Run 375 Average pace: 5:32/km
Location: Brunette River trail and Burnaby Lake (CCW)
Distance: 5.03 km
Time: 27:52
Weather: Overcast, some sun
Temp: 23ºC
Wind: light
Calories burned: 377
Weight: 162.8 pounds <0.2
Total distance to date: 3085
Device used: iPhone 6
Run 376 Average pace: 5:46/km
Location: Burnaby Lake (CCW)
Distance: 5.03 km
Time: 28:58
Weather: Overcast, some sun
Temp: 23ºC
Wind: light
Calories burned: 377
Weight: 162.8 pounds <0.2
Total distance to date: 3090
Device used: iPhone 6
Having two very solid runs during the week, I still found myself approaching the weekend run with some trepidation, because the mid-week runs were so much better than my previous efforts. It seemed odd. Good, but odd.
My plan was to take the best of the mid-week runs by starting on the river trail, then to continue on to the lake, possibly stretching out to 7K instead of 5K. Looking at the first 2 km of the run, I could see my pace was already well off, though the drop from the first km to the second was about the same. On Thursday I finished the first km at 4:46/km and today lagged behind at 5:00/km, ending with a lousy overall pace of 5:32/km, a big drop from the mid-week efforts.
I walked for the next 15 minutes mulling why this happened but have no good answers. Difference in the time of day? Temperature? Humidity? Alignment of moon/planets?
I then decided to do another 5K because why not? I was halfway around the lake so I’d have to walk it, anyway, and running would get me home sooner to lay down and think further about being slower. Starting just past the bridge at Still Creek, I ran a second 5K and my pace was unsurprisingly slower at 5:46/km but I actually didn’t feel too bad (I got a small stitch in my lower right side on the first run). I took solace in the fact that I did 10K, albeit in a bit of a cheaty fashion.
The only downside came around the 3K mark when I saw a large bug ahead of me. When I say large I’m not talking giant African beetle that can cut your fingers off with its pincers, more like something a little smaller than a housefly but way bigger than a gnat. The reason I saw it at all was because of its size. It flew straight into my mouth, like a bullet fired from a gun. Then it got lodged in my throat. At first I thought I had managed to swallow it (trying to stay positive, I kept thinking free protein, free protein) but it became clear I had not. I started to cough and this moved it into a position where it grew exponentially more irritating. I started gagging and choking. I mixed in more coughs for variety. I was less than a km away from hitting 5K, I didn’t want to stop.
Finally it seemed to go down. I ran into another cloud of them and tried punching the bugs, with limited success. I actually improved my pace over the last km, perhaps lifted by the sense that I was no longer choking to death.
Overall, I am disappointed at my slower pace for these runs, but quietly satisfied that I managed two 5Ks. I am most curious to see what Tuesday will be like.
It does many things right and kept me interested and reading through to the end to find out what happened next, and yet it still ended up as somewhat unsatisfying. It’s still a good story and if you like horror and aren’t squeamish, it may be worth checking out.
The rest of this review has major spoilers, so skip if you are spoiler-averse.
On the plus side, The Ruins moves at a brisk pace, the prose is lean and direct and there is an inexorable sense of moving forward, of events heading toward a definite conclusion. The characters are varied without lapsing into stereotypes and behave much in the way that you might expect people in their early 20s would–with adult care and thought, but always with the undercurrent of their not-distant childhood running beneath, sometimes erupting in emotional outbursts and petulant actions. Basically these people aren’t shy about yelling and fighting with each other.
The story is a variation on people-trapped-in-a-hostile/haunted-environment. In this case it is the area surrounding the titular ruins. My first pet peeve is that there really aren’t any ruins at all. There’s a mineshaft at the top of a hill and that’s about it. But “The Ruins” sounds a lot cooler than “Mineshaft” so there you go.
