A review by readingwithhippos
A Head Full of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay

3.0

This Halloween season has inspired me to (very gingerly) test the waters of the horror genre. I'm not usually in the mood for dark, twisted stuff, figuring my mind is already a verdant garden of fear and anxiety, no need to go planting new varieties from outside sources. But I've found, strangely enough, that the right kind of horror read feels like the perfect escape. This one, about a teenage girl believed to be possessed who undergoes an exorcism on reality TV, was just the right amount of scary for me. Demon possession is not something I worry about happening to me on a day-to-day basis, so I was able to handle the fear quotient and get at the bigger questions the novel asks—like, is she really possessed, or does she just want attention? And either way, how far is this going to go before her family fractures under the weight of her antics?

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