They defined this book as mash up of Steel Magnolias-Fried Green Tomatoes and Dracula! No, sir: this is Stepford Wives and Southern Desperate Housewives meet True Blood! And he's the screenwriter behind Mohawk, which is probably the only horror movie about the War of 1812 and Satanic Panic. Five regular Southern housewives (at least that’s what their moron husbands think about them!) start a book club to read true crime stories and discuss them! (See! There is nothing ordinary about them. They know their dark sides and they also know how to retrain it!) Take That!: To Tom Clancy, whose prose Patricia compares to that of an insurance salesman trying to sound like a military man.

Yeah, that rings a bell. I did the stay-at-home mom thing for a couple of decades, so there's another thing we have in common. To top it all off, Hendrix creates a villain who charms all these women with his good looks and money and smooth manipulation tactics. And of course, all the horror elements are over-sexualized and Hendrix comments on women's breasts and pubes all the times. There are a total of 4 rapes in this book that either happen or are mentioned. And the rape and physical violation of women is handled with the same attitude of complacency that everything else in this book is infected with. The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires is a 2020 horror novel by Grady Hendrix, pitched as Steel Magnolias meets Buffy the Vampire Slayer. When a handsome stranger moves to town, Patricia is intrigued and oddly enough, he seems interested in joining the conversation. I FREAKIN' LOVED THIS. I loved every single dark, funny, gory minute of this book. I'm in no way qualified to talk about best and worst books, but I can say with absolute certainty that this is my favourite book so far this year.

This is a whole different ball of wax. I don’t know what to compare it to, but I’ll tell you what it has: Normally I would summarize at the end of my review by saying how "fun" or "intense" or "moving" it was, but I don't know which angle to go for because this book was all those things. This book made me laugh and it made me anxious and I just loved it. It's too bad that it ended in a perfect place because I would definitely sign up for a Southern Book Club series. Patricia Campbell’s life has never felt smaller. Her ambitious husband is too busy to kiss her good-bye in the morning, her kids are wrapped up in their own lives, and she’s always a step behind on thank-you notes and endless chores. The one thing she has to look forward to is her book club, a close-knit group of Charleston women united by their love of true crime and suspenseful fiction. This one is not my normal story and one that was not on my radar to read, but after seeing how much fun some TS were having in a group read, that fear of missing out on a fun discussion had me joining in. That overthinker in me almost ruined the story, and that over-analyzer saved it for me along with my curiosity. I struggled at first with a few of those the gory scenes and with a darkly disturbing part to the story and almost did not finish, but I had to know why so many readers loved this one. Once the story hit that major turning point, everything started to become clear to me as to why! The novel begins with an omniscient narrator who tells us that the story begins with the bloody childbirth of five little girls who grow up to be housewives in the wealthy Old Village of South Carolina. Their story, the narrator says, will also end in blood.

The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires" by Grady Hendrix is a creative mix of Horror and Southern Fiction! Devil in Plain Sight: James is one of these as Patricia becomes more and more aware of this; it's suggested, in fact, that he used the boundaries of polite society to achieve this, rather than his actual vampiric powers. The title - misleading. The book is about one vampire and the Southern Book Club doesn't band together to fight him until 85% of the book is finished. it's not a witty book about southern women fighting vampires at all. As fun (and as creepy) as the title suggests….This novel will definitely whet your appetite if you’re looking for something a bit eccentric and spooky.” —BuzzFeedJadePhoenix13 on Reading The Wheel of Time: Taim Tells Lies and Rand Shares His Plan in Winter’s Heart (Part 3) 3 hours ago What a unique book, I’ve never read one quite like it. It’s quirky and campy and so much fun. I loved seeing how Patricia grew from a mousy genteel southern lady to a bad ass who will do anything to protect her family. The next section is dated August of 1993 and is titled “Psycho.” The women attempt to go to the police, but their husbands stop them because they are working on a housing development project in Six Mile with James. The husbands make their wives apologize to James for starting rumors. James accepts their apology and suggests he join book club permanently so they will realize they have nothing to fear from him. The women agree, but Patricia is devastated that no one believes her. She tries to kill herself by taking all of the Prozac that her husband gave her. When she wakes up in the hospital, he tells her he will take the children away from her if she does not decide to give up on her conspiracy theory. as a preview, here’s a (relatively) cute version of aural invasion. it’s cute if you think, like i did at first, that it’s a ring-tailed lemur in some sort of cave but then OH NOOOOO! Hendrix writes Horror Comedy so well, somehow making it lighthearted, yet horrifying at the same time. It's really quite a skill.