We follow what ends up being six people, two couples, and two other young men, one Greek and the other German. The German, Mathias, convinces everyone to join him to find his brother, who is with a group of archaelogists at the ruins, located about 11 miles away from the Mexican town of Coba. And so the group of twenty-somethings leaves behind lazing about on tropical beaches to venture into the jungle.
Things start going sideways when one of them backs into some seemingly innocuous vines. This causes the Mayans of a nearby village to freak out and, using bows and pistols, they force the group up the hill. It eventually becomes clear that the vines are very bad and the Mayans, having salted the earth, are determined to not allow anyone who contacts them to leave the ruins. Well, the hill with the mineshaft.
Over the next few days things deteriorate rapidly. The Greek breaks his back falling down the mineshaft, the vines worm their way into one of the men, the vines actively plot and move against them. Several times the vines literally laugh at the group, mocking their fate. How would you feel being laughed at by a plant? And then when you say “I’m out of here” there’s some Mayan standing there ready to fill you full of arrows. You’d probably feel a bit bummed out.
The group struggles to maintain hope as they ration their meager supplies and wait for potential rescue but the story strongly and repeatedly makes it clear that they are doomed. And they are. Spoiler: everyone dies.
Now, some people may have a problem with sentient, evil plants that can plot, mimic human voices, manufacture scents and smells as traps and generally carry on in ways that are unlike any plant you are likely to come across. And really, it’s quite silly. But if you buy in–and author Scott Smith offers no explanation for the vines, which actually helps with this–you can focus on how well the story plays out.
Watching the group struggle with the vines, the elements, and each other, is interesting and for the most part believable, but I think Smith tips his hand too early, leeching the story of suspense when it seems obvious everyone will die. And when everyone does, you start looking for the big picture, the commentary on society or whatever and it’s not really there. The takeaway I got is “if you’re going to some ruins in a place you’ve never been before, be more prepared than these nitwits were. Also, if all the locals act spooked and tell you to stay away, you may want to listen to them.”
A few plot contrivances struck me as implausible, undercutting the reality that had been built up. Eric, the would-be teacher and manbaby, essentially flays himself with a dirty knife, yet improbably lingers on after losing what seems to be most of his blood. He also manages to accidentally stab Mathias directly in the heart. Speaking of lucky hits, when Jeff, former Eagle scout and de facto leader, decides to try breaking through the Mayans’ gauntlet, the first arrow shot at him manages to pierce straight through his neck. Apparently Mayans are uncanny archers.
Another nitpick is certain writing affectations Smith adopts and uses repeatedly. I’m usually okay with these but for some reason they starting standing out like blood-sucking vines on a patch of barren rock and became distractions. One was a beat that ended many scenes, variations of “And so they did” or “And that’s what happened.” The second and one that stood out much more, was the excessive use of “of course.” It felt like there was a sentence on every other page that ended with “of course,” such as “Amy wouldn’t actually kiss the Greek, of course” or “The Mayans would still be waiting for them at the bottom of the hill, of course” or “And that’s what happened, of course.” It started bugging me toward the end. On the one hand, it’s a convenient shorthand that gets across tone in a few words. But anything used to excess is going to be too much, of course.
Still, I liked the writing overall. As I said up top, the prose is lean and direct, Smith is economical and efficient but the writing never seems perfunctory or threadbare. He manages to take a very limiting situation and keeps it interesting and varied. The characters are at times petty and annoying, but never to the point of being genuinely unlikeable.
The Ruins, then, gets a provisional thumbs-up from me. Its premise is goofy, the story telegraphs the ending too early, but the journey to get there is still an interesting one.
Run 374 Average pace: 5:10/km
Location: Brunette River trail
Distance: 5.01 km
Time: 25:55
Weather: Sunny
Temp: 21ºC
Wind: breezy
Calories burned: 374
Weight: 163 pounds <1.2
Total distance to date: 3080
Device used: iPhone 6
Two days later and it was significantly warmer at 21ºC. Fortunately it wasn’t too warm and my fears of being slower went unfounded. I pushed toward the end, successfully picking up speed on the last km, and managed to finish slightly ahead of Tuesday’s pace, coming in at 5:10/km. This run also marked the first time this year that I did a full week’s worth of runs. Yay.
