Country: USA
Genre: Horror
Pages: 117 kb (eOriginal)
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"You didn't have to tell her you wanted to bend her over the crash cart and fuck her in the ass". Greg gritted his teeth at the loss of control. "Yeah, sorry about that."
The best stories of Edgar Allan Poe has this particularity that made them so haunting. THE FALL OF THE HOUSE USHER, for example, was the story of a terrible curse on the surface, but Poe gives the reader just enough cues to imply an horrible inter-generational incest story. Reading it, you're not sure which one is the most alarming explanation. R. Thomas Brown's novella MERCILESS PACT functions under the same story mechanics. It gives you the choice to let your imagination run amok or to rationalize what's going on and in both cases, the protagonist Greg's fate is horrible. It's a very bold release that channels inspiration from one of the masters of horror and successfully so. MERCILESS PACT tackles the difficult subject of not giving in to your urges, but rather becoming them. To a certain point, this was somewhat experimental.
Greg's a good guy. A simple guy who loves simple things like there are so many in Texas. He likes to drinks and to watch baseball. That sort of thing. One day, a friend breaks into his house and vomits on him and everything changes. One would argue that anybody's life would change if a friend vomited in your mouth, but in this case, PTSD is the least of Greg's worries. He starts losing control of himself. Urges and creeping up in his mind and body. First, it's irrepressible urges to have sex. That queers things up with the local barmaid and with his friend Doug, but they are just the symptoms of something buried a lot deeper. Greg's life is turning upside down as he starts having conversations with coyotes, who seem to know more than him about the nature of his ills. In the immortal words of Don Corleone, he's about to receive an offer he can't refuse.
Greg's a good guy. A simple guy who loves simple things like there are so many in Texas. He likes to drinks and to watch baseball. That sort of thing. One day, a friend breaks into his house and vomits on him and everything changes. One would argue that anybody's life would change if a friend vomited in your mouth, but in this case, PTSD is the least of Greg's worries. He starts losing control of himself. Urges and creeping up in his mind and body. First, it's irrepressible urges to have sex. That queers things up with the local barmaid and with his friend Doug, but they are just the symptoms of something buried a lot deeper. Greg's life is turning upside down as he starts having conversations with coyotes, who seem to know more than him about the nature of his ills. In the immortal words of Don Corleone, he's about to receive an offer he can't refuse.
"I guess things just look different at night", he said to the wildling across the way before the coyote skittered back and laughed as it vanished into the woods.
MERCILESS PACT chronicles the transformation of Greg into a beast. Where Brown hits that "Poe-esque" note is by always leaving a doubt whether his protagonist is really possessed by something otherworldly or is just really sick from...well, having a sick person vomiting into his mouth. One could be ticked off by it, but I thought it was a nice touch. Horror lies in the balance in between the unspeakable and the human perception of it. In MERCILESS PACT, it's playing in between Greg's perception and OUR perception of the events. So there are two layers of incertitude. For a novella, this is impressive.
One thing that bugged me a little (but who was inevitable) is the later parts where Greg becomes really, more of an animal than a human. That's where MERCILESS PACT becomes a little more experimental. There were not many ways to describe the devolution of a man through language, but I thought it would have been more convincing if the form would have been left out of the equation (it is after all, narrated in third person). Anyway, MERCILESS PACT is a unique and challenging horror novella. It doesn't pack no peek-a-boo scares, but goes deeper and scratches some fundamental human fears.Of course, it's a novella. It's something you read on a rainy afternoon, in a sitting or two. It will touch the right button and give you a good, quick scare.
THREE STARS
One thing that bugged me a little (but who was inevitable) is the later parts where Greg becomes really, more of an animal than a human. That's where MERCILESS PACT becomes a little more experimental. There were not many ways to describe the devolution of a man through language, but I thought it would have been more convincing if the form would have been left out of the equation (it is after all, narrated in third person). Anyway, MERCILESS PACT is a unique and challenging horror novella. It doesn't pack no peek-a-boo scares, but goes deeper and scratches some fundamental human fears.Of course, it's a novella. It's something you read on a rainy afternoon, in a sitting or two. It will touch the right button and give you a good, quick scare.
THREE STARS