Devil House

this is the kind of book that takes itself and puts itself back together again. it's full of john darnielle's typical preoccupation with small towns, houses, people, & the small details of people's lives. the kind of writing you can smell the asphalt from. i listened to the audiobook, so i got to hear john darnielle read his work out loud, which of course suits the text perfectly.

Very few authors can pull off reading their own book and this guy is not one of them. I gave up after 1/2 hour or so. His near monotone drone was bad enough, but that was on top of what is just a generally bad book. 'Nuf said.

Darnielle has a very empathic pen and an amazing sense of story and use of words, without getting bloated or to ethereal. The character are heartbreaking lovely and the story is a fair look into the true crime obsession of today.

Not what I signed up to read at all based on the cover, title and Goodreads tags, but I found it beautifully written (found it very hard to stop reading at times) and considerate/compassionate regarding it's reflections on True Crime as a genre. The structure was very neat, just disorienting enough that I was charmed with its turns without becoming annoyed with not knowing what was going on.

I remember the first time I saw Apocalypse Now. I was 13 or so, watching it by myself. I remember sitting slack-jawed as the credits rolled. It was ugly. It was brutal. And it was undeniably a masterpiece.

I'm obviously finding myself in a similar situation at the end of Devil House.

Mr. Darnielle is a brilliant writer. I found this to be a tough read with a style unlike most books I read, but it was worth it.

I’m a huge fan of John Darnielle, and had read his prior two books as a fan, but this is the first one that I would wholeheartedly recommend to anyone, even if they’ve never heard of the Mountain Goats. A complex and empathetic commentary on our cultural obsession with the true crime genre, with a story that unspools in different directions and never went where I was expecting. His naturalistic dialogue is a pleasure to read, and the characters are fascinating and empathetic. I loved everything about this book.