There’s not much else to add. The run went much as it did on the previous one, though I better planned my switchbacks so I could end before getting to the gate (and the road/sidewalk). Some dope on a bicycle came flying around a blind corner and had to make a sudden course correction to avoid plowing into me. Why do people do these things? “Hey, I know, I’ll ride my bike really fast around this blind corner where I can’t see what, if anything, is coming. Nor will I be able to see if there’s just a giant abyss to sail into, or large pointy spikes to be impaled on, or a rabid dog. Or an abyss filled with pointy spikes and rabid dogs.” I think if I got on a bike again I’d spontaneously start hating myself.
Anyway, I’m cautiously hopeful that I can keep the pace up with a more ambitious run on Sunday.
Run 373 Average pace: 5:12/km
Location: Brunette River trail
Distance: 5.03 km
Time: 26:11
Weather: Sun/rain mix
Temp: 12ºC
Wind: light
Calories burned: 382
Weight: 164.2 pounds >0.4
Total distance to date: 3075
Device used: iPhone 6
For the first time this year I ran on the Brunette River trail and I ran on an actual regular schedule, heading out only two days after my last run. Zounds.
The sky looked generally non-threatening, apart from one fat black cloud skating over the area. I felt a few drops on the walk to the trail but nothing more…until I got to the trail, at which point the fat black cloud opened up. At the same time the sun came out so the first two km of the run was a weird mix of sunshine and steady rain. It stopped after that and I dried quickly, so it was a good opportunity to overcome my usual distaste for running in the rain.
The best news, though, was my pace. I was definitely feeling more energetic and finished with a pace of 5:12/km, a full 30 seconds better than Sunday’s run and still 24 seconds better than my best pace of the year. I broke the 5:00/km mark on the first km and held up decently after. It was nice to see some good numbers after plodding along.
Also, likely because of the weather (it was also only 12ºC, not exactly balmy) I did not see a single other person on the trail during the run. I felt a bit like the Omega man.
My next run is set for Thursday. Here’s hoping I can at least come close to matching tonight’s pace. Excelsior!
Run 372 Average pace: 5:42/km
Location: Burnaby Lake (CCW)
Distance: 5.03 km
Time: 28:42
Weather: Sunny
Temp: 19-22ºC
Wind: high
Calories burned: 385
Weight: 163.8 pounds <1.2
Total distance to date: 3070
Device used: iPhone 6
Today’s run was much the same as last Sunday’s, except it was warmer and I was a bit slower. I didn’t have the energy to do a real final burst but the last three km were steady, a plus.
I didn’t end up running during the week because I am bad and lazy. I’ll try again this week, guilting myself into it somehow.
Otherwise today’s run had no complications. The left foot was sore on the walk back but about the same as it’s been, no better and no worse. It bugs me, that foot. I shake my fist at it.
Run 371 Average pace: 5:36/km
Location: Burnaby Lake (CW)
Distance: 5.03 km
Time: 28:13
Weather: Cloudy, some sun
Temp: 14-16ºC
Wind: moderate
Calories burned: 384
Weight: 165 pounds <1
Total distance to date: 3065
Device used: iPhone 6
After the abysmal effort of last Sunday I knew I was bound to do better today. And I did, hooray!
My pace of 5:36/km is slow in the grand scheme of my running but is my best pace so far this year. I didn’t feel tired heading out and even had enough pep to push a tiny bit during several stretches. I started out strangely disoriented, as for the first time in awhile I began thinking about other things while running (good) and was taken by surprise by the announcement that I’d hit the 1K mark (neither good nor bad). Surveying my surroundings, it seemed I was farther ahead than seemed plausible to have hit 1K, suggesting the GPS was going nutty (bad). As it turned out, I was thinking I was running counter-clockwise when I was actually going clockwise.
