It's Halloween time, so it's time for scary stories!
Admittedly I don't love scary stories, especially movies. For one thing, I don't think murder should be classified as entertainment. For another, some horror stories get downright corny. Evil clowns and baby dolls just don't scare me because, well, they're not real. (Actually, my step-grandma has a house FULL of antique dolls. I mean literally FULL. So I completely understand how they can be terrifying. The evil clowns and monsters, however...) So I stick to the psych thriller genre, and there is some very good stuff there.
Here is my journey into my foray into the genre over the past year or so.
First up is The Hypnotist's Love Story by Liane Moriarty.
I come across this one unexpectedly at the bookstore one day. The concept excited me because it wasn't a traditional horror story. It's a "starter" story about a woman who enters a new relationship, only to find out that he has a stalker. The suspense was super here, because you never knew who she was or where she was going to show up. What made it not as good as it could have been were the multiple attempted subplots that cluttered the second half. They really distracted from the premise and I didn't really care about most of them, particularly the missing father. Still, this was an exciting one.
Wanting more, I moved onto another Moriarty novel, Big Little Lies.
Now this one does end in probable murder, but if you have qualms about that I wouldn't worry. It's not offensive. You'll see after you read it. It starts after someone is killed at a fundraising event at the elementary school and then starts from the beginning. Young mom Jane's son is accused of attacking another child, causing some mama drama that gradually escalates. She and her friends must grapple with it through the coming year. It also proves that thrillers can be serious with its messages about domestic violence. I did find the climax to be rather, well, anticlimactic.
The next one was The Wife Between Us.
Now, I may have been new to the genre but WOW. What a twist! And there were several! This one I enjoyed thoroughly and kept thinking about. I can't speak for aficionados, but maybe they will like this anyway. I haven't reviewed it yet because it's hard to talk about the story without giving things away. If you want a suspenseful thriller without murder, this is a must read.
Wanting it slightly darker, I moved onto You Will Know Me.
I like reading about the lives of those I don't know. In this case, gymnasts. A death rocks the gymnastics community just as the Knox family is preparing to send their daughter Devon to trials for the next level, hoping to eventually send her to the Olympics. I'm sorry, but the writing was just plain bad here. The author goes off on tangents, uses very repetitive language, writes sentences that are half a page long, and multiple other things I disliked. Plus the twist is very easy to guess once you get past a certain incident, even for bad detectives like me. This book got HEAPS of praise and I really can't understand why at all. But if you like don't mind language, feel free to give it a try....
I was hoping for something better so I tried Never Let You Go.
Our protagonist was abused by her then-lover, and he is out of jail now. She believes that he is out to get her again, so she signs up for a defense class. But is he really after her, or is a dark secret throwing its effects on her life? It's good, but nothing special. There are only so many suspects here, but the suspense is good. Definitely better than Abbott's novel.
While browsing the bookstore, I then picked up the hidden find that was The Secret Room.
Fair warning: this is actually a threequel. It can be read on its own, but once you read it you won't need or want to read the first two. Anyway, the premise is that a psychiatrist begins working at a prison and then someone or something starts killing her patients. She might lose her job if she doesn't get to the bottom of things. It's a unique story and the added bonuses of wacky patients and a prison setting make it even spookier. I liked this one. But yeah, it has the same "sudden twist" [not the major twist] that many books have when they feature a female lead. Actually, I think at least two other books on this list have the same twist! Maybe authors should find new ways to change someone's life?
I thought I'd take it a step up and moved on to A Simple Favor.
The last one I read was The Other Woman.
A simple premise: a woman's future mother-in-law wants her gone. She loves her fiance, so she keeps going, but that's hard to do when Pammie is making you look like the bad guy. I could see the red flags in this relationship sticking out like sore thumbs, so while I didn't entirely guess the twist (I think it crossed my mind briefly once or twice) it didn't blow me away either. I also think the characters could have been more interesting.
Not all scary stories are so very terrible. A lot of them actually come with good messages and aren't just "killing for fun." I actually prefer the domestic thriller vein myself. So if you're looking for something different this Halloween, try one of these books.
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