Book: Horrorstor
Author: Grady Hendrix
Pages: 332
Read On: My iPad
How Long it Took Me to Read: 2 days
Plot Summary: Something strange is happening at the Orsk furniture superstore in Cleveland, Ohio. Every morning, employees arrive to find broken Kjerring bookshelves, shattered Glans water goblets, and smashed Liripip wardrobes. Sales are down, security cameras reveal nothing, and store managers are panicking.
To unravel the mystery, three employees volunteer to work a nine-hour dusk-till-dawn shift. In the dead of the night, they’ll patrol the empty showroom floor, investigate strange sights and sounds, and encounter horrors that defy the imagination.
A traditional haunted house story in a thoroughly contemporary setting, Horrorstör comes packaged in the form of a glossy mail order catalog, complete with product illustrations, a home delivery order form, and a map of Orsk’s labyrinthine showroom.
General Thoughts: For some odd reason I was under the impression that this was a graphic novel! I think it was because I heard that this book was designed to looked like an Ikea catalogue. Well, so I stepped into this book hoping for a quick and easy and effortless (all things typical of a graphic novel) read and BAM! it was a regular book.
I won't lie that was a little bit of a letdown for me. I know, it's not the book's fault but still. Letdown it was. I am however, a huge horror fan and wanted to read on.
Things I Liked:
1. The setting of this book was fantastic. A furniture store that after hours turns into a place of nightmares. I could picture the setting very well and I definitely think that stores turn super-duper creepy once the lights are out.
2. I also liked that retail was an interesting setting for a book. I don't think I've ever read a book set in a shop before.
3. The office politics was shown very well in the book.
4. The creepy-ness factor was also pretty high.
5. The way the mystery unravelled and how the past horror was exposed was also done very well.
6. The catalog style of the narrative was also superbly executed.
Things I Didn't Like:
1. It just wasn't scary enough. Creepy yes...scary not so much.
2. Some things were a little predictable. For example, I could tell who was going to survive and who was going to die.
3. The book ends on a possibility of a possible second book...I am not sure if there is going to be second book or not but I don't like books that don't end neatly.
4. I just didn't like any of the characters in the book. I couldn't warm up to them and honestly didn't care if they lived or not. Harsh but true.
Rating: 2.5/5
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