Jonathan Sims

Tobias Fell was a multi-billionaire recluse living in the penthouse of a rather strange apartment building.... until he invited thirteen very different people to a dinner party, all of them associated in some way with the building and all in some way haunted. It ended in the violent death of Fell, and with no one who was present being willing to breathe a word of what happened.

I picked this one up because I absolutely loved Jonathan Sims' horror fiction podcast, The Magnus Archives. And I think for fans of Magnus, there are a lot of elements here that will be familiar. We've got a bunch of little stories about people, each in their own unique ways, having creepy encounters with the supernatural, all of which end up eventually fitting together into a larger narrative, and we've got the use of supernatural horror to reflect on the real-life horrors of exploitation and capitalism.

But, while this isn't bad, I did find it a little bit disappointing by contrast. I was less impressed with the writing here than in Magnus, maybe in part because here we're lacking Sims' fantastic delivery to breathe wonderfully disturbing life into his words. And the social commentary aspects feel a lot more heavy-handed and a lot less nuanced. The structure, while interesting, didn't entirely work for me, either, as each little sub-story just ends quite abruptly, with a dinner invitation right where the exciting climax should be.

All that having been said, though, I did still certainly find it worth reading. When Sims hits with the creepiness, he really hits, and even if he mostly doesn't manage it here as well as he does in the podcast, there are still some very good moments. If nothing else, the chapter about the plumber is definitely going to stick with me for a while. And the central idea is a really clever, interesting, and suitably horrifying variation on haunted house stories, one that impressively widens their scope.… (mais)

Enjoyable read! I thought the front cover was a white shirt until about halfway through the book when I realized it was a sheet and a corpse. I wish the "monster" had been introduced a little bit earlier or that it was more viscous at the end but still a great creature. I always want more horror but I think this book makes a good intro to horror for people who aren't quite ready to take the full leap into the world of horror. The language and writing of the book is very good and very easy to read and follow along with.

I think about this story whenever I drive past the billboard for crime scene cleanup!… (mais)

Sixth and Newest release for the spooky season! Trying to read horror or at least books with horror elements for the whole month of October.

Wow!

Probably my most anticipated read of the Month having been a fan of Jonathan Sims for a few years now. And it was really good! There was a slight feeling that something could have been better which I’ll hope to tackle without any spoilers.

First is the prose was good, not too long winded, very easy to read. Great imagery. Nice vocabulary. I just don’t like the slipping of the third person semi-omniscient narrator. Hard to follow who out of the four characters we are getting the feelings of, because we’re inside each of their heads in the same scene

The plot was super fun I loved all the characters working at this clean up business and having to deal with this “creature” I thought I was cool new take, just slightly predictable. But that’s okay, it’s about how you get there, and the execution.

Speaking of characters, I do think he did an amazing job on making the cast feel unique, and fleshed out. I just wish there were some more scenes to make me feel invested in them, rather than getting to know them more. (I was invested with the other characters, just not as much as the main Character Diya.)

The horror was… okay. I know some reviews say the slow burn was too slow which I don’t agree with. I think the build up and the feeling that the person we follow is going through the sense of dread
was great! But I don’t think the “pay-off” was as strong as it should have been because of the lack of horror through the entire novel. It felt as if at times we were reading scenes to build up for a pay off rather than enjoying the scene we’re in.

All in all I’m super excited to see what comes from this Author next!… (mais)