I blame it on being so fully absorbed in the task and not going loopy.
The run proceeded without any cramps or other issues and only one cyclist, a little kid on a bike following a jogging parent. It was almost cute (no cyclist is ever cute). The main complication came at the second boardwalk, where a large group of adults, kids, dogs and strollers were assembled and largely not moving, part of some gathering or another. This is the primary reason I don’t like weekend runs, the trails are often filled with people on official outings. Surprisingly, they parted not unlike the Red Sea and I threaded my way through only having to ease up on my pace a little.
The rest of the run was uneventful and the left foot, though sore again on the walk back, was tolerable.
Overall, an encouraging run after last week’s terrible slog.
Bonus Prompt: One of a pair of genetically cloned babies robs a bank.
Story:
Babies are small and weak and lack the necessary muscle strength needed to properly hold and handle guns. They also lack the cognitive skills to think through and design a plan to successfully rob a bank, unless the bank is their diaper and their goal is to rob it by peeing in it.
But if the other cloned baby–the one that doesn’t rob banks–could form complex thoughts, this is what it would think: this is one of the dumbest writing prompts in the history of the universe.
The End.
Prompt #4: You go to donate blood, but something goes terribly wrong (click link to read the story)
I’ve decided that doing all of the writing prompts from 1,000 Creative Writing Prompts, Volume 2 will make me crazy and while that may lead to some inventive writing in its own right, I cherish my mental well-being just enough to not risk it for the sake of describing if I was a piece of macaroni, what shape would I be?
Having said that, I am still going to work from a prompt each day, whether it’s from the above-mentioned book or elsewhere.
Prompt: Write about nature. Include the following words: hard drive, stapler, phone, car, billboard.
Story:
When the time for my vacation came around I decided to go on vacation, being a logical and sensible person. I was tired from working in my high-tech position at a powerful technology company, working on super computers and other technical machines. I needed a break, to get away from it all for a little while. Two weeks, to be precise. I needed to visit Nature and touch trees and roll in the grass.
I booked a week at a fabulous yet quaint resort a co-worker recommended. I was going to have so much fun it would be illegal, as they say. I wouldn’t do anything actually illegal, of course, because that would be against the law.
I arrived at the resort right on time and checked in at the front desk upon arrival. The nice young lady at the counter handed me a small envelope. Inside it were two key cards.
“Gosh,” I said to her, “I was hoping for a simple key. I work with these fancy cards every day!” I laughed and she smiled and then turned away from me. I went to my room, changed into a snazzy pair of plaid shorts, a nice t-shirt from my company and a pair of open-toe sandals. It was warm so I took my socks off, allowing my toes to wiggle freely. Wiggle, toes, wiggle. Ah, vacation!
I went to a bar near the pool and ordered a drink. “I’d like something fruity and sweet, with one of those cute little paper umbrellas in it,” I told the bartender. “Of course, you can substitute some other object if you don’t have little paper umbrellas,” I added. He smiled and turned away from me. When he turned back he offered me a wide, fluted glass filled with a lime green fluid of some sort. Sticking out of the fluid was a miniature hard drive. I noted to the bartender that while this was very cute, it was perhaps not entirely sanitary. He laughed and laughed and told me I was crazy and please just go away. I laughed, too, it was all pretty crazy and funny. I found a free chaise lounge and sat down, putting the drink on an accompanying table. The hard drive looked like it was leaking grease. The bartender never asked for money so I didn’t mind too much.
I settled back into the chair, relaxing in the cool shade of a stapler tree. Wait, I thought, that can’t be right! I looked up and the tree was indeed a large red stapler, standing on end, topped with the fronds of a palm tree. This must be a theme resort, I thought, which made sense since my co-worker was a “nerd” and loved these kinds of things. No wonder he recommended it!
