The happy ending of many horror movies, especially slashers, is that the one last main character (usually teen, female, conventionally attractive) walks away bruised and bloodied but alive while the killer dies a horrifically fitting death, often at the hands of the survivor. This happens so frequently, this character trope has a name: the finalContinue reading “From Tropes to Teen Survivors, ‘Final Girl’ Nods to Slashers”
Tag Archives: Fiction
Bigfoot and Big Scares in ‘Devolution’
One of the greatest, most terrible, most amazing parts about reading is when you find yourself absolutely immersed in a book and nothing—not responsibilities, relationships, or reasonable bedtimes—can draw you out of it. Which is why I was flipping ebook page after ebook page at 1:30 a.m. as I raced to reach the end ofContinue reading “Bigfoot and Big Scares in ‘Devolution’”
Rolling Waves of Lovely Prose Propel ‘Find’
There’s a dreaminess from The Ones We’re Meant to Find, even from the very cover, all soft edges and rolling waves. That sense never really lets up—even though it gets considerably more complicated in the middle—and in the end the yearning and saltwater mean as much, or more, than before. It’s a lovely exploration intoContinue reading “Rolling Waves of Lovely Prose Propel ‘Find’”
‘Moonflower’ Has Double the ‘Murders’
There’s a particular brand of murder mystery that’s tough to replicate: a quaint little town in England whose residents hide secrets behind the shutters of their neat little cottages, and when blood is spilled, a twee investigator from the outside comes to expose those secrets one by one. Anthony Horowitz may not have invented theContinue reading “‘Moonflower’ Has Double the ‘Murders’”
‘Tram Car’ More Fun Than ‘Haunting’
The fact the main characters are bored with a haunted, semi-sentient, magically propelled tram car in 1910s Cairo is a pretty good indication of things to come in P. Djeli Clark’s The Hunting of Tram Car 015. This slim novella may be a little light in character development or narrative indulgence, but packs in aContinue reading “‘Tram Car’ More Fun Than ‘Haunting’”
‘Klara’ Shines like the Sun
There are many things Kazuo Ishiguro does brilliantly, but one he does perhaps most uniquely—especially as we move past the glut of thrillers using Gone Girl and/or The Woman On The Train as a comp title—is create a thoroughly unreliable narrator. Unlike the tipsy or mentally ill women who have largely come to define theContinue reading “‘Klara’ Shines like the Sun”
‘Paradise’ has 2/3 of a Great Book
CW: Suicide, Incest, Sexual Abuse There’s this seafood restaurant downtown that is pretty pricy, but once my husband and I were given a gift card for it. The first two courses were incredible—fresh, flavorful, succulent. The third was bizarre and borderline inedible, though we may have just thought it was so gross because we’re unculturedContinue reading “‘Paradise’ has 2/3 of a Great Book”
‘Iraq + 100’ Gives Unique View of Future
For longer than I’ve been alive, Iraq has been either at or adjacent to war. In fact, writes editor Hassan Blasim in the introduction to Iraq + 100, “Iraq has not tasted peace, freedom, or stability since the first British invasion of the country in 1914.” A century of war makes it hard to imagineContinue reading “‘Iraq + 100’ Gives Unique View of Future”
‘The Answers’ Raises Questions
Something I’ve noticed in a lot of millennial literature, as it were, is a thread of dystopia interwoven into what begins—and often ends—with the illusion of being contemporary or realistic. Like Ling Ma’s Severance, about a young woman who keeps her dead-end job after the rest of her office flees in a deadly pandemic inContinue reading “‘The Answers’ Raises Questions”
Leave ‘Only Kid Left’ Behind
I did it. I finally did it. Last year, as I was starting this project, I ordered a bunch of the books I couldn’t find at my library and didn’t already have. (Fitting, then, that I’m posting this on the one-year anniversary of this blog.) One of the first to arrive from that inaugural batchContinue reading “Leave ‘Only Kid Left’ Behind”
Ring Reads 