We Sold Our Souls

Technically, this was a horror book. I mean of course it was, it had dicey moments and something really dark going on in the background, but also, I felt it was more defined by its... weirdness? It had some supernatural elements, some things that happened never got explained and it's all open-ended.
Also, really fucking good.
I read about 2 pages of it once before and then I stopped, but now it hit differently and I had an absolute blast.

Kris is middle-aged woman working in a cheap hotel as a receptionist. She used to play guitar in the metal band Dürt Würk. They almost made it, until their singer, Terry, got them a fishy contract with a sleazy manager, which Kris refused to accept and it all ended in a disaster and the band falling apart.
Now Terry is back, a metal superstar while Kris is unhappy, lonely and unsuccessful, not even playing anymore. But she needs to find out what went wrong with their original band, because she can't quite remember and it all seems... wrong.

Now obviously this book is full of references of music, which I completely missed. Why? Because I don't know shit about music. I listen to it and I enjoy it and it's all good fun, but I'm also tone deaf and I don't know anything about theory.
You don't need to. The story still makes sense and the emotions are universal; regret and trying to make things right after events that can't be undone.

Extra points for middle-aged protagonists. We all know the books about people doing it for the first time, but what happens after that? This is a book about picking up the pieces and having one last stand against something fucked up going on.
And it is fucked. The first half of the book is about the current miseries of Kris and her old bandmates. At first it doesn't seem worse than people way over their glory days and feeling sad over not being free and wild.
By the end it becomes about some messed up conspiracy stuff. Things that make perfect sense. Feelings you have probably felt at least in some way about pop culture, about the things that are meant to give joy. Sure, I don't think it's all supernatural, but man, would it make sense. I feel for Kris seeing her passion tuning into something disgusting.
The book was just as much about media and the content we consume as about Kris' personal journey. Now I probably sound very I'm-14-and-this-is-deep, but fuck, commercial media can be such a joyless affair it almost feels like there must be someone behind it being that way.

Now I want to read more by this author. BRB, I need to pick up another one.