NOS4A2 by Joe Hill
Reviewed by Steven Smokin’ Socks Warren
In a nearly surprising turn of events, the newest, most ferociously satisfying brick of horror to haunt our creaky shelves comes not from Stephen King, but from his depraved offspring, the inimitable Joe Hill. NOS4A2, a hideously hefty treatise on the interconnected, phantasmagorical pathways that make a labyrinth of the creative mind, executes its task with all the guileless imprecision of a rickety motorcycle backfiring along a dirt road, and the staccato explosions of terror that ensue are just as impossible to ignore.
Within the tome’s pages, a celebrated children’s author and recovering human being must re-learn an imaginary skill set and defeat monsters both internal and brazenly alien in order to redeem herself and save her family. Defying her less-than-righteous protocol is a spookily realistic hobgoblin whose only desire is to indefinitely preserve the innocence of lost children as he takes shortcuts through reality in his spectral 1938 Rolls Royce Wraith.
Pound for frenzied pound, NOS4A2 transcends the genre by elevating the mundane, splattered night-rampages of standard horror fare to the bizarre, cerebral night-rampages of this postmodern blood diamond. Drenched in metaphor, Joe Hill’s doorstop narrative drives full tilt from cover to hectic cover, leaving erudite, analytical propositions along with burnt rubber casualties of the plot smoking in its deep red taillights.
Joe Hill is the Bram Stoker Award winning author of Heart-Shaped Box, Horns, the short story collection 20th Century Ghosts, and the Locke & Key series of graphic novels. NOS4A2, his newest novel, knocked my socks off and then set them on fire.
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