Jared

I don't have much to say about this one. It was starting to grab me, but then she started eating people and all of the psychological manipulation just kinda went out the window. The first 200 pages or so are pretty awesome though, it's just a shame they through away all of the tension building for a rushed and rather pathetic ending.

Luckily, Kristopher would improve greatly in the next two years with Gone to See the River Man, a book that's paced perfectly and has a beautifully profound while still disturbing ending.

Why did I finish this one? I honestly can’t tell you. The last book I read before this was Playground and it was so unbelievably awful that it kinda made me not want to read a book for a long time. But three months later and I’ve finally made it through.

Endless Night is a bad horror novel. It’s a great road trip story, but horrible everything else. There are large chunks of this book dedicated to Jody, Andy, Jody’s Dad and Sharon just having a normal vacation that are intercut with the killer talking about how much he wants to kill Jody. I really don’t know if that was meant to make us feel tension but it doesn’t work. I *guess* Laymon was trying to make the reader uncomfortable with the underlying idea that “he could show up at any moment” but it really loses steam quickly. I found myself wanting to get through the killer’s chapters as quick as possible so I could get back to the vacation plot line.

I guess the book succeeded in getting me to care about the characters. But even then it wasn’t like they were treated like real people. Jody and especially Sharon are treated like objects of desire rather than people. The omniscient narrator is *always* talking about their bodies in a very odd way. Even worse that Jody is 16. When the killer’s perspective is just filled with how much he wants to rape this character, it just goes over the top when the unseen narrator of the normal chapters is also constantly describing how attractive this kid is supposed to be.

The ending sucked. I’ve seen stories lull the audience into a sense of comfort before ripping it away. Mommy (2014) in particular is really good at doing what I think this novel was trying to do. But here it just feels cruel. And not in a smart or thought-provoking way. It just gets worse for the sake of getting worse.

Honestly, I’m kinda pissed that Gone to See the River Man was as good as it was. Because I keep getting tricked into thinking that extreme horror can be good. Maybe Kristopher Triana is just built different. I should just read his other books and avoid the rest of the genre.

Endless Night was a waste of time. If Richard Laymon can stop being a pedophile, he should try to write a slice of life comedy book.

From page one it was the worst book I had ever read. At first I was going to finish it with the hope that it would get better. Eventually it got to a point where I finished this out of spite.

Entirely pointless book. A bad spiritual successor to Saw, horrible writing in every aspect, and just pure shock value for the sake of shock value. Aron Beauregard cannot write children.

Don’t waste your time. It’s not even disturbing, it’s just gross. And not in a fun way either. There is something fundamentally wrong with you if you take pleasure in portraying or taking in violence against the most innocent.

The worst part about this was that the book randomly took a turn in an attempt to make you feel bad for the situation. You can’t do that. You have not earned sympathy, you cant suddenly act like this violence has weight to it when you revel in its goofiness.

I very rarely call any art worthless but this was worthless.

From page one it was the worst book I had ever read. At first I was going to finish it with the hope that it would get better. Eventually it got to a point where I finished this out of spite.

Entirely pointless book. A bad spiritual successor to Saw, horrible writing in every aspect, and just pure shock value for the sake of shock value. Aron Beauregard cannot write children.

Don’t waste your time. It’s not even disturbing, it’s just gross. And not in a fun way either. There is something fundamentally wrong with you if you take pleasure in portraying or taking in violence against the most innocent.

The worst part about this was that the book randomly took a turn in an attempt to make you feel bad for the situation. You can’t do that. You have not earned sympathy, you cant suddenly act like this violence has weight to it when you revel in its goofiness.

I very rarely call any art worthless but this was worthless.

I don't have much to say about this one. It was starting to grab me, but then she started eating people and all of the psychological manipulation just kinda went out the window. The first 200 pages or so are pretty awesome though, it's just a shame they through away all of the tension building for a rushed and rather pathetic ending.

Luckily, Kristopher would improve greatly in the next two years with Gone to See the River Man, a book that's paced perfectly and has a beautifully profound while still disturbing ending.

I don't have much to say about this one. It was starting to grab me, but then she started eating people and all of the psychological manipulation just kinda went out the window. The first 200 pages or so are pretty awesome though, it's just a shame they through away all of the tension building for a rushed and rather pathetic ending.

Luckily, Kristopher would improve greatly in the next two years with Gone to See the River Man, a book that's paced perfectly and has a beautifully profound while still disturbing ending.

I cannot believe how much I liked this.

This is my first “splatterpunk” or “extreme horror” book and I’m worried that I might have started with the best of the best.

I heard that this genre was full of the edgiest, lamest attempts at shock value for the sake of shock value. This was anything but.

Most of the horror her is purely psychological. It’s a family drama at heart. Very similar to Hereditary, in that we focus on a family crumbling through the vessel of a demonic tale. Don’t tell anyone I said this, but this book handles that concept WAY better.

This book is unrelenting. It will indeed go there, but it never feels undeserved. The reason this book works so well is because it earns its depravity. It’s not just a series of increasingly vile events, it very slowly builds to a revelation.

They pull the rug out from under you right when you start to sympathize with Lori. She is a bad person and the book slowly reveals that in some of the best usage of flashbacks Ive seen in writing.

The violence is definitely extreme, but it’s rare. A majority of this film’s horror comes from its analysis of what people are capable of. Lori is pure evil, but not in a villainous way. In a purely desperate and depressing way.

I think that’s the main reason this worked. It’s not two people being tortured in a forest. It’s two people uncovering their true selves. and that’s truly terrifying.

I certainly have my issues. For one thing, I think way too much time is dedicated to these killers. I understand that this book was one of the first ever true crime novels, but that doesn’t really excuse it from falling into the common pitfalls of the genre.

That being said, this is truly the best of said genre. In Cold Blood mainly works for me because of part one. An entire third of this book is dedicated to the lives of The Cutters. Parts 2-4 would not work at all without that first part, and while the book does get worse after that, I think it’s overall paced incredibly well.

True Crime as a genre is one of my darkest vices when it comes to art. I know how exploitative it is, I know that it humanizes people who frankly don’t deserve humanization, and I know that it melodramatizes real tragedies. But sometimes, it can be great and respectful.

I heavily doubt anything in the True Crime genre will ever top this. Capote’s dialogue is so expertly written and endlessly layered. The omniscience adds a genuinely chilling atmosphere to the entirety of the aftermath.

I’m overstating my issues with the book because it really is an incredible work of genre-bending nonfiction. Almost perfectly paced and deeply empathetic, even if sometimes to its own detriment.

True Crime will probably never reach these heights again.