--Mild Spoilers for Don't Fear the Reaper, sequel to My Heart is a Chainsaw, nothing outright-- 3.5 Stars
As they sit in the partially intact remains of what was almost Letha’s Terra Nova home (once upon a novel ago), Letha and Jade go back and forth over who could have stepped down behind Sydney in the famous bathroom stall scene in Scream. Letha argues it can’t have been Billy since he was just in the hall arguing with Syd moments before, so it must have been Stu, and further, how could anyone have known to include that private moment in Stab. When pressed for who that person is for her, Jade answers metaphorically, admitting it’s everyone who hurt her or didn’t help.
This small conversation, soon to be interrupted in true slasher form, is pivotal to understanding Don’t Fear the Reaper on multiple levels.
Let's pause for the summary. Don't Fear the Reaper takes place a little over four years after the events on My Heart is a Chainsaw with Jade, sorry I mean --Jennifer--, finally free from an endless trial and legal litigations, returning to Proofrock on probation (for destroying federal property). She returns to a snow burried town still reeling in the trauma from four years ago at about the same time that a recently famous serial killer escapes his reunion tour convoy thanks to an avalanche. The bodies and regret start piling up, and this time, we get a peak inside just about everyone's head.
In this chaotic sequel, each chapter jumps to a new point of view, delaying the characters you’re likely most waiting to hear from to several chapters in, and only offering a summary of events between books through another high school essay, several chapters later still. The jumping around allows for a much more up close and personal experience of all the gruesome murders, addressing a critique often levied against My Heart is a Chainsaw. There should be no complaints here that the murders do not come often nor fast enough. But what this approach also allows for is for the reader to truly become the detective, the question asker, the person trying to tie the timeline together in a way that not a single other character in the book can. Much like a viewer asking if Stu really had time to run and change shoes after scaring Syd in the bathroom, or knowing it can't have been Billy because he just didn't have the means, readers of Reaper, if they’re paying attention, will be trying to count the unmarked minutes and hours between cuts. Trying to put a map of Proofrock together in their heads. The timeline and details feel difficult to thread together, but especially if you're clinging to the red herring bent Chapter 1 and 2 (and even the epitaph) are devoted to.
If sequels need to up the ante, then no one should be expecting the slasher on a platter, Dark Mill South, to be the real, or at least only, culprit. Yet the book does a very good job of making it seem so, and the characters do a damn good job falling for it themselves, and to be fair. Dark Mill South does deliver. But if you are paying attention, the small details just don't add up. And the author doesn't want them to.
However, it isn't just about learning who is in that bathroom stall, it’s about who you want to be or fear to be there. Jade’s metaphorical answer. Which is another theme from this conversation that permeates the book. Revenge, inaction, and the seemingly mundane villains we put up with on the daily, excusing, questioning, or even ignoring, their behavior. It is easy to see why Jade finds herself drawn in by the slasher mentality. There are clear cut rules and a monster who makes no mistake of keeping the truth hidden too long. There is always a reveal, a confrontation, a final girl hero. Everyone knows what the slasher is doing is wrong, and the town bands together to hide or fight. In ways they just never do for the monsters we live with.
So, in that respect, it is also easy to see why so many characters from Proofrock find themselves wrapped up in that same slasher mentality. For some it is the cultural psychology of having a girl obsessed with slashers warn you a slasher is coming, no one listening, and then dying by massacre. You too might take a second look at the source material that let her see what no one else could. But there is also a new history teacher in town, obsessed with slashers and serial killers, turning Jade's old essays into primary source material for his history students, taking advantage of them in more ways than one, to feed his glib obsession. You have Letha, feeling like she would have been a better final girl if she had only prepared for the future instead of getting hung up on the past, and who also needs a distraction wrought with rules to make sense of what is left of life. There are people obsessed with Jade, haunted by the events, and stuck inside themselves. We also get frequent high school essays from Gal, forced to analyze a horror she lived through for high school credit. So the horror references are constant, like the first book, but come from all sorts of different angles, mixed up with different contexts. Realistically, not every character thinks this way or gets the references, but they find themselves in the minority, at least of the ones we focus on. And while the perspectives from Jade's mom, Kimmy, are special in part because of this, they also are a welcome grounding in reality that we don't quite get enough of.
It's a messy delicate balance, this new structure, mirroring the remains, nay the ruins, left behind in the wake of the Independence Day Massacre. It's a new approach to Indian Lake that both gives and takes, but perhaps ends up taking more than it gives. While Reaper held my attention and there were spots I'd of been reluctant to have to pause my reading, it lacks some of the suspense and a lot of the thrill of its predecessor. And it certainly lacks the revving chainsaw heart.
Part of the flaw is how Jade and Letha accidentally bring what should have likely remained a distraction into main focus, giving the climax over to Dark Mill South, and allowing the far more interesting, complex, emotional culprits to fall to the wayside of inner monologue and supposition. Save one shocking moment we don’t get to see the end of. I get there is probably a point to this shift in focus. That realistically not all killers have high goals and mythical means. That some are just brutal. That some just need you to be in the right place at the wrong time. But that point could have been better made without sacrificing the mystery and thrill of discovery that made the end of Chainsaw thrive.
