#my heart is a chainsaw by stephen graham jones

[nerdynatreads]

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book review || My Heart is a Chainsaw by Stephen Graham Jones

ooookay, we’ve got another odd one here. So, based off the summary, I thought this was going to be a mostly character-focused story, but at the start, I wasn’t so sure. The beginning is shocking and bleak, that’s for sure, but I was so confused as to the significance of the events taking place.

We spend a lot, a lot, of time in Jade’s head, her breaking down the parts of her town that make it the perfect setting for a horror movie— oh, sorry, a slasher. At nearly the halfway point, I finally started to see what the importance of this obsession means. Jade is quirky and odd, but her obsessions and constantly changing appearance hide the real depth I’d only just started to see. However, after this revelation, we’re thrown back into, what Jade believes to be, a developing slasher movie and I was kind of lost all over again. Jade seemed like the only character that had a lot of depth.

The writing style fits perfectly with the mind of a slasher-obsessed teenage girl, but it’s also difficult to follow at times. I listened to the first 10% and realized I had no idea what was happening and restarted the audiobook at a slower speed to acclimate myself. There are so many pop culture references, obviously, many coming from classic 80s slasher movies, but other horror stories and genres as well. Jade loses herself in her mind, and goes off on tangents about different characters and their roles in the slasher that’s developing. It reminds me a lot of the writing style utilized in Night of the Mannequins, which works well for the story, but takes some getting used to. The similarities grew as we hit the climax, because I was so lost in Jade’s mind, trying to figure out what was real and what could be an overactive mind, but then the gore really starts up.

As far as horror goes, this starts with a creepy prologue, but once we enter Jade’s perspective, it seems like most of the horror is simply in her mind. There are plenty of gory references, gross imaging, and historic horror stories in the small town, which I do think makes for an unsettling atmosphere. The final climax definitely delivered on that horror though, but in regards to some of the twists, I did see them coming.

There are also these excerpts of Jade’s papers she’s written for her History teacher, revealing the horrific background of the town and the different factors that make up a slasher movie. On one hand, they’re funky for pacing, but given the confusion I had at the beginning of the book, they also give some explanation as to where the story could be going.

I think the final moments of this book really brought things full circle and reminded me of the gut punches that are delivered in the form of Jade’s background. I’m impressed at how SGJ tied all of these heavy topics into her story, but this was also crazy slow for me and I sometimes had a hard time following the story.

3.5 / 5 stars

[phaedraismyusername]

This year some of my favourite books I read were written by indigenous American authors and I just wanted to shout out a couple that I fell in love with

The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones

Horror being my second most read genre, I did not think books could still get under my skin the way this one did lol. It follows four Blackfoot men who are seemingly being hunted by a vengeful... something... years after a fateful hunting trip that happened just before they went their separate ways. The horror, the dread, the something... pure nightmare fuel 10/10

Moon of the Crusted Snow by Waubgeshig Rice

An apocalyptic novel following an isolated Anishinaabe community in the far north who lose contact with the outside world. When two of their young men return from their college with dire news, they set about planning on how to survive the winter, but when outsiders follow, lines are drawn in the community that might doom them all. This book is all dread all the time, the use of dreams and the inevitability of conflict weighs heavy til the very end. An excellent apocalypse story if you're into that kind of thing.

My Heart is a Chainsaw by Stephen Graham Jones

This book follows Jade, a deeply troubled mixed race teenager with a shitty homelife who's *obsessed* with slasher movies. When she finds evidence that there's a killer running about her soon-to-be gentrified small town, she weaponises that knowledge to predict what's going to happen next. I don't think this book will work for most people, it's a little stream of consciousness, Jade's head is frequently a very difficult place to be in, but by the last page I had so much love for her as a character and the emotional rollercoaster she's on that I had to mention it here.