My eyes fluttered open and I realized I had dozed off. How relaxing! The sound of my ringing phone had stirred me out of my slumber. I flipped it open and took the call. It was my car telling me it had run over a billboard. It was crying. Stupid car.
I wasn’t going to let a “smart” car ruin my vacation, though. I told it to clean up the mess and have the bill sent to the company, as it was technically a company car. It honked affirmatively and hung up.
I went back inside and asked the young lady at the front desk if she knew the best place to find trees, to get close to nature. She suggested Yosemite Park, which was over two thousand miles away. Then she laughed and turned away from me. I knew she wanted to make it an adventure, so I also laughed, then did a Google search on my laptop and found a local park that was filled with trees. I called the car to ask if it could pick me up and it had composed itself enough to assure me it could be at the resort in fifteen minutes. I told it to drive carefully and it growled its engine at me. What a saucy car.
Unfortunately the car did not diagnose its condition properly after the billboard incident and it plowed into a copse of trees when we arrived at the park, due to malfunctioning brakes. I broke both legs, bringing my vacation to an early end.
I did touch a tree, though, albeit with my head when I went through the windshield. I think about the irony and laugh and laugh. Ah vacation!
~fin~
Alternately, this is what I first wrote after looking at the prompt. It actually follows the rule of being short-short:
On vacation I relaxed in the cool shade of a stapler tree, sipping on my hard drive julep. Suddenly my phone rang. It was my car telling me it had just run over a billboard. It was crying. Stupid car.
Prompt #2: What past memory do you cherish the most and why? If you could trade that memory for something amazing to happen in the future, would you do it? Why or why not?
Story:
I remember the day I learned to ride a bike. It all happened on that one day, not because I was a fast learner, but because I was determined beyond all reason.
It started out with my father, a man of limited patience, helping to guide me up and down the driveway, having first moved the family car and his beloved Ford pickup out onto the street in front of our house. I sat tentatively on the banana seat of my bike. I called it a mustang for some reason, though I don’t remember the brand now. The training wheels had been screwed off earlier and were sitting in the workshop, ready to be fastened to the future bike of my baby sister. My dad and I were equally confident I would no longer need them.
My dad guided me up and down the driveway a couple of times, holding onto the bike with an increasingly looser grip until he finally let go. I moved forward under my own momentum, wobbly but still upright. Then I toppled over. I wasn’t hurt because I was barely moving, a contributing factor to the toppling. I walked the bike to the top of the driveway and we tried again. My dad released a little earlier this time, probably trying to show his confidence in me. I rewarded this show of confidence by crashing even faster than before.
He muttered something under his breath and we made a third attempt, then a fourth and a few more after that. It was like watching a film of the Titanic striking the iceberg. The result was always the same: disaster.
I walked the bike up to the top of the driveway, not in the least bit discouraged by the setbacks, but dad was done. He expressed his dismay through the use of colorful metaphors, careful to not actually blame me for being an uncoordinated putz.
I felt bad. I also felt clumsy, a bit stupid and a little bruised. The bruising was part ego and part left knee. I’d landed on it at least three times going down.
I got on the bike and took a breath. I knew if I crashed now it would be worse somehow. A secret shame. Plus landing on the left knee a fourth time would hurt like hell. I pushed with my left foot and began coasting down the gentle slope of the driveway. I wobbled, I nearly yanked the handlebars too hard to the left, then too hard to the right, but somehow I managed to keep the bike moving forward.
And then it happened. The wobble vanished. The handlebars became steady in my hands. I was riding and not crashing. I felt giddy. I wanted to whoop in triumph but that might bring me crashing down. Instead I rode down the street to the cul-de-sac, then back to the driveway, reveling in my secret victory.
I knew how to ride a bike. And just like the old saying goes, I didn’t forget. I never had another crash again. I was on a high for the rest of the week.