I keep comparing Reaper to Chainsaw, which in some ways is unfair, given that it can’t be that, doesn’t want to be that, doesn’t need to be that, and is much better left stitching together the fleshy pieces that the raw cuts of Chainsaw left behind. But, there it is, isn’t it? Reaper doesn’t, can’t, exist without Chainsaw (though it's possible to read without having read the first, I wouldn't recommend it). Like that strange clump of mutilated meat on the underside of the pier, starving for blood, what makes it frightening is not what it is, but how it might bring what was back to life. As a reader, I cling to Reaper for those shreds of what it was, fascinated by the way it’s trying to stitch itself back together. Instead, it only falls further apart, disintegrating like lake water and memories.
In some ways, it feels like it’s trying so hard to not be a predictable sequel, or go down tempting rabbit holes that feel out paced with possibility — that it ends up doing nothing notable instead. There’s all this boiling potential from traumatized identical twins, the return of ghosts, the desire to see the town slashed for more reasons than one person can hold — and it all fizzles out to strong arm the hard-to-kill serial killer who hasn’t earned that slasher strength.
Even the final moments, where Jade, some would argue needlessly, turns herself in trying to protect someone else, trying to allow that person to exist to protect what she has left here, are given to us in a postscript essay which dances around the truth and motivations of two other guilty parties. It lacks the power of the primal realization Jade has at the end of the first book, and sure, she’s trying to be Jennifer now, or at least, take only the good parts of Jade, trying to be more mature, giving of herself in the way she always has and always will because no one ever gave it to her… but this quiet victory like all her victories get muted by the distant observations of others. And while it's a song well sung in the first book, it feels more like a chain she’s looped around her own legs here.
Don’t get me wrong. There’s still a lot to admire here. The structural and thematic attempts of questioning, burrowing, into the slasher while still delivering on the promises of one are admirable, and often handled well. The sheer shift from a single pov to one that bounces across the lake and back through town demonstrates well how trauma and tragedy and loss act more like bird shot than silver bullets meant specially for a single person's monster. And if you’re into the gore and fight and shock and obvious nods and allusions to the craft, then this book delivers tenfold. The individual povs are very well done, and most the time you don't even need the chapter title to know who's head we're haunting. There's still a lot to enjoy and for a writer to learn from. As an added bonus, the acknowledgements, as always, are fun to read.
But if you’re a fan of the first, and were hoping the sequel would do all that without losing what made the original so special to begin with, you might find yourself a bit disappointed. If you prefer straightforward mysteries, and solving alongside your main character amateur sleuth, then the bouncing pov may additionally frustrate more than it intrigues. And if you’re looking for another embracing of both the mortal and immoral worlds of slashers, you’ll find this installment, well, a bit off balance.
As for this reader, I’m not done with Graham Jones nor Indian Lake. But I will be expecting more from the next installment to keep going. And I hope between this book and the next, our talented author has rediscovered that chainsaw’s pull cord, wrapped it around his fingers, and tugged, hard.
In this chaotic sequel, each chapter jumps to a new point of view, delaying the characters you’re likely most waiting to hear from to several chapters in, and only offering a summary of events between books through another high school essay, several chapters later still. The jumping around allows for a much more up close and personal experience of all the gruesome murders, addressing a critique often levied against My Heart is a Chainsaw. There should be no complaints here that the murders do not come often nor fast enough. But what this approach also allows for is for the reader to truly become the detective, the question asker, the person trying to tie the timeline together in a way that not a single other character in the book can. Much like a viewer asking if Stu really had time to run and change shoes after scaring Syd in the bathroom, or knowing it can't have been Billy because he just didn't have the means, readers of Reaper, if they’re paying attention, will be trying to count the unmarked minutes and hours between cuts. Trying to put a map of Proofrock together in their heads. The timeline and details feel difficult to thread together, but especially if you're clinging to the red herring bent Chapter 1 and 2 (and even the epitaph) are devoted to.
If sequels need to up the ante, then no one should be expecting the slasher on a platter, Dark Mill South, to be the real, or at least only, culprit. Yet the book does a very good job of making it seem so, and the characters do a damn good job falling for it themselves, and to be fair. Dark Mill South does deliver. But if you are paying attention, the small details just don't add up. And the author doesn't want them to.
However, it isn't just about learning who is in that bathroom stall, it’s about who you want to be or fear to be there. Jade’s metaphorical answer. Which is another theme from this conversation that permeates the book. Revenge, inaction, and the seemingly mundane villains we put up with on the daily, excusing, questioning, or even ignoring, their behavior. It is easy to see why Jade finds herself drawn in by the slasher mentality. There are clear cut rules and a monster who makes no mistake of keeping the truth hidden too long. There is always a reveal, a confrontation, a final girl hero. Everyone knows what the slasher is doing is wrong, and the town bands together to hide or fight. In ways they just never do for the monsters we live with.
