Puzzle Box Horror’s book recommendation of the week is Tome by Ross Jeffery.
Ross Jefferyis the Bram Stoker nominated and Splatterpunk Award nominated author of Tome, Juniper & Tethered. He’s also a Bristol based writer and Executive Director of Books for STORGY Magazine. Ross has been published in print with with a number of anthologies. His work has also appeared in various online journals. Ross lives in Bristol with his wife (Anna) and two children (Eva and Sophie). You can follow him on Twitter here: @Ross1982
Synopsis
Juniper Correctional, jokingly abbreviated to JC, a dark jewel in the crown of the godawful American prison system, where the very worst of Juniper rot for life-sentences that seem to stretch forever. In this hell-on-earth, it’s hard to tell most days who is worse: the inmates or the corrupt guards that enact the will of the monomaniacal Chief Warden Fleming. Fleming is a fallen star, a once bright-minded leader who turned the prison around, now hiding a terrible secret eating him away from the inside, a secret he’ll do anything to cover up. But Fleming has problems, problems that threaten to unveil his secret. There is killer among those housed at Juniper Correctional. Inmates keep turning up dead, murdered in ungodly ways, but nobody knows how or why. The only thing that connects them is a nameless book from the prison’s library.
Review
“So what were my favourite things about this particular story? Well something that I loved, was the little nods to the horror community. Both Joshua and Gemma Amor, another fellow West Country author, got a shout-out and there were a few little nuggets like that. Those meta references always make me smile, an if a normie was to read it, you never know, they might just go and google their name and hence, a new fan is born. I also really liked the fact that Ross wasn’t afraid to get right down to the nitty gritty with some of the gore. We had blood and viscera a plenty and I love that! Yes I know, horror doesn’t have to be in your face to fill you with dread but gimme some ghoulish gutting scenes and I’m in heaven – or hell haha.”
Janine Pipe, author of Twisted: Tainted Tales
“If you like the perverse mystery of Fincher’s Se7en (but with demons), the violent prison setting of Brawl in Cell Block 99, or the literary quality and bleak humanity of much of Cormac McCarthy’s writing, then you will absolutely enjoy this! The characters, though immensely flawed, are all fascinating and multifaceted. The story line is full of twists and scenes I will never forget.”
Ben’s love for horror began at a young age when he devoured books like the Goosebumps series and the various scary stories of Alvin Schwartz. Growing up he spent an unholy amount of time binge watching horror films and staying up till the early hours of the morning playing games like Resident Evil and Silent Hill. Since then his love for the genre has only increased, expanding to include all manner of subgenres and mediums. He firmly believes in the power of horror to create an imaginative space for exploring our connection to each other and the universe, but he also appreciates the pure entertainment of B movies and splatterpunk fiction.
Nowadays you can find Ben hustling his skills as a freelance writer and editor. When he’s not building his portfolio or spending time with his wife and two kids, he’s immersing himself in his reading and writing. Though he loves horror in all forms, he has a particular penchant for indie authors and publishers. He is a proud supporter of the horror community and spends much of his free time reviewing and promoting the books/comics you need to be reading right now!
Is there anything more complex than religious faith? Faith can be ineffably inspirational and intractably inflexible, a source of hope to motivate some of humanity’s greatest heroes and an excuse to defend some of our most despicable monsters. And when most people talk about the subject, they tend to focus on one quality to the exclusion of the other.
So it’s to the credit of British author C.J. Tudor that her novel The Burning Girls incorporates faith into horror story in a humane and principled manner. The book’s title refers to two young girls martyred in the 16th century for their Protestant beliefs. Today, villagers in their hometown remember “the Sussex Martyrs” as champions, holding memorial ceremonies and constructing twig dolls in homage. And sometimes, the girls’ flaming ghosts appear as omens to those who are in trouble.
The most important troubled person is Reverend Jack Brooks, a vicar who has been moved, along with her fourteen-year-old daughter Flo, to the tiny Sussex village Chapel Cross from her urban parish in Nottingham. Jack brings along her troubled past, including the murder of a young parishioner, her husband’s shadowy death, and a family history that she does not want to discuss with anyone, including us readers.
Despite her increasingly weighty baggage, Jack makes for a kind and engaging lead. Serving as the narrator for the majority of the book’s chapters (Tudor employs third-person voice for chapters focusing on other characters), Jack is quick with a quip and a forgiving aside, without ever feeling like a saint. The mercy she extends to others stems from an awareness of her shortcomings. When she begins judging a colleague for engaging in a sin of omission, she checks herself and thinks, “Who am I to judge?”