Elatsoe by Darcie Little Badger

Taking a bit of a left turn but this charming YA murder mystery really stuck with me this year. Elatsoe is a teenage girl living in an America where myths, monsters, and magic are all real every day occurrences. When her cousin dies mysteriously with no witnesses, she decides to do whatever she can, including using her ability to raise the spirits of dead animals, to solve the case. The worldbuilding was just really fun in this one, but the Native American myths and influence were the shining star for me, and the asexual rep was refreshing to see in a YA book too tbh

Split Tooth by Tanya Tagaq

The audiobook, the audiobook, the audiobook!!!! Also the physical book because formatting and illustrations, but the audiobook!!! Tanya Tagaq is an Inuit throat singer, and this novel is a genre blending of 20 years worth of the authors journal entries, poetry, and short stories, that culminates in a truly unique story about a young girl surviving her teenage years in a small tundra town in the 70s. It is sad and beautiful and hard but an experience like nothing else I read this year.

[brokehorrorfan]

Stephen Graham Jones (My Heart is a Chainsaw, The Only Good Indians) will publish The Buffalo Hunter Hunter on Match 18 via Saga Press.

Set in the American west of 1912, the 496-page horror novel follows a Lutheran priest who transcribes the life of a vampire who haunts the fields of the Blackfeet reservation looking for justice.

A diary, written in 1912 by a Lutheran pastor is discovered within a wall. What it unveils is a slow massacre, a chain of events that go back to 217 Blackfeet dead in the snow. Told in transcribed interviews by a Blackfeet named Good Stab, who shares the narrative of his peculiar life over a series of confessional visits. This is an American Indian revenge story written by one of the new masters of horror, Stephen Graham Jones.

Pre-order The Buffalo Hunter Hunter by Stephen Graham Jones.

[kristybluebird]

"My heart is a chainsaw" & "Don't fear the reaper" are great books go read them now!

[gigantomachylesbian]

Stephen Graham Jones could write Beverly Marsh but Stephen King WISHES he could write Jade Daniels

[wormwoodandhoney]

books read in 2023: the indian lake trilogy [my heart is a chainsaw & don't fear the reaper]

Jade [...] breathes all the corruption in her lungs out. Well, not the blackness, she supposes. Not the horror. Never that.

[bluestjaybird]

jade from my heart is a chainsaw walks the line of “fucked up mentally ill teen girl” so masterfully it makes me alternate between cringing so hard i crunch in on myself like an empty can of coke from the pain of my own “fucked up mentally ill teen girl” self being splattered so viciously across the page and screaming screaming screaming “SOMEONE HELP HER, SOMEONE PAY ATTENTION TO HER, PLEASE!!!!”

[haveyoureadthisbook-poll]

[finalgirrls]

A playlist for one of the best literary horror girlies: Jade Daniels from the Jade Daniels trilogy (My Heart is a Chainsaw, Don’t Fear the Reaper, and The Angel of Indian Lake) written by Stephen Graham Jones.

I had to make this as I read an advance copy of The Angel of Indian Lake (out later this year!!) with a moodboard because I’m well into my feelings about the series and Jade.

[grimalkintoes]

if stephen graham jones has a million fans, then i'm one of them. if stephen graham jones has one fan, then i'm THAT ONE. if stephen graham jones has no fans, that means i've died a horrific, slasher-worthy death.

[literary-illuminati]

Reading My Heart is a Chainsaw and the protagonist is the cringiest performatively-edgy-as-a-coping-mechanism-for-a-generally-shitty-life teenager I've ever seen. Her internal monologue consists entirely of comparing thing to slasher movies. The book starts with her having fucked up dying her hair teal and ending up with pink. Her reaction to the idea that a serial killer's active in the town is jumping up and down with glee. Love her.

[omegasmileyface]

"when you say 'girl help' its not any particular girl its the concept of Girl—" WRONG. tbe girl is Letha Mondragon

[brokehorrorfan]

I Was a Teenage Slasher by New York Times bestselling author Stephen Graham Jones (My Heart Is a Chainsaw, The Only Good Indians) will be published on July 16, 2024 via Simon & Schuster.

A slasher story told from the killer's perspective, the 384-page horror novel will be available in hardcover, e-book, and audio book. Jon Bush designed the jacket cover. Read on for the synopsis.

1989, Lamesa, Texas. A small west Texas town driven by oil and cotton—and a place where everyone knows everyone else’s business. So it goes for Tolly Driver, a good kid with more potential than application, seventeen, and about to be cursed to kill for revenge. Here Stephen Graham Jones explores the Texas he grew up in, the unfairness of being on the outside, through the slasher horror he lives but from the perspective of the killer, Tolly, writing his own autobiography. Find yourself rooting for a killer in this summer teen movie of a novel gone full blood-curdling tragic.

