace without having to wait to find out what happened next.

That said, this took me a bit to get through, but it was such a comfy read I kept it in my purse for anytime I needed a little treat, dragging it out as long as I could to enjoy the sweet, nostalgic vibes of it. This is easily Cassie's coziest book, just a sweet epistolary collection that filled my heart up while making me (impossibly so) much more excited for The Last King of Faerie to launch the beginning of The Wicked Powers.

I definitely enjoyed this all through a season and a half and I'm so stoked for my next Seasons book soon!

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Damned Souls and a Sangria by Annette Marie - blurrypetals review

originally posted nov. 5, 2024 - ★★★★☆

I don't know why I never read this back in 2020. Sure, the audiobook wasn't out by the time I finished Lost Talismans and a Tequila in September, but I don't know why I didn't return when this was finally released on audiobook in November. I do remember losing some momentum with the series at the time, but having read this now, I'm disappointed in myself for waiting as long as I did, because I know I would have liked this so much better if I'd read it when the series was fresh in my memory.

That being said, I still did enjoy this a lot. I missed Annette's easy, fun banter and I ate it right up the same way I used to.

While I didn't remember hardly anything that was going on at first, I did still care about what was going on, about what would happen to these characters, particularly to Ezra and, by proxy, Eterran. It was also incredibly wonderful to see Robin and Zylas again! They're my favorites and always steal the show whenever they're on the page.

This was definitely a good conclusion to the Spellbound books and I'm looking forward to moving on to starting Warped and Unveiled!

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The Guild Codex Comic Collection by Annette Marie & Ashley Zanardi - blurrypetals review

originally posted nov. 3, 2024 - ★★★★☆

I finally decided it was time for me to return to the Guild Codex series after 4 years away from it, and I figured there would be no better quick recap than this!

I think the art is pretty good. Although it is a bit stiff in some areas, I really think Zanardi captured my mental images of each character perfectly, even if her renderings weren't always so natural looking.

It was a little funny how it was just a bunch of 1- or 2-page comics, would have liked some that were a bit longer than that, but that doesn't bring the collection down that much. I'll definitely be checking out Zanardi's Webtoon series after this, see if her renderings have gotten a little more fluid.

That being said, this was a great time and definitely reminded me very well what I read of the series 4 years ago to set me up for success in finishing the final Spellbound book and finally moving on to Warped and Unveiled. I can't wait!

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The Pairing by Casey McQuiston - blurrypetals review

originally posted nov. 3, 2024 - ★★★☆☆

While I liked this book a lot more than I liked McQuiston's previous adult novel, One Last Stop (I missed that they released a YA novel, I Kissed Shara Wheeler so I'm planning to read that eventually) I can't say I was even close to loving this one as much as I loved Red, White & Royal Blue.

I think this book had some interesting themes. Having grown up in Utah, I know many people who married their high school/childhood sweethearts and find it impossible to grow with someone they have known for so long, someone who wants their partner to stay the same person they married. I found that part of this book to be the most interesting, but as much as I liked the questions it posed, I feel like McQuiston didn't nail the execution of it.

It seemed like the only growth the protagonists went through while they were apart, however, is getting better at sex. Theo does seem to be rather self-assured, and we're told from Kit's thoughts that they didn't used to be like this, but it's difficult to see growth when we don't know what a character was like prior to the events of the novel.

I did empathize with Theo, though. I have been in that, "What do I do with my life?" phase of my life a few times before, so their half of the novel had my attention very well. I also felt like the "reveal" of their gender was very sweet, and I liked that we as readers discovered they were nonbinary at the same moment Kit did, despite having just spent half a novel in their head, though I'll admit I wondered if they were not a woman after a few hints were dropped early on.

That being said, Kit's half of the book was much more of a slog for me. I think this is due in part to the fact that I did not care for the audiobook narrator, but he felt like a two dimensional sap. It reminded me of how Jane in One Last Stop had no flaws, and the more we learned about her, the more we'd find she was an annoying fairytale who didn't feel like a real character in the least. All Kit does is wax poetic about how heartbroken he is over Theo, how much he loves Theo, while Theo actually appears to have wants and aspirations beyond their desire to be with Kit.

Honestly, I think I would have liked this book more if, in the end, Theo and Kit had decided not to be together by the end of the trip as they nearly did, and then, a few years later, we see them about to take another tour together, we think it's maybe as friends, and then someone notices a ring on Theo's or Kit's (or both) hands. We don't know if they got back together, but it's okay not to know. I like the idea of a more bittersweet ending for these two, because we don't see them grow between their first breakup and the beginning of the novel, we need them to grow more. They are not ready for a committed relationship again by the end of this novel, I don't buy into that.

