Grady Hendrix

I really enjoyed this one. The villain was terrifying, and I really felt for all of the communities who were affected by his predatory activities. But this book wasn't exactly about vampirism as a form of feeding, or supernatural creatures. It was about gaslighting, both on an individual level, and on the level of whole communities. The main character is gaslit by all the men around her into believing that the man who moved to their neighborhood is a friend, not a foe. She starts to question herself and all of her experiences and feels that she is lessened by this doubt. No one listens to her until she convinces her friends with irrefutable evidence. Communities of color are gaslit by the authorities into believing that all of the missing children are due to drugs or that they've run away, even when the communities have evidence to the contrary. No one listens to them, so they have to take action on their own. I was mad at the villain in this book, for who he manipulated, hurt, and killed , but I was also mad at the family members, friends, authorities, and community members who gaslit our MC.

I thought the pacing was a little weird though. After the first climax, there is a large gap in time, and while I understand why it was done, I felt it could have been handled a little more elegantly. But other than that, I thought it was really well done.… (mer)

Review based on ARC.

A fun, fast, lite-horror read. ... A little less "lite" than some of the other "lite" horrors I've read, but it doesn't get underneath your skin and deeply disturb you.

I love the concept and I think Hendrix executed it very well. Imagine a knock-off IKEA called Orsk -- cheaper than IKEA, but the same concept. And imagine that it has a secret, dark history that its employees will discover on a long, hard, dark, disturbing, night in the store. There will be blood, there will be guts, there will be death. But it's so creative (I love Hendrix's names for the various pieces of "furniture" he's created, especially the little details he's employed, like the colors available) and such a quick read that, as I say, it's not deeply disturbing.

It's also not particularly deep in any sense, but that's ok. It was just the thing to pass a few hours on a rainy evening.
Definitely recommend to people who are fans of lite-horror or anyone who's just been horrified by certain aspects of IKEA ;)

I will certainly read more by Hendrix!… (mer)