Sara Gran

Come Closer

Her happy marriage to Ed challenged by odd noises, petty squabbles, and the onset of disturbing blackouts with no medical source, Amanda begins to dream about a woman from her past and accidentally receives a mail-order book on possession, the arrival of which coincides with increasingly bizarre events. Reprint. 30,000 first printing.

A Novel

i loved the story telling in this one but was sad to see how everything played out.... like, i actually was tearing up towards the end. still a good & quick read 

Sophia Rico

Patty Pforte

hessensitive

extremely mid latter half but i was entertained in the beginning!! had me anxious for the main character but after it was clear what was happening it just became sad, not scary

riss

Very fast-paced and creepy! I wouldn’t say it was extremely scary but definitely eerie. 

Alicia Evans

Ryan Mateyk

Possession in the first person makes for a terrifying read

Molly M

veryyyyyy 2003 but pretty spooky and delicious

Short and straight to the point , some parts had me weirded out but overall one of my favorite reads this year 

Maria Morales 

I read it all in one go.. very intriguing, very nasty, it kept me wishing for a happy ending

Valentina

there’s a point where possession stories start reading like accounts of more unchecked mental health moments, just with a few demon names sprinkled in 😓 

 by any means; this one was more a case of how i often feel like shorter pieces of media need to do even more to occupy what little space they do

have, bc there are things only something of that length can do really well. it’s almost double the letdown when a shorter story ends in a way that feels haphazardly cobbled together in the last stretch just bc it thinks its structure is designed to let it get away with it. 

there’s a point where possession stories start reading like accounts of more unchecked mental health moments, just with a few demon names sprinkled in 😓 

that’s not exclusive to come closer by any means; this one was more a case of how i often feel like shorter pieces of media need to do even more to occupy what little space they do have, bc there are things only something of that length can do really well. it’s almost double the letdown when a shorter story ends in a way that feels haphazardly cobbled together in the last stretch just bc it thinks its structure is designed to let it get away with it. 

This book was... okay. I didn't like what was going on with the mythos and I am never going to be a fan of "Is it real or is our protag cRaAzY!!!!" stories (I wouldn't have read this one if I had realized before I started that it'd really lean into that ;) )  It's probably part of the reason it took me so long to read despite its short length.

One of my friends said it reads like not even the author knew which was true, which feels correct.

Also, personal gripe: I am never going to be a fan of a book that potentially portrays a violent psychotic the way this one does. As someone crazy... wasn't a fan.

Jules

This book was... okay. I didn't like what was going on with the mythos and I am never going to be a fan of "Is it real or is our protag cRaAzY!!!!" stories (I wouldn't have read this one if I had realized before I started that it'd really lean into that ;) )  It's probably part of the reason it took me so long to read despite its short length.

One of my friends said it reads like not even the author knew which was true, which feels correct.

Also, personal gripe: I am never going to be a fan of a book that potentially portrays a violent psychotic the way this one does. As someone crazy... wasn't a fan.

Finished in one sitting. I really enjoyed this unconventional storytelling. The writing style is exactly my taste. 

Christy Faun 

Her marriage to Ed is challenged by odd noises, petty squabbles, and the onset of blackouts with no medical source, Amanda accidentally recieves a book on possession, the arrival of which coincides with increasingly bizarre events.

Ana Hein

3.5 stars. Enjoyed and thought it was really well executed. I think the ending is perfect and just subversive enough but totally makes sense with the set up. Its short and punchy and gets in and out for the perfect time. I liked it but didnt really really like it, but its very well executed. Not supper scarry but a touch unnerving. Love women on the edge.

“What begins as a sly fable about frustrated desire evolves into a genuinely scary novel about possession and insanity. Hypnotic” (Bret Easton Ellis, author of American Psycho). A recurrent, unidentifiable noise in her apartment. A memo to her boss that’s replaced by obscene insults. Amanda—a successful architect in a happy marriage—finds her life going off kilter by degrees. She starts smoking again, and one night for no reason, without even the knowledge that she’s doing it, she burns her husband with a cigarette. At night she dreams of a beautiful woman with pointed teeth on the shore of a blood-red sea. The new voice in Amanda’s head, the one that tells her to steal things and talk to strange men in bars, is strange and frightening, and Amanda struggles to wrest back control of her life. Is she possessed by a demon, or is she simply insane? Described as “a new kind of psychological thriller” by George Pelecanos and “this year’s scariest novel” by Time Out New York, Come Closer has become a modern classic “with a kick that will stay with the reader for days afterward” (The Dallas Morning News).