This isn’t to say that Jack doesn’t make mistakes. She gives into anger and (like all parents) constantly flubs in her decisions with Flo. But given how easily this smoking, swearing, horror-movie-watching woman of the cloth could become a “cool priest” cliché, there’s something refreshingly real to Jack’s grounded approach to the transcendent, especially to a lifelong practicing Christian like me. The Burning Girls insists that everyone has their demons and fights them their own way.
Despite the certainly admirable quality of this theme, the novel does become laden with tragedy. Everyone from a small-time reporter to a fellow vicar’s wife has a tragic backstory, which can become overwhelming. Given the mundane atrocities that mark The Burning Girls, pyro specters and crooked exorcism blades seem excessive.
The problem is exacerbated by Tudor’s sometimes too-lean prose, which prioritizes snappy dialogue over clearly defined spaces and characters. The book often reads like a script, as conversations between characters can go on for over a page, with little more than a signal phrase to break it up. As a result, the characters feel thin, as we’re forced to construct our mental image of them from the things they say, rather than the physical attributes the narrator allows us to see. This tendency crosses over from frustrating to irritating when the characters indulge in pop-culture references, talking about Evil Dead, Bill Hicks, and (with surprising frequency) The Usual Suspects. Unless you’re Nick Hornby, readers shouldn’t know more about your protagonists’ movie collections than we do about their physical features.
Fortunately, Tudor balances these issues by moving the plot along swiftly. The author shows a deft hand at revealing clues and mysteries, allowing connections between the Sussex martyrs, the disappearance of two teen girls and a local priest, and Jack’s biography, to float into view with satisfying elegance. The reader feels like an active participant in the adventure, never ahead of the characters and rarely trailing behind.
The Burning Girls treads some truly horrific ground, recounting some of the worst things humans can do to one another. And it does not shy away from the fact that religious faith often drives these acts of brutality. But it also shows us how faith can be a healing element, compelling us to care for each other, all the more in the face of such cruelty.
There are many, many demon houses in America – from the hauntings of Amityville to Georgia to Connecticut and every state in between. But there’s another Gothic-style home that came far before any of these famous hauntings – across the pond and described as “the most haunted house in England” by famed psychic researcher Harry Price. Yes, we’re talking about Borley Rectory. Built in 1862 and demolished in 1944, there were claims of paranormal activity within the house for many decades – from owners, paranormal experts, visitors and more for many decades after the house was destroyed. Sure, there were a few skeptics… but what haunting legend doesn’t have its haters? Read on to learn more about Borley Rectory and the horror it bestowed upon Britain many years ago.
The Reverend
Quite a few hauntings around demon houses involve religion, whether it’s regarding a nun spirit (wait for it) or the priest who is forced to come in and perform an exorcism on the property. The difference with Borley Rectory, however, is that it was made specifically for Reverend Henry Dawson Ellis Bull to live in after becoming rector of the parish. The manor was built after the previous rectory had burned to the ground just one year prior… and immediately became a source of gossip for the townspeople. Partly for the gothic exterior that stood out in a rural suburban town, and partly for the spirits that were seen wandering the grounds throughout the years.
Reverend Henry Dawson Ellis Bull lived there with his fourteen children until his death in 1892, and those three decades were supposedly filled with all types of paranormal activity and unexplained events – a claim which would be supported by later owners. His daughters were the first ones who claimed to see the ghostly nun – which would become one of the most prominent spiritual figures within the home and an apparition seen by many people of Borley. Despite these claims of ghostly activity, the Bull family owned the house until 1927 when the Reverend’s eldest son died. That’s when Reverend Guy Eric Smith and his wife moved in and began to ask questions that the Bulls never had.
Society for Psychical Research
When you find the skull of a young woman in one of the cupboards of your new house, like the Smiths did, it’s likely that you’d have a few questions. Especially since the paranormal activity at Borley Rectory reached a peak right after this discovery of human remains. The couple apparently saw a headless horseman pulling the carriage while they heard unexplained footsteps and servant bells ringing… which prompted them to contact The Daily Mirror and plead for contact with the Society for Psychical Research (SPR). That’s how the Smiths met Harry Price, the famed paranormal investigator who would later call Borley Rectory “the most haunted house in England.”
