Night of the Mannequins

Okay so I have a few things to say about this novella. The story was interesting and definitely unique but I realized I just wanted it to be over. I expected something different. With the title Night of the Mannequins I expected creepy mannequins popping up around town or something more spooky.

This is my first time reading Stephen Graham Jones and I don't know if I'm a fan. His writing is too wordy and kind of veers off often with descriptions and tidbits I feel are unnecessary for the story. To be honest, I feel like there are too many run-on sentences that make the story confusing and overwhelming at points. It's like an information overload. I want to read his other works specifically The Only Good Indians, but I'm reluctant to because I could barely get through a novella of only 131 pages. I can't imagine trying to read an entire novel of run on sentences and extra descriptive words. It sounds tedious and boring. I gave the novella 1 star. I did enjoy some parts of the story but his writing style is not for me.

Off and on, while I was reading this, I couldn't decide if I was liking it or not. It's a quick read, 130 sparsely populated pages, so I never considered quitting. Since the story is narrated by a character, what was happening was pretty transparent and consequently, there wasn't a lot of surprise/tension. Once it got to the last 20 pages, things got more interesting.

I think it's hard to talk about without giving it away. I can say that it's about one mannequin, a few teenagers, and lots of death. Like the cover marketing says, it is indeed “twisted.” It's super weird and ambiguous, which are things I like. It was also funny at times, in that dark way.

I finished the book with a feeling of “huh...” but it was an entertaining kind of “huh...”

Well... this was not what I was expecting.

This book was so original and I definitely haven't read anything quite like this. It was suspenseful and fast-paced. It was a classic horror novella.

I love slashers so this was right up my alley. Sawyer was a character that you couldn't help but root for, despite his horrific actions. I would say more about my thoughts on the plot but I think this is a good book to go into blind.

The ending left me feeling unsatisfied and that's why I couldn't rate this any higher than I had.

Okay this is my second SGJ book after My heart is a chainsaw and I think I've cracked it. His writing style is strange. Even the sentence structure at times is very odd. It's like I need a minute or two to make sense of it. Maybe the intention was to portray teen angst, but honestly it was tough to keep up. Too bad as the plot was boring and quite frankly not scary, which I was hoping for.

3.5 stars!
this was a pretty fun, campy, horror read. I really enjoyed the writing style and how it really just felt like Sawyer was a friend casually talking to me and telling me this weird story. I wish there was a little bit more explanation throughout, especially with the ending, but obviously that's hard to do in such a short story. would definitely recommended and I'm excited to check out more from this author!

This wasn't the book I was expecting, but it was still a decent read. In comparison to SGJ's other books, especially his recent novel The Only Good Indians, I felt like this novella fell flat- but taken objectively by itself it was still kind of fun. The book is set in a town near to where I grew up, so it was fun to see North Texas represented in horror fiction! SGJ also did a great job of expressing character in his quick paced and sometimes rambling writing style in the voice of a teenage narrator, in someways this book reminded me of his earlier work, Mongrels, but with more of an edge. I also appreciated seeing anxiety and saviorism taken to an extreme in this psychological horror, albeit I felt like the book really stretched my suspension of disbelief to the breaking point several times. I think my expectations for this book were perhaps too high, but I still mostly enjoyed this tale.