John Hornor Jacobs
In my experience, it is easier for works of horror to fail than it is for works of any other genre. A work of horror can inspire terror in a number of different ways, and what one person finds effective often doesn't work for the next person. Is it more frightening to know that you're being watched from the woods by something unknown? Or to know what horrible thing it is that's watching you? Is it worse to fear what may become of a character or is it worse to know what horrible thing happens to that character? In other words, how much of terror is a product of mystery and the unknown on the one hand, and certainty of known horrors on the other?
For me personally, the intimation of the terrifying--the approach that focuses on developing a sense of mystery and the unknown--is almost always more effective and interesting than an approach that emphasizes known horrors. Southern Gods, the debut novel from John Hornor Jacobs, utilizes both approaches and for that reason the first half of the book was some of the most effective horror writing I've encountered in some time while the second half really fell flat for me personally.
The premise of this novel was simply too promising to pass up. Tough guy veteran Bull Ingram is hired by a record company owner to search post-World War II Arkansas for two things: one of his music promoters who has vanished, and a man by the name of Ramblin' John Hastur, a local blues legend who is said to have sold his soul to the devil in exchange for his musical abilities, Robert Johnson-style. Hastur's music is said to cause people to go insane and to act out their basest violent and sexual proclivities. Ingram gets a taste of this when he hears a sample of Hastur's music and immediately starts feeling inexplicably violent and enraged.
The first half of the book takes this extremely promising premise and runs with it. Bull enters a the rural Arkansas backwater and encounters increasingly frightening evidence that things did not turn out well for the missing promoter and that there really may be something to the rumors about Hastur. I could not put this work of the Southern Gothic down for this first part. While this is only his first novel, Mr. Jacobs does a wonderful job of creating suspense and conveying a sense of the ominousness of backwoods Arkansas. At this point, I thought there was a chance that Southern Gods might even dethrone Bill Hussey's Through A Glass, Darkly (review here) as my favorite horror novel ever.
At some point, though, Mr. Jacobs moves the focus of the novel away from Bull's increasingly ominous descent into rural Arkansas and begins to focus on another aspect of his narrative. This other aspect concerns Sarah, the abused wife of an alcoholic, who has retreated with her daughter to her childhood home in Arkansas to get away from her husband and to gather herself. There's nothing particularly wrong with this thread of the story, except that it served to interrupt and often diffuse the suspense and mystery that Mr. Jacobs was so capably developing in the Bull thread of the story.
The suspense, mystery, and terror was finally killed for me when the source of the events turned out to be a Lovecraftian entity. Say what you will about Lovecraftian fiction, but the complete lack of mystery and suspense that accompanied this resolution was so antithetical to the brilliant first half of the book that I was almost angry that Mr. Jacobs had squandered such a promising start.
Despite my qualms with the book, it is undeniable that Mr. Jacobs is a very promising entrant onto the field. His prose reads more like that of a seasoned pro than it does a debut novelist. More importantly, as he demonstrates with the first half of the book, Mr. Jacobs clearly possesses the capacity to write extremely effective horror. Keep your eye on this one. He has a bright career ahead of him.
Rating: 7/10
The True First
Southern Gods was first published by Night Shade Books in 2011 as a trade paperback. Sadly, no hardcover edition is available.
[This review was not based on a review copy]
2 comments:
Considering the guy's last name is Hastur, you probably should have seen the Lovecraftian stuff coming.
@Donald: I did see the Lovecraftian stuff coming (and the blurb itself makes it clear that the book has Lovecraftian elements). I have no problem at all with Lovecraftian writing and enjoy a lot of it quite a bit. It's just that in this particular case, I felt like the author was going out of his way to add Lovecraftian elements in a way that damaged the great story he'd been building up to that point.
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