Bury Your Gays

Chuck Tingle is king of queer horror. He can be queen if he wants, I know he is non-dysphoric trans, but whatever kind non-authoritarian benevolent monarch title works, he is it. This novel Bury Your Gays and his other traditional published novel Camp Damascus are set in the same layer of the Tingleverse, and I should explain that if you don't know Chuck Tingle lore.

So, Tingleverse is a multi-layer reality, all infinite number of universes stacked on top of each other. The higher up a story is, the closer everything in the story is to our base reality. The lower, the stranger and more about butts and dicks and all that you see in his internet published short stories. But in all layers Love is Real. Outside the Tingleverse is the Void, which comes seeping in and brings monsters and horrors, and that is partially where the horrors in his horror novels come from. So, Camp Damascus and Bury Your Gays take place in the same layer, but it is a little down from our top layer so more weirdness can happen. The novels reference each other in really tiny ways but you don't need one before the other.

I don't want to give too much information on the plot because there are some nice surprises and it is best to just experience them. But it has a lot to do with "capitalism is terrible" and "generative AI is terrible" and "hollywood is often terrible" and writing horror as a way of overcoming childhood trauma. Like, the monsters in the book come straight from the protagonist's childhood experiences with homophobia by friends and family, that he wrote into film and television. And there is the big theme that queer joy is not a forced thing and we should be able to write whatever queer stories we want to write rather than whatever is profitable for big media or The Algorithm.

The ending climax made me laugh and cheer and cover up my smile with my hand. It was that good.

I have to admit I'm a bit unsure how to feel about this. I really loved the writing style and the characters. The tension was very high until it was revealed what the “antagonist” was… This is a trope I don't really enjoy in movies either and didn't enjoy much more here unfortunately… Which is a shame! Up to this point it had the potential of a five stars. I understand this is a me problem though and I definitely want to check out more by this author!

I just finished Bury Your Gays by Chuck Tingle and here are my thoughts.

Misha should be on cloud nine. He has an oscar nomination under his belt and his long time running show has excellent ratings. The studio wants him to do one teeny tiny thing... Kill off the gay characters in the season finale.

As a gay man half in the closet, he can't bring himself to do it. When he tells the studio no, that should be the end of it right? Except now, his written creations for the screen, are coming to life and if they follow their personas in the real world... He has 5 days before he dies. No matter where he goes, they are right there, stalking him.

Haunted by a past he wanted to forget, he must figure out how this is happening and how to save his career and his life.

When I read the synopsis of the book I was like huh.... Wasn't giving away much of what the book was about but it was in the horror genre and I love horror so I thought, why the heck not.... I am so glad I did.

It is heavy on the LGBTQ rep so if that isn't something you like, you may wanna give it a miss. I found it actually elevated the story because you can see how Misha ended up writing the things he wrote and why he became as closed off as he did. I know some people get weird about books that lean heavily in but I think this book really did an excellent job of balancing it out.

I loved that we got a glimpse of Misha's past and it explains how his experiences helped him write the characters that are now alive and stalking him. I thought it added some real depth to the story.

Narrator was great. I felt really invested in the book and I loved the creepy undertones that are weaved within the story.

It's not a long book so I finished the audio in a morning but it was so well done and I was blown away with the clever dialogue and epic storytelling.

I am a fan! I'm not gonna lie, I need more books like this.

4.5 stars

Thank you to @netgalley and @macmillanaudio for my gifted alc

Out now and well worth it (I mean come on! The cover alone did it for me)

#buryyourgays #chucktingle #horror #lgbtqrep #gayreads #booklover #audiobook #audiobooklover #audiobookreview #bookalorian #bookblog