Anyway, there was plenty here I liked, such as Theo's struggles, the colorful writing surrounding the descriptions of food and drink, and, yes, the sex scenes, but beyond that, I found the plot itself to be pretty thin, the novel itself to be too long, and the lack of flashbacks to be to the novel's detriment.

And damn, did it make me hungry for food I could not have and that's a crime.

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Waywarden by S.A. Harian - blurrypetals review

originally posted oct. 31, 2024 - ★★★★☆

I'll be perfectly honest, this book nearly lost me, but in the end, those reveals, those cliffhangers absolutely hooked me back in to the point where Broodmother is certainly one of my more anticipated releases of the moment now. Hopefully it's here sooner rather than later!

But I did have a fairly large issue with this book's pacing. While I was still very invested in the story and what was happening, it did feel a bit like the story meandered a lot. There was so much walk here, do this, get scared by this, almost die, maybe watch someone else die, etc.

That said, while it got a bit exhausting, I still wanted to know what was going on, and I think this gave me enough to keep stringing me along without things getting too exhausting. I'm stoked to find out what happens next!

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Briardark by S.A. Harian - blurrypetals review

originally posted oct. 28, 2024 - ★★★★☆

This book is the wonderfully weird love child of Annihilation and The Blair Witch Project, two of my all-time favorite horror movies, as well as Search and Rescue Woods by Kerry Hammond, House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski (my favorite stand-alone novel), and even my most recent horror read prior to this one, We Used to Live Here by Marcus Kliewer, with a pinch of The Lake House.

Which is all to say, on a list of Things Which are Definitely My Shit, you'd find the concept of this novel. As I mentioned, I really enjoy all the things I'd compare this story to on its surface, and beyond that, I really enjoyed most of the execution of it all.

I loved the way this story unfolded, the way we discover how Siena and Holden's stories (and timelines) might or might not be interacting. I loved how we slowly came to learn how everyone on the outside of the forest might not have the research group's best interests at heart and how that affects the events of the novel.

Honestly, the reason this isn't 5 stars is because it left so many questions unanswered by the end. Luckily, unlike the aforementioned We Used to Live Here there's a sequel already out as well as a forthcoming third book, so answers and cliffhanger resolutions are much more possible here than they were there.

This was a great spooky read and I can't wait to see what happens next! Until then!

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Angelika Frankenstein Makes Her Match by Sally Thorne - blurrypetals review

originally posted oct. 24, 2024 - ★☆☆☆☆

Completely fucking excuse me? What is this book?

It's been a good while since I've bounced off something this hard and felt the need to still review it. Usually I try to get at least 25-30% of the way through a book before even putting it on my Goodreads, but because this is Sally Thorne, I had to say something rather than quietly removing it from my Want to Read and moving forward.

I can't be sure exactly how far I made it into this book, but when Angelika had absolutely zero sympathy for a man in an incredible amount of pain (whose butchered body had an erection like 100% of the time I spent with this book) and confusion, I couldn't do it anymore. I refused to invest any further time in a story where a woman picks out her future husband's penis size, grafts said member onto her ideal body, and then has no sympathy for the pain she is putting this person through.

When first getting this book, I expected it to be a story about a Frankenstein falling in love with her creation after making him, not a Frankenstein making someone to fall in love with. It's so gross, I can't even begin, and I'm not talking about the idea of banging someone who's made of disparate parts in that respect.

I quickly looked up a few reviews on here, found a few spoilers, and I know I'd have been furious if I pushed through to finish this book. Allegedly it's found out the creation (I refuse to use the name he's given by others) was once a priest in his previous life, and the book ends with him and Angelika with a K quitting science and living a quiet and pious life. What in the actual hell, y'all?

If I hadn't have known better, I would never have guessed this was written by the Sally Thorne—the same woman who wrote one of my all-time favorite books? No way she wrote The Hating Game and this. Utterly unbelievable. A truly shocking and unpleasant experience all-around.

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We Used to Live Here by Marcus Kliewer - blurrypetals review

originally posted oct. 22, 2024 - ★★★★☆

This went from terrifying to mind-bending in a similar fashion to House of Leaves by Mark. Z. Danielewski, but while this book is undeniably dense and well-written, I just don't think this will stay with me the same way as its forefather.

