Horns: A Novel

Ig Perrish wakes up one morning with a hell of a hangover and discovers that he has grown horns on his head. He has become a (the?) devil, has powers and thus opportunities (but also downsides) he didn't have before, and within a short time, he knows just what he wants to do with them - take revenge for a hideous wrong. How best to do it?

That's simple enough, an amusing premise for something of a supernatural thriller, but Joe Hill does more than just exploit that - a lot more.

First of all, the book is just crazy funny. Hill has a great ear for dialogue, his scenes are often completely absurd and yet somehow believeable, and the situations are, after all, ridiculous on their face, but he makes it all work.

Second, his plotting (for such a strange book) is tight. The heart of the book is something of a murder mystery, and Hill uses flashbacks from various characters to good effect, putting the pieces of the puzzle in place in a pretty clever way.

Third, there is something more than just a wild ride for his characters here - there is actually a touching love story, and the revelations behind various motivations and actions are really well done. The last 50 pages or so, and especially the last 20, are in fact just downright intimate - and all without seeming mawkish or losing the flavor of the very strange ending.

It's a crime story, a horror story, a love story - frankly, it's a lot like something Steven King would have written 20 years ago. It's excellent.

I've been waiting for the release of Joe Hill's second book ever since I finished his debut masterpiece "Heart Shaped Box." Sadly, Hill hits a bit of a sophmore slump here and Horns fails to live up to its potential.

To start, Joe Hill is a fabulous writer. His prose is some of the best in horror today and his use of imaging and metaphors are that of a writer with far more books under his belt. Furthermore, his characters are welll drawn and multifaceted. Where Hill falls in Horns is on the plot itself.

Horns styles itself a horror novel, but mostly it is an almost Jodi Picoult look at love and tragedy and its effects on three main characters. Ig makes for a good main character and the first 70 pages which deal with his new horns and their ability to make people tell the horrible truth about their sins is fascinating. Ig is a suspected murderer and he finds out the true feelings of his accquaintances and relatives. Sadly, after a roaring first fifth of the book, the real murderer is revealed and we are plunged into a long flashback taking Ig and the other characters from teenagers to adulthood with a few present day chapters sprinkled in.

The horns chapters are good, the flashback chapters are good, but they never seem to find a happy connection with each other. The ending also feels rushed and like the final gasp of a writer who just wanted to get the book out of his life as soon as he could.

Horns isn't a poor book by any means, there are many plasures to be had with it. However, it does not rival Heart Shaped Box in any way. We can only hope book number three will be a return to glory.

What can happen to a man when the woman he loves is brutally raped and murdered and everyone -- including his own parents -- thinks he did it despite there being no evidence to justify the theory? What does happen one year later when that man wakes up after a bender and discovers he has horns growing out of his temples?

These questions are the basis of Joe Hill's (the pseudonym adopted by Stephen King's son) newest novel. When Ignatius Perrish wakes up with a horrendous headache after he gets his drunk on at the one year anniversary of his girlfriend Merrin Williams's murder, he thinks it's a simple hangover until he sees the horns growing from his temples. Just as disturbing is that not only are people not terribly bothered by the horns but that they start confessing their darkest secrets to him. Then he learns his brother's worst secret -- he knows who really killed Merrin -- and sets out for revenge.

The format of the book is a bit disconcerting and almost put me off. It seemed strange for Ig to learn who killed Merrin within the first 50 pages of a 300+ page novel. This is because much of the book is flashback. At first, this format was annoying, but I got used to it. The flashbacks turned out to be illuminating -- about Ig, about the murderer, and about how each of them viewed Merrin and their respective relationships with her. I was all set to give it four stars out of five until I read the climax. My reaction put simply = BOO! My reaction put more intelligently = it was not nearly as climactic as it could have been. The level of betrayal Merrin and Ig experience deserves a much stronger resolution than it got. The denoument, however, was very good.

For his sophomore novel, Hill didn't do too badly, but I was not as impressed with Horns as I was with his debut, Heart-Shaped Box. Still, I won't cut him from my "To Read" list when his next novel comes out.

When Ig Perrish wakes up after a night of drunken self-pity, he finds a pair of enormous horns sprouting from his forehead. This is only the first in a series of uncomfortable transformations: people share uncomfortable secrets with him, he can flawlessly imitate other voices, snakes gaze at him longingly and there's even a bit of breathing fire.

The demonization of Ig Perrish is only the latest thing to go wrong for him. Ig's been the town outcast for a year - ever since his girlfriend was found raped & murdered on the edge of town. Merrin had just dumped Ig (in public), so the popular sentiment has varied between 'string him up' and 'set him on fire first'.

Ig quickly discovers that the horns (and everything that goes with them) aren't a full-on curse, as much as they are a mixed blessing. With their eerie, mind-altering abilities, it doesn't take him long to discover the truth behind Merrin's death. The challenge, however, is in what he can do about it.

In Horns, Joe Hill writes a deliciously & aggressively blasphemous book. The town's stockpile of good Christians (including the pastor) are quickly revealed as unpleasant hypocrites. The role of God and prayer are challenged from start to finish - with Ig repeatedly reaching the same conclusion: while God is an absentee parent, the Devil's got humanity's best interests at heart. Perhaps the high point is Ig's own sermon on the mount - at the moment he accepts his fate, he declaims his new vision to an audience of snakes. The speech is tender and hilarious (the Devil is pro-Love and anti-polyester).

But the sympathy for the Devil shtick isn't where Hill's true daring comes into play. In Ig, Joe Hill has created an omniscient, omnipotent, invulnerable protagonist. And, yet Horns is neither boring nor predictable. Just because Ig knows everything doesn't mean he's put it all together - he's got the power of the Devil, but the mind of an ordinary guy. The mystery is unravelled one tantalizing piece at a time, culminating in a sequence of genuine surprises and revelations - and one hell of an explosive climax.

Horns is an absolutely brilliant piece of work that snared me from the first pages. Initially in awe ("How could this possibly keep up for an entire book?"), I was very quickly absorbed in Ig & Merrin's story. For a book that stars the Devil, this is a very human drama. And for a second novel, Hill's already written his name in the (five-pointed) stars.

I read Heart Shaped Box first, and didn't love it, but I am such a fan of Locke & Key that I wanted to give Joe Hill another chance. I'm sorry to say I'm done with his novels after reading Horns. The idea was there, and it was an intriguing idea. However, it was so poorly executed. He may as well have titled this book "Flashback" because that's what 70% of the book was, unnecessary flashbacks. I understand a quick blurb about how someone got messed up, and quick moment to explain how you met someone. But the flashbacks were so often and so long, by the time we got back to the story, I'd have to flip back a few chapters to remember what was going on. It was too much, and not needed to propel the story. If you tell me a character was in love with his girlfriend, I believe you. There's no need for chapter after chapter detailing their entire courtship to prove it. In the end, the storytelling was weak and took me too far out of the actual plot. Excellent idea, horribly laid out, and an ending so weak that it felt like his hand cramped up and he just wanted to quit typing, so he ended it. Usually when a book drags like this one did, I'm relieved when it's over, but this book, somehow, managed to make me long for an ending, but then disappoint me with it when it came.