I would never trade the sweet memory of that day, the gleeful sensation of overcoming what seemed like an impossible task. Well, actually, I suppose I would trade it for world peace. I mean, I could always just walk and world peace is probably more important than riding a bike, even one with a cool banana seat. But it would have to be genuine world peace and not some surprise twist like “all humanity is wiped out, therefore peace” or “humans revert back to protoplasm, incapable of shooting rifles or tossing fragmentation grenades.”
Today I am starting a new writing project. I am dispensing with both quality and quantity in favor of regularity. Think of it as Metamucil for the mind. Or maybe don’t do that.
Specifically, I am going to use the prompts featured in 1,000 Creative Writing Prompts, Volume 2 (Goodreads link) to write ultra-short stories that are no more than a few paragraphs long. I will work through the prompts in order, one per day. After that, I will perhaps have a party of some sort.
Sometimes instead of a story I will simply answer the questions (most of the prompts are in the form of questions).
Note that in my first attempt below I completely blow the concept of “ultra-short” with a story that is 1123 words long. Whoops.
Prompt #1: If you could travel back to any time in the past, what date would you choose and why? Would you attempt to influence past events while you were there? Why or why not?
Story:
Bradley had been a barista at a Starbucks knock-off for five years and as he mindlessly sprayed whipped cream on top of yet another large mocha he thought that this was about four years too many. Maybe even five. He wanted to do more with his life. He wasn’t sure what that would entail except that it wouldn’t include spraying whipped cream on large mochas.
He finished his shift and as he walked through the cooling air of evening toward his shoebox apartment the sounds of downtown seemed muted and distant. It was a weeknight and things were winding down. His walk was short, only eight blocks. Once home he’d watch Game of Thrones or something else. It didn’t matter, he never really paid attention, anyway. He’d nosh on a nuked pizza pop and burn his tongue like he always did. Then it would be off to bed, followed by a Groundhog Day-like repeat of everything the next morning. It was life and it was quietly horrible, but Bradley was not a man of action. If there was to be a plan that would change his course, it would need to be delivered.
As he reached the halfway point of his short trip home, the delivery arrived. It came in the form of a nondescript man dressed so blandly that Bradley’s eyes couldn’t properly focus on him. He was wearing some sort of jacket and pants and a hat. A fedora, maybe, like hipsters wear. All of these items only registered at the most basic level, colorless shapes stuck to a human form. Bradley never saw the face of the man or if he did the face left no impression.
The man shoved a small box toward Bradley as he brushed past and Bradley took the box without thinking. A moment later he assumed it was a bomb and almost chucked it in the street, but that struck Bradley as a very bad idea just before he released the package. Instead he thought to gently set it down on top of a trash receptacle and let some city worker deal with it, hopefully without blowing himself or others up.
But he could not let go of the box. It was neatly wrapped in plain brown paper. It bore no writing or markings of any kind. Bright white string was neatly tied around it. Bradley put a finger on the string and as if by magic it unraveled and fell to the ground. He pulled at the paper and it, too, slid away, leaving him with an unadorned wooden box. It had a simple lid with no hinge and Bradley pulled it off. Inside was a small device that looked a bit like a TV remote. A slip of paper was underneath it. He took out the paper and written on it was the following:
Hello! This small device is a battery-operated time machine. Simply punch in the time you wish to visit and you will be taken there immediately. You can return to your own time by simply entering the appropriate date. Don’t be afraid to experiment! Time has a way of healing all wounds, even those to itself. Want to stop Hitler? Go ahead and give it a shot!
It was ridiculous and Bradley was hungry, so he went home and nuked a pizza pop. But he brought the device with him, and sat it on the coffee table. When he had finished dinner and salved his tongue with some Pepsi, he grabbed his laptop and did a search on when Hitler was born. He was no dummy. If he was going to take out Hitler it would be when he was a tiny baby, not a Nazi leader surrounded by other Nazis with guns and tanks.