I really loved the first third or so of this book. I couldn't even read it for a bit this weekend because it wasn't broad daylight and my husband was asleep. The family visiting is so goddamn unsettling, Jenny's behavior with her notebook and hiding were so creepy, and don't get me started with the figures on the stairs or the knocking! Properly horrific, and quickly.

But then, the longer the family stays, the more it feels like a horror in the vein of Darren Aronofsky's film Mother! as the discomfort stems less from creatures and more from things being disorienting and socially uncomfortable. It turns away from the horror and terror of it all and becomes much more of a thriller where we try to sort out what the hell is going on and how Eve is going to save herself and her family.

This book really lost me with its final act, though. I wasn't scared anymore and I definitely felt my interest dwelling a bit. There were definitely still things I was interested in, but it was a significant drop-off from where we'd started. I left this book feeling pretty unsatisfied with how it ended, too, though the work’s quality shone through at every turn regardless..

I did a little reading on Reddit to make sure I hadn't missed anything and found there's a whole separate ARG active at the moment which may grant further clarity and depth to this work, but, while I appreciate the thought and detail that must have gone into this, I have a hard time with books (or any other media) that need another work in order to be truly understood. I love that House of Leaves has something similar going on, but that everything you might need from it is all in the text, not on some auxiliary Instagram account you got a message about from an email address you found on a Reddit. That's too much work, too exhausting for me. I'll just be waiting for the 2-hour YouTube video NightMind will inevitably make about it someday.

This book is blurbed as Parasite meets Get Out. While I don't find these comparisons unfit, I do think this is an unholy child of the aforementioned House of Leaves and Mother! with a dash of Stephen Chbosky's Imaginary Friend, raised on religious and socially anxious theming. I can't decide if I'd actually recommend it to anyone, but it does have undeniably good craft behind it, so what I will say is I'll definitely be keeping my eye out for Kliewer's next work and any information that comes from the ARG. Until then, I'm glad to have more time to keep stewing on it.

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The Housemaid by Freida McFadden - blurrypetals review

originally posted oct. 18, 2024 - ★★★☆☆

I finally read the thriller that has the whole internet in a chokehold...and it was just okay.

Honestly, this is quite well-written at a base level, with interesting characters and an intriguing setup, but the plot itself was unfortunately incredibly predictable, and to a point where I started spinning other theories beyond my first (correct) theory that felt more interesting than what was actually going on.

This wasn't a bad time, and I wouldn't be opposed to reading more of McFadden's work in the future, but I'm definitely disappointed this was a mashup of Verity by Colleen Hoover and The Wife Upstairs by Rachel Hawkins. Therefore, the rating going to have to split the difference between the two of those books, too.

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Betwixt by Darynda Jones - blurrypetals review

originally posted oct. 16, 2024 - ★☆☆☆☆

[read for my book club, Prose and Cons]

All told, I wouldn't have finished this if I hadn't been reading it for book club. After all, I've already DNF'd one of Jones's other novels, First Grave on the Right back in 2021, and I apparently bounced off it so hard I forgot to even review it.

I've been trying a lot harder to give things a chance than I once did, but I knew almost instantly this one simply wasn't for me.

While I appreciated that I was reading a paranormal book where the main character was in her 40's and had been through a divorce, I quickly found that even though those things should have made her more mature and interesting than the 17 to 24-year-olds we usually have, Defiance thinks and talks just like the rest of them.

I also think the way relationships work in this book are pretty immature and wooden. Defiance finds out her grandmother is the one who left the house to her when she died, but the grandmother is also a ghost Defiance can speak to, and the two of them connect instantly, like they've been in each other's lives forever. There is no friction between them like there should or would be between a grandmother and her granddaughter who she gave up for adoption.

Branching off of that, I didn't buy into any romance between Defiance and Roan. Defiance has this thought at some point that's along the lines of, "I'm too old to believe in insta-love," but like, ma'am, you do, you're instantly in love with this man and there's nothing you can say or do to prove otherwise.

She's also like, wicked dumb and it made the entire experience very frustrating. The instant they saw a red haired wolf, I knew it was Roan, but this 40-year-old woman can't even begin to think that A, might have been a werewolf, and B, that werewolf might be the dude she's boinking. Acts like a teenager, has the intellect of a teenager.

Anyway, this was a pretty rough time. The humor never landed and just reminded me of the "LOL so rAnDoM" kids I knew in high school. The fact that multiple chapters began with quotes off of t-shirts reminded me of all the bad fanfiction I read back in the day, too. The romance was cliché, relationships with family were frictionless and weird, and the magic and worldbuilding were unimaginative and stale. No thanks.