Price’s presence in the house only upset the spirits, and his report of terrifying experiences at Borley Rectory included objects being thrown and “spirit messages” in the mirror. As could be expected, this phenomena came to a halt shortly after Price left the house. While the investigator had many skeptics who doubted his claims of paranormal activity at the house, including Mrs. Smith herself, his experiences captured the attention of people far outside of Borley and contributed to the house’s infamy. It’s also worth noting that many other paranormal investigators over the years, including famed ghosthunters Ed and Lorraine Warren, supported the idea of frightening phenomena within Borley Rectory.
The Smiths stayed in the house for only a couple years, being replaced by Reverend Lionel Algernon Foyster and his wife Marianne in 1929. This family reported far more frightening events than those before them – including being locked in rooms, threatening mirror messages, and being violently thrown from the bed. The Reverend compiled an entire report of paranormal phenomena that they experienced during their time at Borley Rectory, which caused Harry Prince to circle back around and become even more interested in the house. While he failed to exorcise the property on two occasions, he drew enormous attention to Borley Rectory and inspired many ghosthunters and mediums to attend and study the ghosts within the walls. How popular was this home in the city of Essex, exactly? Let this quote from The Daily Mirror tell you.
“The rectory continues to receive the unwelcome attention of hundreds of curious people, and at night the headlights of their cars may be seen for miles around. One ‘enterprising’ firm even ran a motor coach to the Rectory, inviting the public ‘to come and see the Borley Ghost’, while cases of rowdyism were frequent.’”
The Spirits
After the Foysters left Borley Rectory in 1935, Price would move in and spend years experimenting with the paranormal phenomena in the house. He held seances, hired psychics, and recorded instances with meticulous detail to uncover the history of the house. The closest he got was one instance in 1938, in which medium Helen Glanville was reported as having made successful contact with a nun and an unidentified male spirit. The man even predicted that the Borley Rectory would be destroyed in a fire in March of that year. Spoiler alert: he was right.
Despite the fire badly damaging the house and the entire demolition of the property in 1944, there has been continued interest in the ghostly activity within Borley Rectory. Both from Harry Prince and the many ghost hunters that came after him. What’s the deal with the nun, and why exactly did the Foysters experience more terror than any other family?
There are plenty of books, movies and mini-series that you can check out for answers, as you become immersed in the mystery of Borley Rectory.
I am a lifelong pop culture junkie with immense passion for all forms of art and entertainment. On a typical weekend, I can be found at a concert or musical, chasing ghosts on the Haunted Mansion at Disneyland, or watching way too many makeup tutorials on YouTube.
We love movies about haunted artifacts and apparently so do millions of people. There is just something about an evil spirit trapped inside an inanimate object when it causes suffering and chaos to the unfortunate owner that is so mysteriously macabre.
We Really Like Katie Holmes (But Not in Horror Movies)
Laura Cohen was the central character of The Boy (2016) and she had already mastered horror after playing Maggie in The Walking Dead (2010 – ). As a horror actress, she’s an instant hit, because she brings a sort of fearless badassery that makes us believe she is experiencing authentic terror. When Cohen is scared, we are scared. This is something that Katie Holmes has not quite mastered because horror is not really a genre that fits her profile or range.
It takes someone who loves horror to act with believable fear in a horror movie. Laura Cohen had more than a decade of that experience as she was slaying zombies on-screen every week. She has the survivor chops that someone like Katie Holmes cannot quite muster in a scary movie. She does, however, play a really awesome victim who is being stalked by a psychopath, but even her performance in the 2002 movie Abandon was panned by critics. Katie Holmes is not someone we want to see in a horror movie; she belongs in forty-something adult romantic comedies or suspense movies.
Brahms: The Boy II is not the first horror movie that Katie Holmes has been cast in, which is kind of strange since we feel that she’s not really the kind of person you want to see fighting in a life or death situation with a demonic entity. Holmes also appeared in “Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark”,“Teaching Mrs. Tingle” and “Disturbing Behavior”, which do not top the list of truly scary movies. More like, the kind of scary movies you watch with your mom who hates horror movies. Watered down. Decidedly un-scary.
