The Book of Accidents

4,5 stars!

this book was weird but i also loved it’s commentary on pain. how we need our pain. how pain is a part of us you can’t destroy. also horror used to tell stories of trauma and grief are my favorite

Lots of convoluted horror elements, but not much atmosphere. Each member of the family has his or her own specific horror drama, but while they all ultimately contributed to the big showdown stuff the end of the novel, the book really felt pretty scattered and stretched thin. However, the climactic end scene was exciting enough. I will be so relieved when the multiverse trend has run its course. ------ Shout out to Caleb, whose only job in this book is driving Oliver places and warning him that the vibes are off with Jake. I swear I read the same conversation with the two of them three times. Maddie keeps saying things like Nate is absent, that it always falls to Maddie to carry the family through, Nate leaves household stuff to her, she's tired of begging the strong one... But I don't think we see much evidence of that? Like Maddie is the one who missed all those calls from the school because she was in an art fugue state, and she leaves town for a weekend refusing to tell Nate OR her son Oliver where she was going or why. But I dunno, maybe I missed something. I do like Maddie a lot, but those moments in her interior monologue seemed off.

Thank you go to both Del Rey Book and Chuck Wendig for gifting me the ARC of this book. Thank you so much! I’m pretty honored that you allowed me to read this one! I also want to make sure the entire world knows I was in no way influenced while I wrote this review. There is a WHOLE LOTTA STUFF going on in this book. So. Much. Stuff. This would have come close to being a five star, but I had a hard time wading through the stuff (did I mention there was a lot of stuff?). Otherwise I loved everything about this book. Who doesn’t love a book with Stephen King references? Unless you don’t, in which case, this is not the book for you. This family decided to move to the sticks after their son had some unfortunate experiences, and after they got there they realized the sticks was kind of a crappy place. At first it seemed like the place might be haunted, but they soon realized the truth was so much worse. There was a little Stephen King, some Stranger Things, and a whole lot of somebody who might have been on drugs while he was writing this (I’m just kidding here, I have no idea what Wendig did while writing this, but I feel like therapy might have been needed at some point). Anyway, it’s very good. I’m just hoping that he writes a sequel, because the end left me a teeny bit frustrated (the book might have taken an airborne trip across the room).

The Book of Accidents is an amazing work of horror by Chuck Wendig. Reminiscent of early Stephen King, The Book of Accidents is a horror novel with great heart that is about spirals, families, mistakes, love, empathy, and serial killers, ghosts-that-aren't-ghosts, interstitial liminal voids, and alternate realities. Really, at its core, this story is about learning to break cycles of abuse and learning how to heal but it is told through a supernatural lens. The Book of Accidents is big-hearted and terrifying. And I can't wait for another Chuck Wendig horror novel.

The Book of Accidents is one of the scariest things I’ve read in a long time. It’s also one of the most original horror novels I’ve come across. I was gripped from start to finish, and I was deeply invested in the characters. It was horror on a cosmic level, while also being horror at the simplest and most vital level: that in which someone is at war with themselves. It didn’t even feel bloated, despite it length. And there were a few scenes that genuinely scared me, or disturbed me, or grossed me out. Or all of the above in one fell swoop. It was out there, but in the best way.

I was so hesitant to pick this book up. Not because I thought it would scare me, but because I had such a disappointing experience with Wanderers, Wendig’s previous book. It wasn’t a bad book; on the contrary, it was very well written. But I was not only unable to connect with it, but was strangely repelled by it. Wendig’s political views were so palpable in his narrative that it came across as preachy, and that’s not something I ever enjoy, regardless of the worldview from which it’s written.

So much of this story is about finding the potential to break free of the cycle of generational trauma and abuse. It’s about recognizing the cancer of pain within yourself and others and doing what you can to exorcise that cancer in any way you can. Can we judge someone based on their potential, whether for good or ill? Or can we only evaluate the actions they’ve already taken? With which viewpoint does the most hope and optimism lie?

If I hadn’t listened to this on audio, it might have been a 4 read for me instead of a 4.5, but the narration was simply brilliant. Co-narrators Xe Sands and George Newbern did an incredible job breathing life into every single character. The only negative thing I have to say is that the ending didn’t feel quite as tight in terms of writing and plotting as the rest of the book. The change was nearly negligible, but it was there. At least, it was for me.

Overall, this was an incredibly satisfying horror story that radically altered my opinion of its author. I’m so glad to have read it, and to have enjoyed it so thoroughly. It’s a book that I can see myself happily recommending to others. And often. And even better, it’s a story that I’ll be contemplating for quite a while to come.

Thanks to NetGalley, Del Rey, and Chuck Wendig for an advance copy of this book in return for an honest review. This book was fantastic! There are many stories where you meet a family and grow to care for them through excellent character development, honestly, but this family will make you fall in love from the get-go. They are honest, loving, and an actual team. It’s so refreshing! I honestly can’t think of the last time I identified with a mother character as strongly as I did in this novel. She’s vulgar but would do anything and everything for her kid and family. This was my first venture into Chuck Wendig’s work, and it won’t be my last. It’s also important to note that this had one of my favorite endings in forever. Do yourself a favor by picking this up as soon as possible (which will be July 20th, so that you know). It's a well-earned 5 star read for me.

I can’t tell how I feel about this book. It wasn’t what I was expecting, I guess. The plot was so convoluted and confusing, I almost gave up on it a few times. It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t exactly good either. I feel like it took forever to read.

Horror and magic? Count me in. Gives me the Time traveler’s wife vibe with the end of the world Dr. Strange magic. It had all the elements from Horror, mystery, fantasy and action, this was worth the read.

It's been a while since I've read a book where the author's strengths and weaknesses were so apparent and so equally strong. Wendig writes some very evocative prose—he fully earns the label "literary horror"—and given how complicated the plot of this thing is, it never came off as messy or overly-confusing. His dialogue is...something. If Aaron Sorkin ever wrote a horror movie, I imagine the characters would sound like they did here. So much speechifying and broad declaration about the state of the world, even from characters who appear in a single scene. It's clunky and wrenched me out of the book on more than one occasion. Probably more like a 3.5, but rounding up because it's an impressive story even with the dialogue problems.

I loved this. I don’t read anything about a book before I read it so I go in blind each time, and this did not disappoint. Pace was excellent, character development was great, and the story was deeply engaging. I DO immediately have a need to ‘solve’ each book while I’m reading, and to me this one wasn’t difficult…however, that absolutely didn’t take away from the story at all. This is also a wonderful book because the author seamlessly blends multiple genres in the best possible way. Definitely give this one a go.

Damn this book is good! I'm going to be thinking about it for a long time. It's a great mix of horror and scifi!

Very creepy and a bit grotesque in parts. Overall a very good story though!

3.5