The Final Girl Support Group by Grady Hendrix
(Format used for this read: Audiobook)
In horror movies, the final girls are the ones left standing when the credits roll. They made it through the worst night of their lives…but what happens after?
Like his best-selling novel The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires, Grady Hendrix’s latest is a fast-paced, frightening, and wickedly humorous thriller. From chain saws to summer camp slayers, The Final Girl Support Group pays tribute to and slyly subverts our most popular horror films – movies like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, A Nightmare on Elm Street, and Scream.
Lynnette Tarkington is a real-life final girl who survived a massacre. For more than a decade, she’s been meeting with five other final girls and their therapist in a support group for those who survived the unthinkable, working to put their lives back together. Then one woman misses a meeting, and their worst fears are realized – someone knows about the group and is determined to rip their lives apart again, piece by piece.
But the thing about final girls is that no matter how bad the odds, how dark the night, how sharp the knife, they will never, ever give up.
This is the 5th book of Grady Hendrix’s I have read, so apparently I’m a fan 🤣
So far, I would give all his books except one (Horrorstor) 5 shining stars.
This one I think is a solid three star moment for me.
Plenty of good things I had fun reading but also plenty of not as great things I kinda trudged thru.
I absolutely adore me some retro throwbacks in my entertainment….middle age does this to you.
So I LOVED all the 80s/90s horror film indirect shout outs…..all the final girls names were super similar to real life final girl actress names, their characters names, or another character they played (Heather, Julia, Marilyn, Adrienne, etc)
All the rewording of titles of the horror movies they starred in with *VERY* similar plots to ones we are quite familiar with…like Panhandle Meathook referenced Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Dream King referenced Nightmare on Elm Street.
All the things that kept me up at night when I was younger came FLOODING back….
As a 80s/90s kid and teen who used to really LOVE horror movies back in the day, those were the most fun pieces of the book for me…nostalgia will ALWAYS get me, yall. (again…MIDDLE AGE)
BUT….
What I don’t love about all those old horror movies (and new horror movies as well) is all the VIOLENCE.
The “slashing” of slasher flicks is just too excessive for me.
I can do okay with some of it….but usually it gets to be WAY too much for my heart and brain to handle.
And since this book was about final girls and slasher flicks, of COURSE there was lots of violence and blood and weapons to behold.
Not my thing, really. I am just not entertained with large amounts of horribly violent killing and physical violence towards human beings.
BUT…
Interestingly enough….
There *was* quite a bit of good commentary on violence in the media and violence against women in real life…. as well as statements on mental health and the toxicity of the patriarchy in society and media too.
I appreciated reading those things and I think the author did a really great job of weaving it into the storyline.
While I didn’t love this book as much as I loved *most* of his others, I didn’t hate it….and I am DEFINITELY still a fan.
If you love you some slasher films, especially retro ones, I think you’ll have a WONDERFUL time in these pages.