Horns by Joe Hill

At first Ig thought the horns were a hallucination, the product of a mind damaged by rage and grief. He had spent the last year in a lonely, private purgatory, following the death of his beloved, Merrin Williams, who was raped and murdered under inexplicable circumstances. A mental breakdown would have been the most natural thing in the world. But there was nothing natural about the horns, which were all too real. Once the righteous Ig had enjoyed the life of the blessed: born into privilege, the second son of a renowned musician and younger brother of a rising late-night TV star, he had security, wealth, and a place in his community. Ig had it all, and more—he had Merrin and a love founded on shared daydreams, mutual daring, and unlikely midsummer magic. But Merrin's death damned all that. The only suspect in the crime, Ig was never charged or tried. And he was never cleared. In the court of public opinion in Gideon, New Hampshire, Ig is and always will be guilty because his rich and connected parents pulled strings to make the investigation go away. Nothing Ig can do, nothing he can say, matters. Everyone, it seems, including God, has abandoned him. Everyone, that is, but the devil inside. . . . Now Ig is possessed of a terrible new power to go with his terrible new look—a macabre talent he intends to use to find the monster who killed Merrin and destroyed his life. Being good and praying for the best got him nowhere. It's time for a little revenge. . . . It's time the devil had his due. . . .

Hey everyone, its Sarah and I’m here with my first book review. Today's book is Horns by Joe Hill. This book was released a couple of years ago and I only recently picked it up when I first saw the movie trailer and discovered it and I was so intrigued by the movie trailer that I grabbed this book the moment I saw it and was dying to read it.

When I first opened the book and began to read, I was extremely intrigued. I loved the concept and the characters that you are first introduced to, and I also loved the setting. The bases of the story starts with the story of twenty six year old Ignatius "Ig" Perrish; who is the second son of a renowned musician and the younger brother of a rising late nigh TV star, Terry Perrish; has woken up one morning to find horns growing out of his head. Around a year early Ig was blamed and arrested for the murder of his long time girlfriend, Merrin Williams, but he was never proven guilty or tried due to the lack of evidence even though that the public opinion is that in fact Ig did kill her.

The novel itself is consists of fifty chapters which are ground five different sections of the book, all containing ten chapters. Every chapter is named according to the content of the book however I do not know the full meaning of them all, in order the sections are name: Hell - Section 1, Cherry - Section 2, The Fire Sermon - Section 3, The Fixer - Section 4, The Gospel According to Mick and Keith - Section 5. Every section is a different but important part of the story you need to know to understand to make complete sense of this novel. The sections, however, are not in linear order. Sections 1, 3 and 5 are the current time in Ig's life, the moments he is dealing with the horns growing from his head, while sections 2 is about his childhood when Ig meets another main character of the book, Lee Tourneau, who was Ig's best friend growing up. Section 4 of this book is about a certain time in Lee's life and you see the mystery of the book unfold and you are giving the answers that you seek. Some of the answers anyway, not all.

The writing of the novel is what you would expect of an Adult novel. The book I found has a bit of a slow pace at some parts where Hill put a lot of work into giving you vivid details and imaginative images, showing you the world and the experiences that Ig is going through. Some parts I absolutely loved and enjoyed the images that flashed through my mind as I read, sometimes however, the details over flowed and I lost track of what I was reading. This did not ruin my experience though.

The characters in the books themselves are all unique in their own way and they all change. While you see that characters change, some for the good and some for the bad, I didn't find myself hating any of the characters. Where normally you are meant to hate the villains of the story, in this novel I didn't hate them; I simply felt sorry for them.

Over all, the book was a fantastic read but the last twenty pages or so completely through me. As Hill wraps up the story I got confused as to what happened and had to re-read, after I was still unsure of what to think. The rest of the book was amazing and I loved it all, but the ending let the rest of the story down. Even though already the story is dark and weird the ending seemed to just suddenly take it to a whole new level and for me didn't fit in with the story. That or I just didn't make the connection to the ending in the story.

Do not let anything detour you from reading this book though, it is simply amazing and I gave it a 4.5 out of 5 stars in my YouTube video review and I would recommend that you pick this up the next time you are in a book store. If you like your dark stories then this is a book for you.

That's all for now. Write you soon.

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