4/5 stars
What's it about? Julie and James leave the city to buy their first home, and the experience exposes their raw and ugly through a nightmarish possession. Is the house and its sinister history to blame, or have the tensions in their marriage finally stretched to breaking? A thoroughly haunting story that creeps under your skin and refuses to fade, much like Julie’s mysterious bruises.
How’d I find it? I comb horror lists every year, and The Grip of It makes repeat appearances. Spotting the unsettling cover at Greedy Reads inspired me to take it home.
Who will enjoy this book? The destabilizing effect of The Grip of It recalls Charlie Kaufman’s I’m Thinking of Ending Things or the more recent (but decidedly less satisfying) Barbarian. Horror fans, you must pick this up.
What stood out? Jemc knows how to spook a reader, and The Grip of It leaves one panting with dread. A scene involving a Mardi Gras mask had me tossing and turning all night. The book is content to leave many of its questions unanswered, including the motives of the voyeuristic neighbor next door. Successful elements aside, the language can become overworked in more emotional moments (“we buck and shatter against the tedium,” for example).
Which line made me feel something? “There is still a chance that everything might be true, that we both might be filled with scars and substances that cause our synapses to fire inefficiently, that cause us to make decisions that are unwise and fantastic, and to believe what shouldn’t be believed, but that is not to say that the world outside our minds is reasonable. That is just to say there is no sense in knowing where the line is drawn.”