How to Kill a Guy in Ten Dates
by Shailee Thompson
Blurb:
A humorous, swoony, and downright terrifying slasher rom-com in which a cinephile gets caught in the middle of a murder spree at a speed-dating event and must use her encyclopedic knowledge of the romance and horror genres to make it as a real-life Final Girl.
When Jamie Prescott and her best friend Laurie attend a speed-dating event, Jamie expects to meet a roster of mediocre men and indulge in some street food afterwards. She doesn’t expect one of her dates to have his throat slit at their table during a blackout. After the lights come back on and there are more bodies on the floor, it becomes clear that dating can be a very dangerous pastime.
Armed with makeshift weapons and Jamie’s extensive knowledge of what NOT to do in a slasher, the remaining speed daters try to find an exit while the killer adds to their body count. As the night progresses and Jamie comes face-to-mask with the murderer, she begins to suspect they are committing the slayings to woo one of the daters and turn them into a real-life Final Girl. But Jamie has other plans, and as she fights for her life, she can’t help but find herself ensconced in a love triangle with two of the other survivors. Will she make it through the bloodshed to find her Happily Ever After? Or does this machete-wielding psychopath have another ending in mind?
For fans of Love in the Time of Serial Killers and Butcher & Blackbird, How to Kill a Guy in Ten Dates is one killer love story.
My Review:
There are books that fill a need you did not
even know you had until the moment they land in your hands. How to Kill a Guy
in Ten Dates by Shailee Thompson is exactly that kind of book for me. I did not
know I needed this. I did not know that the specific combination of romance and
horror living inside the same story was something my soul had been quietly
craving. But the moment I started reading I knew I had found something that was
made for someone exactly like me.
Let me tell you a little bit about who I am
as a reader and as a person, because it matters here. I love romance. I am a
sucker for it in all of its forms. And I love horror. I was raised on classic
slasher films, the kind with rules and final girls and that perfect blend of
tension and chaos that makes your heart race in the best possible way. So when
I tell you that this book felt like someone took my two greatest loves and
smashed them together into one gloriously unhinged story, I mean that as the highest
compliment I am capable of giving.
The humor in this book is something else
entirely. I was laughing out loud one moment and then clutching my chest the
next because something came out of nowhere and absolutely got me. Jump scares.
In a book. I did not think that was possible but Shailee Thompson found a way
to make it happen on the page and I am still not entirely over it. The balance
between the comedy and the horror is so perfectly calibrated that you never
feel whiplash, you just feel alive and delighted and slightly terrified all at
once, which is honestly my ideal reading state.
Now I will be completely transparent with
you because I think honesty is important in a book review. Would I personally
be able to fall in love in the middle of a situation like the one unfolding in
this story? Absolutely not. Not even a little bit. My brain would not allow it.
But here is the thing, I also would not be the final girl. I have watched
enough horror films to know exactly where I fall in the lineup and it is not at
the end. I would be one of the first ones to go. Probably within the first twenty
minutes. And I have fully made my peace with that reality.
But the characters in this story? They pull
it off. And somehow the author makes you believe in every single moment of it,
the romance, the danger, the impossible combination of falling for someone
while everything around you is descending into chaos. It works. It really,
genuinely works.
What makes this book sing beyond just the
fun of it is the fact that it is built on a foundation of real love and
knowledge of the horror genre. If you grew up watching classic slasher films,
if you know the rules, if you have ever sat on a couch yelling at a character
on screen for doing exactly what you should never do in a horror movie, then
this book was written for you. It plays with those rules in the most delicious
way. It rewards the people who paid attention. It is all of that classic horror
film energy translated beautifully and brilliantly into book form.
It is also a shorter read, which I think
actually works in its favor. It moves fast and sharp and purposeful, just like
the best horror films do. There is no wasted space, no dragging, just a tight
and entertaining story that delivers exactly what it promises from the very
first page to the very last.
If you are looking for something fun and
fresh and unlike anything you have picked up in a while, this is it. I loved it
completely and I will be recommending it to every single person I know who has
ever stayed up late watching horror movies with their heart in their throat and
a smile on their face.
No comments:
Post a Comment