A Head Full of Ghosts: A Novel

Paul Tremblay

Jun 2015 · Sold by HarperCollins

About this ebook

WINNER OF THE 2015 BRAM STOKER AWARD FOR SUPERIOR ACHIEVEMENT IN A NOVEL

A chilling thriller that brilliantly blends psychological suspense and supernatural horror, reminiscent of Stephen King's The Shining, Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House, and William Peter Blatty's The Exorcist.

The lives of the Barretts, a normal suburban New England family, are torn apart when fourteen-year-old Marjorie begins to display signs of acute schizophrenia.

To her parents’ despair, the doctors are unable to stop Marjorie’s descent into madness. As their stable home devolves into a house of horrors, they reluctantly turn to a local Catholic priest for help. Father Wanderly suggests an exorcism; he believes the vulnerable teenager is the victim of demonic possession. He also contacts a production company that is eager to document the Barretts’ plight. With John, Marjorie’s father, out of work for more than a year and the medical bills looming, the family agrees to be filmed, and soon find themselves the unwitting stars of The Possession, a hit reality television show. When events in the Barrett household explode in tragedy, the show and the shocking incidents it captures become the stuff of urban legend.

Fifteen years later, a bestselling writer interviews Marjorie’s younger sister, Merry. As she recalls those long ago events that took place when she was just eight years old, long-buried secrets and painful memories that clash with what was broadcast on television begin to surface—and a mind-bending tale of psychological horror is unleashed, raising vexing questions about memory and reality, science and religion, and the very nature of evil.

Ratings and reviews

I've been reading Paul Tremblay's work for about a decade now. I've enjoyed his short fiction and his novels. And I can say that a Head Full of Ghosts is by far his best work. He's syncretized so much horror, both literature and film, into a new narrative. Stephen King was correct when he said this book is scary as hell. As with the best horror, often it's the human element, rather than the supernatural, which is the most terrifying. Fans of the horror genre, especially those familiar with today's strongest names in the field, will recognize many of the references in this book. Without spoiling the plot, readers may also notice a strong echo of Shirley Jackson's most terrifying works. I especially enjoyed the references, both overt and subtle, to Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper." But those who aren't as familiar with these modern and classic masters of horror will still find much to enjoy in this creepy American gothic masterpiece. Better read this before they make it into a film (I heard it has been optioned). Even so, I don't think a film can really do the characters justice as well as Paul's intimate prose does. As the title implies, he really gets into the character's heads in a way I don't think a film can capture. A great book. Highly recommended.

Not good. When I say "not good", I don't mean that the premise behind the story is bad-- it's fine. The ending is okay. The writing itself, however, is pretty painful to read. The one and a half narrative framing devices the book uses both feel pretty superfluous. The blogger is written in such an obnoxious fashion, I felt like it had to be done purposefully as a condemnation of pop culture bloggers, only to have another character in the book later refer to these fake blog entries as being really well written. Nah, my dude-- they're insufferable. The present-day storyline barely exists, and seems largely to serve an expository purpose. Adults act in ways that adults in real life would never do, largely noticeable in the mannerisms Tremblay writes for his characters-- if I ever was having a conversation with someone who praised and then literally applauded themself, I would dive out the nearest window to get some distance between myself and that lunatic. This review, I fear, is not particularly well written either-- I attribute this to the fact that I hate-read the last fifty or so pages in an evening and was so profoundly irritated by so many things in this book, I had to immediately write a review, regardless of how late in the evening it happened to be. A few final things that bugged me-- Tremblay uses a LOT of similes and metaphors, to the point where it's distracting. He's going through them in a fashion similar to how Richard Pryor's character spends money in Brewster's Millions (see that? That is a TORTURED simile right there, and in spite of that, it's still better than most of the ones in this book). No details are spared for mundane things, but things that seem like they should be significant are glossed over. Characters are flippant in situations where they realistically shouldn't be. Ultimately, and most damningly, the book just isn't scary. What really pains me, though, is that it opens with a quote from a Future of the Left song. I love Future of the Left. Falco retweeted a picture of my cat one time. For a book to get my hopes up with something like that, and then be as disappointing as I found it to be... it hurts.

I have mixed feelings. The book was overally good, but it felt very anticlimactic. Maybe it was meant to feel that way, to make the story feel more real, despite being fiction.

About the author

Paul Tremblay has won the Bram Stoker, British Fantasy, and Massachusetts Book Awards and is the New York Times bestselling author of Horror Movie, The Beast You Are, The Pallbearers Club, Survivor Song, Growing Things and Other Stories, Disappearance at Devil’s Rock, A Head Full of Ghosts, and the crime novels The Little Sleep and No Sleep Till Wonderland. His novel The Cabin at the End of the World was adapted into the Universal Pictures film Knock at the Cabin. Another is his first children’s book. He has been teaching high school math for a long, long time, and he lives outside Boston with his family.