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Bride by Ali Hazelwood

originally posted oct. 14, 2024 - ★☆☆☆☆

Oof. Or, should I say, woof.

I really have to stop taking book recommendations from Facebook and Instagram Reels (sorry, not a TikTok user). I've never read any of Ali Hazelwood's work. Something about the covers just set off alarm bells for me, like a poisonous plant flagging its toxic nature to those who see it, so I steered clear. This book, however, seemed not only directly up my alley, but had a cool cover that seemed to say: hey, this book is different from her other work.

How wrong I was.

This book and I immediately started off on the wrong foot when it was revealed the book is, for a reason I cannot comprehend, set in the modern day. Nothing about the synopsis indicates this and the worldbuilding is so god-awful, it doesn't matter one single bit that it's set in the modern day at all, beyond talking about phones and internet.

It's not that having a vampire (ahem, sorry, vampyre) and werewolf romance set in the modern day is inherently bad, it just does not fit the plot at all and it isn't used to the story's advantage either, so it just feels awkward and out of place. Why do these werewolves have spyware? Spywerewolves. Stupid.

Also, this is, uh...allegedly supposed to be enemies to lovers? Where are the enemies? They just seem like slow-burn friends, for fuck's sake. Lowe also has like, no personality and while Misery has a personality, it's poorly-written and overdone. The sex was also extremely lame, and everything about his knot (which I wasn't prepared for one single bit) made me laugh so hard, so uncomfortably. Holy shit, y'all, this book was so fucking weird and stupid.

The side-characters are all absolutely wildly undercooked, too. Ana is quite literally every precocious child character I've ever read about, especially the badly-written ones. I also really don't understand how Misery so cartoonishly hates children (to the point where she can't tell the difference between a 3-year-old and a 13-year old? Excuse me?) except for this one kid because she's so special.

And speaking of children, the worldbuilding was so wild, it felt like a toddler who just learned what werewolves and vampires were trying to tell me what they were like: So, uh, the werewolves and vampires don't like each other, and the vampires are spelled with a Y instead of an I, and the werewolves have green blood, and the vampires like the sun but it can still hurt them and—

I couldn't stand this book. I don't understand why it's popular, but that's been the same song and dance for me all year, it seems. The characters were flat, boring, and had zero chemistry, even when they were fucking, the worldbuilding is absolutely laughable, some of the funniest shit I've read all year, and the writing is awful. It's incredible how bad this all is.

Thanks, but no thanks, Ali Hazelwood. I should have known this would be a poisonous plant, too, and stayed far away.

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Uzumaki by Junji Ito - blurrypetals review

originally posted oct. 11, 2024 - ★★★★☆

I'll be honest, I'm not 100% sure where to start this review, so telling you that much should be enough of a starting point or introduction to begin.

While I've read a handful of Ito's one-shots, this was my first foray into any of his series. I'd forgotten it was about to be adapted into animation soon when I began, so figured it was lucky timing that I finally started it just ahead of the anime's release (though, I've heard the anime might not be worth my time, as the second episode was just released as I write this and people, uh, did not like it).

Enough about the anecdotes, though, I think my biggest issue with this purely comes down to pacing. I think the first 9 chapters were basically perfect, which is a big reason why this review is no lower than 4 stars. I didn't care for chapters 10 or 11 because, as an insectophobe and female anatomy-haver, they just crossed a personal line for me. That said, those two chapters were otherwise good chapters.

After this, the story has a turning point wherein storms, whirlwinds, and the destruction they wreak are the main focus for several chapters. The pacing slows way down for chapters 12 through 17. They meander for a good while and there seems to be less horror throughout these chapters as well. It's certainly still present, but less so.

However, I do think the ending and the last couple of chapters leading up to it are pretty great and definitely leave things finishing strong. My biggest issue is, as I mentioned, the pacing in the latter half. I think if those 6 chapters were condensed or even some of them removed. I nearly ran out of my free trial on Viz's website because these chapters killed my momentum that badly.

Anyway, I'd like to read more of Ito's work in the future, though I'll probably read more one-shots first before dipping into Tomie or Gyo.

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Doctor Sleep by Stephen King - blurrypetals review

originally posted oct. 10, 2024 - ★★★★☆

Mike Flanagan is the reason I love the film adaptation of The Shining.

Don't get me wrong, I liked and appreciated The Shining before seeing the adaptation of Doctor Sleep in 2019, but the film of the sequel was so fantastic at being a good adaptation while also being a good sequel to both The Shining film and The Shining book its own film's ending differed from.

