I Was a Teenage Slasher by Stephen Graham Jones

I’m excited to be back working with my blog more often. I want to write more books review and I promise I will review books by other authors than Stephen Graham Jones. I do read quite a few but SGJ’s work is just my current reading obsession.

In my opinion, one of Stephen Graham Jones’s best talents is building characters in a way that makes them feel real. It puts the reader into the story as if they are standing beside these characters, experiencing events as they unfold. This book is the perfect example of feeling apart of the story and not just looking in from afar.

This book is the sensitive coming of age story of two friends trying to find there place in the chaotic world of high school social groups. Dealing with the pressures of growing up navigating cliques, and home work this book sets up like most teen movies with a killer unsupervised party. What happens at this party will change the lives of Tolly and Amber forever.

If you remember the classic John Hughes movies and teen comedies and horror movies of the 90’s and early 2000’s, you will feel right at home as this book gets going. We have a party the entire small town high school attends at the home of the graduate who cannot let go of high school. We find out Deek and his crew were the cause of a violent death of the traditional lost puppy character, Justin, who just wanted to be with the cool crowd and would do anything to impress them.

Enter the slasher and the rules. Justin is back from the dead and ready for revenge. Tolly being way to drunk to know better and now in the wrong place at the wrong time becomes infected by Justin. I’m not going to say how, (this isn’t a zombie story it’s a slasher) you’ll just have to read for yourself. Surviving his own near death situation, Tolly’s infection starts taking over his body restricting him to the rules of the slasher.

This story takes us through Tolly’s transformation and step by step the rules of being a slasher. Like for example, slashers move faster when no one is looking or if they have a limp. Slashers do not speak and tend to wear a mask. Slasher’s cannot be killed until their mission is complete or their weakness before they became a slasher is exploited. An example of this last one would be Jason is affected by water because he drowned. Freddy is not a big fan of fire kind of thing. There were even rules brought up in this book that I never considered and absolutely loved.

This story is told in the style of confessional from Tolly as an adult, but feels like the reader is apart of the memory. We see the friendship between Tolly and Amber be tested by this new changes. It’s like horror puberty took over Tolly. Amber is the resident Randy character who knows all of the rules and helps to educate Tolly as they work through this and try to find a way to redeem him and keep him from following through on his murderous mission. The kills in this book are fantastic and very well written. They are creative but also something you could absolutely see in a Friday the 13th movie or

This is a really fun and heartfelt read. You can absolutely feel Stephen Graham Jones has written himself into this book. I can easily see events and characters that were influenced by his own teenage years and experiences. The characters are so well fleshed out that this book had a powerful emotional effect on me that had me laughing at times and tears sliding down my cheeks from being emotionally demolished.

I rate this book another solid 🥃🥃🥃🥃🥃!!! Here is why. I love reading but I do not have the time to read as I once did. This book is the fastest I have read through in years. I found excuses to read this one, I couldn’t wait to finish my work day so I could squeak in time before I cooked dinner. I could not put this down!!! My own life has been very challenging with changes at work and my anxiety and depression ramping up and this was exactly what I needed to escape and calm myself. This book completely took me in and made me feel like I belonged. This was exactly what I needed. As I finished this and closed the book I felt like I had just said good bye to a long time friend. That is the talent of Stephen Graham Jones and his World/Character building. I cannot recommend this book enough. Go read it.