Horror AND? :: 2 Books That Push Genre Boundaries

I love a good horror story. I also love a book that can blend more than one genre together into something new. Recently I read two horror hybrids that take their readers interesting new places!

Disappearance at Devil's Rock by Paul Tremblay
Publisher: William Morrow. June 21, 2016.
Genre: Horror & Mystery
Source: Publisher
Pages: 327


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She can't tell her that people always do things that their friends and loved ones never imagined they would do. Not only is everyone more than capable of making the worst decisions possible, those kinds of decisions are frighteningly commonplace and easy to make.

Paul Tremblay, author of one of my favorite horror novels ever, is at it again with a new horror story with mystery/crime/thriller elements. Disappearance at Devil's Rock is about a very real horror: the disappearance of a child. After Tommy, a young teen, disappears in a park, and nobody seems to know why or how this happened. And then his mother is convinced she sees his ghost in the house. All sorts of weird shit goes down and I don't want to say much more than that plot-wise.

When I first finished this novel, I wasn't sure if I liked it or if I would categorize it as horror, though it definitely had horror elements. That was until I remembered that Paul Tremblay is totally a horror fan's writer. He had heavy allusions to several books/movies in Head Full of Ghosts, which led me to remember a favorite horror movie of mine, Lake Mungo. The plot of this book is heavily influenced by the Australian film: beloved teen goes missing, mom believes in ghost, sibling admits something, we eventually discover teen had secrets, doppelganger/future-seeing stuff. I'll stop my analysis before I spoil both film AND book.

What I'm trying to say is that having seen this movie made me completely understand what Tremblay was going for. I believe he was trying to recreate the slow burn pacing of the mockumentary film, because it has a very particular creepy tone. And, unfortunately, while I love the Lake Mungo plot similarities, I don't know if the pacing/tone was captured. Disappearance often just felt slow, regardless of whether some of the reveals and creepy bits were super intense and original, leaving them less scary for me. Another complaint some readers had were of too many Minecraft references. But as someone who teaches Minecraft, I can tell you that if anything Tremblay went light on them for the reader's sake. He captured awkward, annoying, approval-needing teen boys perfectly in this dark, eerie tale of the secrets people close to us keep.

My Best Friend's Exorcism by Grady Hendrix
Publisher: Quirk Books. May 17, 2016.
Genre: Horror & Comedy
Source: Publisher
Pages: 336



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"Corn dogs," the exorcist said, "are all the proof I need that there is a God."

If you're looking for a lighter horror novel, My Best Friend's Exorcism is the book for you. Grady Hendrix is responsible for Horrorstor, the horror novel that looks like an IKEA catalog. The gimmick this time? An 80s theme with binding that looks like an old yearbook. Normally gimmick turns me off, but this book had enough substance and good storytelling to cause me to "have fun." I started reading this book, looked up for air, and realized I was 100 pages into the book. Oops!

Super readable and fun (and that's coming from someone who hates fun), this is a story about teen girls in private school and a possession. Something happens to Abby's best friend, Gretchen, in the woods one night and she's a little different afterwards. And then she's a lot different. In a series of disturbing scenes, we start to see Gretchen's transformation and the havoc she wreaks on his friend group. Even though Gretchen turns on Abby in horrible ways, Abby is determined to save her friend. And she may get a body building god-enthusiast in on it. I laughed several times throughout the book.

There are a lot of things to love about this book. Every chapter title is the name of an 80s song, for example. There weren't quite enough scares for me, but it makes up for it with how fun it is. And the ending is surprisingly moving (I cried). Early on, I was very nervous the plot was going down a "girl gets raped and manifests itself in ways that look like possession" path. Which is a tricky path to navigate. But then that potential plot sort of gets dropped? Which is overall good, but then also feels like a loose thread. I don't know. I also paused for a number of days in the middle of reading, so it's possible that's what caused the feeling of a break in that plotline. Overall, a fun horror novel if you're not looking to get too scared.

What horror combo books do you love?

A Head Full of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay: Review

A Head Full of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay
Publisher: William Morrow. June 2015.
Pages: 286
Genre: Horror
Source: Publisher



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The lives of the Barretts, a normal suburban New England family, are torn apart when fourteen-year-old Marjorie begins to display signs of acute schizophrenia.

To her parents' despair, the doctors are unable to stop Marjorie's descent into madness. As their stable home devolves into a house of horrors, they reluctantly turn to a local Catholic priest for help. Father Wanderly suggests an exorcism. He also contacts a production company that is eager to document the Barretts' plight. With John, Marjorie's father, out of work for more than a year and the medical bills looming, the family agrees to be filmed, and soon find themselves the unwitting stars of The Possession, a hit reality television show. When events in the Barrett household explode in tragedy, the show and the shocking incidents it captures become the stuff of urban legend.

Fifteen years later, a bestselling writer interviews Marjorie's younger sister, Merry. As she recalls those long ago events that took place when she was just eight years old, long-buried secrets and painful memories that clash with what was broadcast on television begin to surface--and a mind-bending tale of psychological horror is unleashed, raising vexing questions about memory and reality, science and religion, and the very nature of evil.- Goodreads

I've talked before about having trouble finding books that actually scare me. Despite loving horror movies, I had come to avoid horror novels for the most part, for fear of being disappointed. I had put off reading A Head Full of Ghosts for a long time, and I hate that I didn't read it immediately when I got it.

Apart from it being horrifying, it's a combination of horror AND reality TV. Yes, you read that correctly. Never before has a book been more perfect for me, combining my two true loves. The tale is told by Merry in retrospect as she speaks to a writer interested in her story 15 years later. After young teen Marjorie starts acting a little bit kooky/possessed, the parents send her to doctors and psychologists to no avail. The unemployed father gets more and more religious and begins to insist on Marjorie seeing a Catholic priest who wants to give her an exorcism. As money runs out from all the doctors, the family is left with no choice but to go the exorcism route and monetize it by agreeing to be a part of a new reality show called The Posession.

This is all told from Merry's childish point of view, because she was young when this all went down. And Merry saw the most of the horrifying, often demonic things Marjorie did and said. At the beginning of each new "Part," we read a blog post by somebody analyzing the the show's episodes, pointing out allusions to other horror movies/books, and identifying broader themes in it as a piece of media. This is all delightfully meta and a fascinating look at the horror we consume, and it just gets better as the book goes along.

I watched the blinking red of the screen and then looked over at the blanket-covered house. In the LED white light the blue blanket looked like it was the same white color as the cardboard house... I stared at or into the blanket, trying to see the blue that I knew was there but wasn't seeing, and then the blanket was sucked inside the house through the shutters of the front window, as though that window was a ravenous black hole.

It's hard to say much more without spoiling the book. It gets super intense and makes you question everything. You never quite know what to expect next from it. Or, you think you know, but you're wrong and you're completely delighted by where it ends up going. Is Marjorie struggling with mental illness or is something more sinister afoot? There are all sorts of psychological twists and turns that will make it a huge struggle to put down this book once you start. An exorcism tale that's highly self aware, modern, and incredibly clever, A Head Full of Ghosts will scare the pants off you and give you a whole new appreciation for the horror genre itself.

I sneak into your room when you are asleep, Merry-monkey. I've been doing it for weeks now, since the end of summer. You're so pretty when you're asleep. Last night, I pinched your nose shut until you opened your little mouth and gasped...

xoxo

Marjorie