And now, having read Doctor Sleep 5 years after I saw its film adaptation, I can only appreciate the film more, this time from an adaptational standpoint. I think this book is pretty great, thus the 4-star rating, but its movie adaptation is so good, it made the book pale a bit in comparison.

That being said, this was still an incredibly good read. I can absolutely see why King's writing is as popular as it is: it draws the reader in absolutely, enveloping you in the world he's woven together. Child characters like Abra and young Danny at first might seem a bit too precocious before you remember they've been hearing and seeing adults' thoughts since they were tiny and you realize they're incredibly well-written for what they are.

I also was a pretty surprised and intrigued by some of the omissions the movie made, such as Billy's abilities (a-Billy-ties?), the location of the True Knot's campsite, and Lucy's parentage. I do wish King would have done a little more with the latter, as it was a reveal that genuinely made me gasp.

All in all, this was a pretty great book but just not as great as its predecessor or the movie based on it. At the end of the day, Mike Flanagan's ability to hone in on the themes of fatherhood, loss, and alcoholism in not only Doctor Sleep but many of his other works just barely outdid King in this particular situation. That said, it was incredibly fun to see Flanagan's inspiration firsthand, not only in this but in The Shining as well. Flanagan's writing style is very clearly influenced by King's and it was so fucking cool to see where one of my favorite filmmakers working today came from, in a way.

It was also a treat to finally read some Stephen King novels! I've read some of his short fiction over the years, but never any of his novels until now! His writing style is incredibly unique and gripping and I'm very interested to read more someday.

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The Shining by Stephen King - blurrypetals review

originally posted oct. 7, 2024 - ★★★★★

[buddy read with my husband, Jaden]

The film, The Shining, is my favorite horror movie. As a cinephile, how could I not just adore everything about it? The sound design, the acting, editing, shot composition, editing...I could go on (and have gone on) for hours about it.

For years, I've read about all the differences between book and film, how King famously despises the film adaptation, how King tried making his own adaptation in 1997 but it was not capable of making it a fraction as frightening as its filmic forebear. Because of this, I was convinced the ultimately more faithful miniseries being a little stale compared to the film would mean the original book would also be a little stale.

Oh, how glad I am to be wrong in cases like these.

First, I can see why King hated the original adaptation. The film is about a man who is already kind of unhinged giving in to his violent disposition at the suggestion of the evil within the hotel. There is little to no indication he loves his family very much to begin with, so his desire to hurt them does not come as much of a surprise. The horror comes from the ghosts, the hotel, the evil the place oozes.

By contrast, most of the horror found in this book comes from the terror of Jack Torrance—family man whose alcoholism more than once got the best of him, but who is trying his best, loves Danny and Wendy deeply—suddenly and without reason, wanting to kill his wife and child. While there are certainly some frights from the ghosts abound, this is the prevailing fear that follows you long after you close the book.

I'm so glad I finally got to read this and I'm very excited to dig into Doctor Sleep and continue discussing this book with my husband as he makes his way through it. What a great novel, and incredibly fucking great for King's third effort of many.

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The Final Girl Support Group by Grady Hendrix - blurrypetals review

originally posted oct. 2, 2024 - ★★☆☆☆

I've been looking forward to reading this ever since seeing Laura Crone's video on thriller novels and Riley Sager last year and I've gotta admit, I'm a little disappointed.

I think, as a genre, I don't find most slashers to be overtly horrific, but I do love a good murder mystery. It's one of the reasons I always liked the reveal in Scream so much, I never expected there to be two killers, which made it so much harder for me to guess who was behind it all. I love a mystery I can't guess myself but one that's possible to solve if you're paying attention. It's a delicate tightrope to walk, but if I guess who one or both of your killers is the moment they're introduced, I'm sorry, but you're doing it wrong.

See where I'm going here?

Yeah, I immediately pinned Sky as the killer. It was so obvious, considering the amount of description and time his character got where nobody else's really did. I absolutely never believed it was Carol or Chrissy as they read very much like the major red herrings they were. It was also really frustrating that Lynette didn't consider Sky as a possible perpetrator, particularly after all the mentions that he's good with computers and had access to his mother's files.

This book was also way slower than I was hoping and expecting, and while I appreciated some things, like Lynette's inner voice (especially her conversations with her house plant, Fine) and liked how each final girl was based on some real-life horror film, the whole book was an absolutely joyless slog to get through.

I was listening at 2x speed toward the end just to get it over with. And hey, even with all that extra time and poor pacing, they only had one group meeting!