A Head Full of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
A Head Full of Ghosts could be described glibly as “The Exorcist meets Discovery Channel Reality TV show” but that sells it short.
The story of a 14 year old girl who may be possessed by a demon or may just be suffering from mental illness, is told from the perspective of her younger sister, eight at the time and 23 in the present day. There are three threads that Meredith “Merry” Barrett presents to the reader. One is a straight re-telling of the events that happened to her family in 2001, another is as analysis of the Discovery show “The Possession” presented in a blog under a pseudonym, and the third is Merry sharing her story with a writer putting together a book on the events.
Tremblay does a terrific job in capturing the essence of the eight year old Merry, a smart girl still prone to the flights of fancy that seem perfectly natural in the mind of a child. The slow unraveling of her parents and sister is both sad and horrifying to witness.
The relationship between the sisters forms the core of the story and it is by turns touching, funny and freaky. Marjorie, the older sister, initially appears whimsical, but that whimsy turns macabre as she comes apart. When the Discovery crew arrives to record the family’s activities, hoping (and to an extent trying to manufacture) some really weird stuff, the story eases up and lets the reader breathe easy for a bit. Then it turns even darker as the father brings in a priest (and yes, another, younger priest–Trembay openly pays homage to almost every possession-themed movie out there) and everything turns toward an inevitable exorcism.
The thing I enjoyed most about A Head Full of Ghosts is the way it constantly challenges the reader to determine what is real, what is fake, what’s being done for show and what’s being done because people no longer have control. It’s not an especially scary book–though there are scares to be had–but it is disturbing. Conversely, the deconstruction of familiar horror tropes is to the point and often quite funny. Somehow Tremblay makes the two work together.
Recommended.
Share this post on social media.