So, in that respect, it is also easy to see why so many characters from Proofrock find themselves wrapped up in that same slasher mentality. For some it is the cultural psychology of having a girl obsessed with slashers warn you a slasher is coming, no one listening, and then dying by massacre. You too might take a second look at the source material that let her see what no one else could. But there is also a new history teacher in town, obsessed with slashers and serial killers, turning Jade's old essays into primary source material for his history students, taking advantage of them in more ways than one, to feed his glib obsession. You have Letha, feeling like she would have been a better final girl if she had only prepared for the future instead of getting hung up on the past, and who also needs a distraction wrought with rules to make sense of what is left of life. There are people obsessed with Jade, haunted by the events, and stuck inside themselves. We also get frequent high school essays from Gal, forced to analyze a horror she lived through for high school credit. So the horror references are constant, like the first book, but come from all sorts of different angles, mixed up with different contexts. Realistically, not every character thinks this way or gets the references, but they find themselves in the minority, at least of the ones we focus on. And while the perspectives from Jade's mom, Kimmy, are special in part because of this, they also are a welcome grounding in reality that we don't quite get enough of.
It's a messy delicate balance, this new structure, mirroring the remains, nay the ruins, left behind in the wake of the Independence Day Massacre. It's a new approach to Indian Lake that both gives and takes, but perhaps ends up taking more than it gives. While Reaper held my attention and there were spots I'd of been reluctant to have to pause my reading, it lacks some of the suspense and a lot of the thrill of its predecessor. And it certainly lacks the revving chainsaw heart.
Part of the flaw is how Jade and Letha accidentally bring what should have likely remained a distraction into main focus, giving the climax over to Dark Mill South, and allowing the far more interesting, complex, emotional culprits to fall to the wayside of inner monologue and supposition. Save one shocking moment we don’t get to see the end of. I get there is probably a point to this shift in focus. That realistically not all killers have high goals and mythical means. That some are just brutal. That some just need you to be in the right place at the wrong time. But that point could have been better made without sacrificing the mystery and thrill of discovery that made the end of Chainsaw thrive.
I keep comparing Reaper to Chainsaw, which in some ways is unfair, given that it can’t be that, doesn’t want to be that, doesn’t need to be that, and is much better left stitching together the fleshy pieces that the raw cuts of Chainsaw left behind. But, there it is, isn’t it? Reaper doesn’t, can’t, exist without Chainsaw (though it's possible to read without having read the first, I wouldn't recommend it). Like that strange clump of mutilated meat on the underside of the pier, starving for blood, what makes it frightening is not what it is, but how it might bring what was back to life. As a reader, I cling to Reaper for those shreds of what it was, fascinated by the way it’s trying to stitch itself back together. Instead, it only falls further apart, disintegrating like lake water and memories.
In some ways, it feels like it’s trying so hard to not be a predictable sequel, or go down tempting rabbit holes that feel out paced with possibility — that it ends up doing nothing notable instead. There’s all this boiling potential from traumatized identical twins, the return of ghosts, the desire to see the town slashed for more reasons than one person can hold — and it all fizzles out to strong arm the hard-to-kill serial killer who hasn’t earned that slasher strength.
Even the final moments, where Jade, some would argue needlessly, turns herself in trying to protect someone else, trying to allow that person to exist to protect what she has left here, are given to us in a postscript essay which dances around the truth and motivations of two other guilty parties. It lacks the power of the primal realization Jade has at the end of the first book, and sure, she’s trying to be Jennifer now, or at least, take only the good parts of Jade, trying to be more mature, giving of herself in the way she always has and always will because no one ever gave it to her… but this quiet victory like all her victories get muted by the distant observations of others. And while it's a song well sung in the first book, it feels more like a chain she’s looped around her own legs here.
Don’t get me wrong. There’s still a lot to admire here. The structural and thematic attempts of questioning, burrowing, into the slasher while still delivering on the promises of one are admirable, and often handled well. The sheer shift from a single pov to one that bounces across the lake and back through town demonstrates well how trauma and tragedy and loss act more like bird shot than silver bullets meant specially for a single person's monster. And if you’re into the gore and fight and shock and obvious nods and allusions to the craft, then this book delivers tenfold. The individual povs are very well done, and most the time you don't even need the chapter title to know who's head we're haunting. There's still a lot to enjoy and for a writer to learn from. As an added bonus, the acknowledgements, as always, are fun to read.
But if you’re a fan of the first, and were hoping the sequel would do all that without losing what made the original so special to begin with, you might find yourself a bit disappointed. If you prefer straightforward mysteries, and solving alongside your main character amateur sleuth, then the bouncing pov may additionally frustrate more than it intrigues. And if you’re looking for another embracing of both the mortal and immoral worlds of slashers, you’ll find this installment, well, a bit off balance.
As for this reader, I’m not done with Graham Jones nor Indian Lake. But I will be expecting more from the next installment to keep going. And I hope between this book and the next, our talented author has rediscovered that chainsaw’s pull cord, wrapped it around his fingers, and tugged, hard.
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