We wondered if Katie Holmes was a closeted horror fan. Was she someone that had a massive collection of every horror movie ever made? Did she snuggle on the couch with Jamie Foxx with a big ass bowl of popcorn and watch The Exorcist for the 100th time? There has to be a reason why she seems to get cast into horror roles right? Is she asking for work in the genre, without knowing she would be a better fit on feel-good shows like a Gilmore Girls reboot?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNJgte__mIc
Apparently, she does love horror, but her inspiration for the movie was communicating the vulnerability of Liza, the mother of Jude (played by the talented Christopher Convery). In several interviews Holmes has said she wanted to show the protective nature of a parent, and she nailed that (tapping into her own real-life experiences). But while she states in several interviews that Brahms: The Boy II will ‘have you on the edge of your seat terrified” the truth is that the scariest scenes barely involve Holmes at all. That is not where the few (but impactful) terror moments in the movie come from.
A High-Quality Scary Movie Which Pales in Comparison to the First Iteration “The Boy”
There is a checklist of cinematic techniques and storytelling that make for a good (but maybe not great) horror movie. Real fans of the horror genre and writers are able to see these commercial cookie cutter elements that are (unfortunately) a predictable and repetitive recipe for mainstream scary movies.
At least one A-list actor to ensure audience enticement
A scary filming location (the Craigdarroch Castle in Victoria, British Columbia Canada)
Eerie but pristine old looking wooded areas
Creepy doll
An older historian type figure who connects the dots for the family with facts they were not aware of about the house, and the doll
A dog that can sense the malevolent spirit is brutally killed (we hate this by the way but understand the psychological trigger of including it in the plot). Cheap shot.
A strained marriage because of [insert trauma type] that makes the protagonist feel like he/she may be going insane as they start to witness paranormal behaviors
The injury of a child playing with the possessed or influenced child, within the geographic influence of the haunted artifact.
A male partner who thinks the female protagonist experiencing paranormal is hormonal or possibly insane. (We love it when horror writers throw in the ‘female is batshit crazy’ card… thanks.)
Sounds familiar right? With very few exceptions and breakout moments of script and storyline originality, Brahms: The Boy II feels like a movie we have seen before. Time and time again.
We cannot call it ‘horror’ because we were not afraid to go into the basement with the lights off, after watching the movie. We did not feel the need to sleep with the closet light on, and we had no bad dreams after watching Brahm: The Boy II. It made us jump a few times which was fun, but it failed to penetrate into that squishy psychological area of our brain which makes us think about the movie for days afterward. Zero trauma. We were disappointed.
Hollywood horror producers, if you are looking for some talented writers in the genre, we have a long list of talented horror creatives. Just in case, you know, you are actually looking for some truly terrifying novels to adapt to the kind of horror movies we want to see.
REAL. SCARY. HORROR.
Brahms: The Boy II is Less Intense and Terrifying Than “The Boy”
At time of publishing “Brahms: The Boy II was out in the theaters (hello pandemic, not that we can actually go see it or anything… anyone else missing hot pretzels and insanely large sodas?). We went to Redbox on Demand and found that it was not yet available for rent, but we could buy it for $9.99. So, we did.
In the first film The Boy, we see a much more violent and malevolent demonic presence and influence in the doll. Yep, we are Maggie fans, because the talented Laura Cohen makes you feel the same fear she is experiencing. By comparison to Liza, played by Katie Holmes, we have a ‘concerned mother’ who feels a little slow moving to connect the dots.
The trauma is to blame? Maybe, but Holmes comes across as the kind of Mom that is distracted (not distraught), and definitely not the horror movie hero we want her to be in the movie. She comes across as being too nice, like a Mom you would like to invite to your wine and book club. This movie and storyline based on the original had so much potential, and literally falls on its face. Great cinematography however and some amazing camera angles, set and performances by other new and supporting actors in the film.
The creepy factor of Brahms activities are really limited to moving his head, footsteps in the hall (or up the stairs), slamming doors and one particular scene with a flashlight that we won’t ruin for you. But overall, the dolls behavior in this sequel is pretty tame when you compare it to his epic and eerie malice in “The Boy”.
For the record, we REALLY wanted to see this movie. We paid $10 to watch it at home! We wanted it to be a fun and scary experience but ended up watching something scarier after the movie was over. My 14-year old stepson (who is only toe dipping into the genre with books and movies) said it best:
“That wasn’t really a scary movie. Can we watch something scary next?”
Go back to what worked in the first film. We look forward to the potential twist of storyline in The Boy 3.
Definition of Lunchbox Let Down:When your mom tells you that she packed something extra special for your lunch. And you get all excited about it, until you open it on the bus and find a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, a bottle of water, and an apple.
Generation X gamer girl, marketing professional and closet horror writer. Lover of fast moving horror movies, slow moving zombies and historically based paranormal lore.
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