April 20, 1889, in some town called Braunau am Inn. It seemed like ancient history to Bradley. Did they even have cars in 1889? Bradley tried riding a horse once when his family went on vacation to Wyoming and his ass had hurt for a week after. He didn’t like the idea of chasing down baby Hitler on a horse. He would add 15 years to the date because Hitler would still only be some brooding high school punk and he could run him down with a new-fangled automobile.
He went to the bathroom and checked his hair in the mirror. It seemed important to look decent for time travel.
He returned to the living room and took the device from the box. He punched in April 20, 1904 and wondered how it would know where to send him. Maybe he just had to concentrate on the name of the city. He said out loud, in a stupid-sounding German accent, “Braunau am Inn!” He pressed the neon green button on the device labeled GO.
An acrid smell rose into his nostrils and the apartment went dark. Bradley felt a surge of panic and began groping about, trying to grab onto something, anything. The darkness lifted suddenly and Bradley found himself standing in the middle of a cobblestone street. Old timey, he thought, as he looked around at the buildings. He heard a strange and ridiculous sound and spun around toward it. It was a car horn. So there were cars! Good.
Except the car was bearing down on him and he had no time to move. The horn made its strange and ridiculous sound again but cut off when the car smashed into Bradley, sending him tumbling toward a gutter where he lay broken and bleeding.
The driver got out and raced to him. The passenger, a sullen-looking teenage boy, also got out, but he went to the device that laid on the cobblestone. He eyed the display, still showing April 20, 1904. He nodded, then threw the device into a nearby field. Out of sight in the tall grass, he could not see it burn a black patch into the grass before fading from view.
The boy walked over to Bradley. Bradley looked up, focusing with his left eye, the other shut tight and leaking blood. He could feel some parts of his body and couldn’t feel others. He was no doctor but he was pretty sure he had suffered fatal injuries. He asked himself if this is what dying felt like and the answer was a confident “You betcha.”
“Are you Hitler?” Bradley asked the boy.
The teen tilted his head, neither confirming nor denying. Bradley took it as confirmation because clearly things were not unfolding as intended.
“Nuts. I should have chosen baby Hitler.”
The possibly teenage Hitler shrugged and walked away. Bradley coughed a mix of blood and spittle, then closed his eyes. He rubbed his tongue over his teeth and vowed to let the pizza pops cool down properly next time. Then he remembered there would be no next time and felt a small twinge of regret as he expired.
Horrorstör is one of those horror stories that can be easily described in one sentence. Heck, just a phrase: a haunted Ikea knock-off. I found this book by perusing NPR’s Best Books of 2014 and couldn’t resist. I don’t know about you but I find the bewildering and deliberately maze-like design of Ikea stores scary even with the lights on.
Horrorstör leads the reader through a terrifying night where five employees of an Orsk store find themselves trapped in retail hell. Except this time it’s a little more literal. Riffing on the old ancient burial ground theme (this time a long ago prison), we find our plucky/weird/selfish heroes trying to survive a night of being locked in storage cases with names like Liripip by vengeful ghosts.
The story starts out light and funny, with Hendrix making witty observations on the retail experience. Somewhat predictably the funny stuff largely disappears once the horror starts cranking up. Apart from catalog illustrations of weirdly-named furniture that grace the start of each chapter, there is little humor to be found in the latter half of the book. This isn’t a bad thing per se, but it seems like a lot of authors who write comic horror tend to dispense with the funny once the gore starts flowing, making for an uneven tone.
Hendrix still does a nifty job in describing the horrors taking place within the cavernous confines of the Orsk store, though. You may never look at a sofa with an umlaut in its name the same way again. In fact, the liberal use of authentic-looking catalog pages and other related paraphernalia make me recommend reading this novel on a larger tablet (like the standard iPad), to better appreciate these illustrations. They’re neat and well-made additions.
If you want a short and (mostly) funny horror story, Horrorstör comes recommended.