Pre-order I Was a Teenage by Stephen Graham Jones.

[quotian]

“I read your letter six times, standing by the mailbox. By the end I was crying.” Jade has to press her lips together to keep from smiling like an idiot. If you cry writing it, maybe someone will cry reading it. It's more than she could have hoped for, is all she was wishing for. my heart is a chainsaw - stephen graham jones

[destroyscout]

[graciecatfamilyband]

The Info-Dumpers who Love Characters Website is totally sleeping on the best Info-Dumping Character of All Time:

Jade Daniels, the 17 year-old half-indigenous girl from Stephen Graham Jones’ My Heart is a Chainsaw.

In everyone’s defense, character-driven slow-burn literary fiction that is also a slasher (stab stab 🔪🔪🩸) is a hard genre to sell. Many of us who love one part of this equation don’t love the other.

But Jade has captured my whole chainsaw ♥️, and I CANNOT be normal about it. Jade has never met a person at whom she wasn’t willing to spout random facts that they have exhibited no interest in. She can bring ANYTHING back around to connect to her hyperfixation which is, coincidentally, slasher movies. And she is the most vivid, alive, real-to-me protagonist I have ever encountered. Because of the way she hyperfixates and info dumps, not in spite of it. (Which surely says something about me but again, I am among friends on this webbed site!)

Jade makes completely normal, totally hinged choices like:

(When we the audience are first introduced to her) Going up to a group of construction workers having a trash fire in the middle of the night and being like, “If we were in a slasher right now, this is what the plot line would be. Also, have some random slasher movie facts.” (Their response: Are you okay? You seem like you are not okay.)

Writing extra credit essays for her history teacher about the tropes and conventions of the slasher genre. For four years. Not what he asked for, but what he got. (These essays are included in the book and are a godsend for those of us who are not already slasher fans! They literally help the reader understand the story beats as they unfold, while simultaneously giving life to Jade’s voice and helping us understand what makes her tick.)

Deciding the New Girl At School has all the qualities of a Final Girl, the slasher film trope in which there is one girl left alive to confront the killer and stop the slasher cycle.

Trying to warn the New Girl At School that she is going to be The Final Girl, by putting a VHS copy of the 1971 slasher Bay of Blood and all of Jade’s slasher extra credit essays in her mailbox. With a note. A note that says that she is going to be The Final Girl in a slasher cycle that seems to be starting up. (Jade is just trying to help! So helpful.)

Of course, the core of this novel is: What is going on with Jade? After all, she actually wants a slasher cycle to start in her town. (She also wants the slasher cycle to be stopped at the proper moment, to ensure that the vengeance of the slasher is balanced by the justice of the Final Girl.) She does not see herself as a possible Final Girl, but she is willing to help the richer, prettier, more appropriate classmate who she thinks is that girl. Why, why, why?

To be clear, the novel does not posit that something must be wrong with a person to be intensely, obsessively interested in something or for that thing to be horror- even slashers! But Jade’s behavior is, like I said, not entirely hinged, even for a slasher fan. Something must be up.

The novel gives us all the clues we need to peel back the layers of what’s really happening, and when truths are revealed, everything just *clicks.* Themes are introduced and then reinforced on multiple levels. There is a bear. 🐻 (The bear is the not the slasher.)

And throughout, Jade gets to be fully-human and fully seven-fucking-teen. Even though she is on the cusp of adulthood, she is still a child, and a wounded one at that. (Her wounds in no way fucking diminish her.)  Her judgment is often impaired. Her actions are often questionable. Her hair-dye jobs gets so bad, even she thinks its gross. She is so alive, and so deserving of love. 🥹 

I love her.

I would fight for her.

I desperately want to make soup for her, and let her tell me about the Scream franchise (I do not care about the Scream franchise), and give her a safe place to sleep. Even if doing so makes it way more likely that I’m about to get murdered.

Jade Fucking Daniels. My chainsaw-hearted, info-dumping hero protagonist. I salute you, my final girl.