Janice Hopper

The first part of this book was creepy AF, as the protagonist tries to figure out what is happening to her. But as it continues and (view spoiler)[she gets more and more taken over by the demon  (hide spoiler)], it just becomes kind of sad. 

Wanting not to be alone can be pretty bad sometimes.

Jasmine

This book just felt incredibly silly to me for whatever reason. It wasn’t bad, but just not really my cup of tea.

Catarina Silva

3 stars
It was a quick, enjoyable audiobook, but nothing special really

Rhiannon Jerrom

A very unsettling book, well written and one I’m glad to have read. It’s not necessarily scary but definitely unsettling and uncomfortable.

'A dark, seductive cocktail of a thriller, with a splash of black humour and a twist of horror.' Francine Toon, author of Pine There was no reason to assume anything out of the ordinary was going on. Strange noises in the apartment. Impulsive behaviour. Intense dreams. It wasn't like everything went wrong all at once. Shoplifting. Fighting. Blackouts. There must be a reasonable explanation for all this. 'It will scare the pants off you. It is a perfect horror novel.' Paul Tremblay 'Deeply scary.' The Times 'Terrifying.' Daily Mail 'Sinister.' Time Out

Lauren M

I was given a copy of this to review on Netgalley, although I did then realize I had already purchased the book at an earlier date to read.

The review will contain some small spoilers. 

I wasn't sure at first how much Sara Gran could pack into a short novella of under 200 pages, but by the end of Come Closer I was surprised at how much detail she was able to really pour onto the page. 

This is a very interesting take on possession, especially considering most of what we know from movies and other stories usually gives us a third person look at what's happening. In Come Closer, we get a firsthand account through the eyes of our protagonist Amanda. While not overly exciting due to a lack of 'action', it is extremely successful in how Gran uses suspense and psychological horror. 

There are moments throughout the book where the reader is unsure of whether or not Amanda is truly possessed or whether she is suffering through a mental break which affects her marriage, her work and her overall well-being. Amanda herself even remarks that there is nothing and no one she can trust due to what is happening to her, and therefore the reader feels the same sense of unease. 

The moments of 'possession', when we see what the entity wants, and what it wishes Amanda to do are truly unnerving and because of this, the novella itself is one that will stay with me for a long time to come.

YES

short and amazing. very fast paced and very interesting. i love the authors writing style. you should check it out.

Amanda Autumn Berrey

☽ jess ☾

Jessica Flores

Amazing! Didn’t scare me to the point where I couldn’t sleep but it is definitely unsettling. Love the ending…definitely not a “happy” end but still great. Also fuck Ed 😂

Mars Holscher

Summary: A woman gets possessed by a demon, and doesn't really seem to mind.

This was very short. It almost felt like the author wrote out the full book, then wrote a 200 page summary about it, and published it as this novel. There was a serious lack of detail, specificity, and elaboration on the protagonist's thoughts and feelings.

From the initial description I read on Amazon, this was slated as some sort of mystery along the lines of "Is she mentally unwell, or is she possessed?" That's not what the story was, at all. It was a 100% clear cut "she's possessed" descent-into-ruin storyline from the moment it started. I wish it had been left ambiguous: it would've been much more interesting to explore the parallels between being taken over by a demon and being taken over by extreme moods. But you can't judge a book by what you wish it was, only by what it is.

Given what the book was actually about...I thought this was a very bizarre story. The protagonist showed NO resistance to being possessed. She starts shoplifting red items, becomes randomly violent and sexual, and loses bits of memory. At one point, she takes what basically amounts to a Myspace quiz that asks, "Are you possessed?" She decides that, yes, there is indeed a demon taking over her. But she doesn't care at all. Maybe that's supposed to be the "horror" aspect of it? The sense that some foreign entity can take over you and your own apathy can destroy your life? I don't know. It was hard to care about the main character, or about anyone in the story, because everyone was so passive. There was a lot of potential for this book to be deep and engaging, but it fell uncomfortably flat. 

I'm not sure I'd recommend this to others. Nothing good or nice happens the entire time, yet I didn't find it interesting and thought-provoking enough to justify the doom-and-gloominess.

Patti Reinheimer

Seriously unsettling in the best possible way.

Come Closer

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