Max Lieberman
Titling your novel "Horror Movie" is writing a big ol' Publisher's Clearing House check. Like Peter Straub's "Ghost Story," or Robert Evans' "Love Story," Tremblay is staking out an ambitious plot in a densely populated genre. He's arguably going even further, writing a book about that genre as it exists in an entirely different medium. I'm pleased to report that the check clears.
This novel is organized into three different sections, presented in rotating fashion so as to keep key plot revelations veiled.
First, the screenplay of the titular horror movie. The script, which was filmed but never released back in the mid-90s, is an elliptical genre vivisection laden with symbols that the book's narrator (mode: deeply unreliable; profession: horror convention "celebrity," trading on his notoriety from acting in said movie) suggests "add up to nothing." I'm not sure how this script would work if filmed, but as a narrative conceit to build dread and introduce us to its in-universe author, it kills.
Second, snarky observations about the experience of making a new, shinier, better financed version of the movie in the 2020s. The unnamed narrator comes across during these chapters as a stock jaded Gen X alternaguy. He's full of disdain for the successful people in front of him, and equally full of self-loathing, knowing that his persona and career is entirely the creation of his (more talented, less living) friends. There is, ultimately, more going on with him than we see here — but for most of the book, it's like reading a less-clever version of Chuck Klosterman. Horrifying indeed.
Third, memories about the making of the original movie, and fleeting glimpses of the narrator's life since then. The film itself was never finished, for the same reason that it is notorious, which is of course also why it's also being re-made/-booted/-financed by IP-hungry Hollywood 30 years later. Those secrets, too, are eventually revealed, and they're the most satisfying (and to me, the only truly emotionally moving) moments in the novel.
This was the first book by Tremblay that I've read, and I'll certainly seek out another.
Titling your novel "Horror Movie" is writing a big ol' Publisher's Clearing House check. Like Peter Straub's "Ghost Story," or Robert Evans' "Love Story," Tremblay is staking out an ambitious plot in a densely populated genre. He's arguably going even further, writing a book about that genre as it exists in an entirely different medium. I'm pleased to report that the check clears.
This novel is organized into three different sections, presented in rotating fashion so as to keep key plot revelations veiled.
First, the screenplay of the titular horror movie. The script, which was filmed but never released back in the mid-90s, is an elliptical genre vivisection laden with symbols that the book's narrator (mode: deeply unreliable; profession: horror convention "celebrity," trading on his notoriety from acting in said movie) suggests "add up to nothing." I'm not sure how this script would work if filmed, but as a narrative conceit to build dread and introduce us to its in-universe author, it kills.
Second, snarky observations about the experience of making a new, shinier, better financed version of the movie in the 2020s. The unnamed narrator comes across during these chapters as a stock jaded Gen X alternaguy. He's full of disdain for the successful people in front of him, and equally full of self-loathing, knowing that his persona and career is entirely the creation of his (more talented, less living) friends. There is, ultimately, more going on with him than we see here — but for most of the book, it's like reading a less-clever version of Chuck Klosterman. Horrifying indeed.
Third, memories about the making of the original movie, and fleeting glimpses of the narrator's life since then. The film itself was never finished, for the same reason that it is notorious, which is of course also why it's also being re-made/-booted/-financed by IP-hungry Hollywood 30 years later. Those secrets, too, are eventually revealed, and they're the most satisfying (and to me, the only truly emotionally moving) moments in the novel.
This was the first book by Tremblay that I've read, and I'll certainly seek out another.