Patricia Campbell is an unfulfilled Charleston housewife, with one thing to look forward to-the evenings spent with her book club-other mothers who love to read and discuss true crime books. Nothing seems more satisfying than discussing Helter Skelter, Psycho or James Bundy? The Gracious Cay development that James sponsors in the Six Mile neighborhood is a case of Villainous Gentrification as plain as day, once again exploiting poor people who society won't miss. This is not one of Hendrix’s lighter books. This is hardcore, graphic, physically and psychologically violent, gory horror. The gory parts are hard to read and the psychological horror even tougher. There are some funny moments but it’s not humor and it sure isn’t romance. D'Alessandro, Anthony (2020-06-15). "New Republic Pictures Acquires Grady Hendrix's Novel 'Horrorstör' ". Deadline . Retrieved 2020-08-04. Fat, Sweaty Southerner in a White Suit: Mr. Harris is pretty fit, but he does not like the sun at all. Furthermore, once money starts flooding into the Old Village from the housing development, a lot of people start adopting this style which doesn't suit them.The title is misleading. They got the Southern Book Club part right, but if you go into this book thinking that multiple vampires will be slain by said book club, you will be disappointed. Not only do most of the book club members not even believe there is a vampire in town for at least 80% of the book, but notice that I said “vampire” and not “vampires”. Also, in no way is this book a “guide” to anything, so I feel the title was chosen to be literary and cool and catchy. Fried Green Tomatoesand Steel Magnoliasmeet Draculain this horror novel set in 1990s suburban Charleston I was so thrown by the way the plot went too. I never knew what was going to happen next and I was LIVING ,for that. It wasnt a light horror romp which is what I expected. It was atmospheric and heavy and the while the antagonist was a monster he certainly wasnt the only one in the book.

the stories themselves are not played for laffs. that’s not to say there’s never anything funny in them, but they’re not the campy adventures the covers might lead you to expect. Then this dude comes to town and, because we all know the title of this book, its pretty easy to guess where things go from there. Let's just say things are about get very spicy indeed. Patricia, in good-neighborly spirits, invites him along to her Book Club. After all, how much harm could his presence bring? In my opinion, no. So this book didn't work for me as satire because Hendrix is only exposing a problem... a problem that the characters in the book seem to be ok with existing or having existed. I really wanted there to be more critique here, but there just wasn't. The choices these women had to make were hard, and they were never offered the easy option. Southern ladies are not cute and cuddly. They are tough, strong women who will mess you up.

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Did the rape scenes (there are 4 that are either portrayed or discussed in detail) need to be that graphic? The book is adamant that housewives and mothers are often, and stupidly, underestimated, that there is strength in numbers, and that you should never ever apologize for your reading material. There’s a lot of trauma to get through before the celebrating, though. Patricia faces losses for a long time before she garners any victories. James Harris, with a polite voice and a smile on his face, befriends her children, gets all the husbands of her friends financially entangled in his investments, and convinces everyone, sometimes even including Patricia, that she is mentally unstable and unreliable. Worst of all, he ingratiates himself into Patricia’s beloved book club, turning it from a safe space for women to yet another event which men control and dominate. A] clever, addictive vampire thriller….This powerful, eclectic novel both pays homage to the literary vampire canon and stands singularly within it.”— Publishers Weekly, starred review On the surface, this one is not what it seems, through the brilliantly layered southern humour, horrifying twists, what seems like stereotyped characters and insightful social commentary comes a powerful turning point in the story that made this one an eclectic sightful, thrilling and entertaining read.