Night of the Mannequins

"I felt like maybe this just isn't one for me. so much potential, but didn't go where I was hoping it would. I felt myself having to reread sentences and just left with a wtf feeling. 3 stars "

"A creepy story about when a teen prank goes wrong. The question lies is there something supernatural going on or not. "

"Good, short and twisted…"

"3.5⭐<br/><br/>I'm going to be upfront and say that I was not sure about Night of the Mannequins for the first 30% or 40% of the book. I kept going, and I'm so glad that I did. I'm not going to say much else about it because you should just read it. I wasn't a huge fan of the narration style, but I enjoyed the story overall. This book made me really miss the movie theater. If you're looking for horror novellas, this is one to add to your list!"

"I really wanted to like this novella but I didn't. I can't even pin point a specific reason."

"Okay I didn’t think I’d like this but I did. Was it amazing? No. Was it super well written? Also no. Was it creepy and fun and engaging? YES. I quite enjoyed it and would recommend it as light reading for those into thrillers and horror"

"This is set in a city near my small hometown and it was such a trip reading about all the places that I've gone to numerous times before! I'll never think of Rockwall the same way again..."

"You wouldn’t have expected what happen to happen! It’s detailed in how ppl get killed. Makes you wonder how cold hearted one could be."

"⭐⭐"

"Book:<br/>Night of the Mannequins<br/><br/>Author<br/>Stephen Graham Jones<br/><br/>Rating:<br/>3/5<br/><br/>Review (Spoiler Free):<br/><br/>I read this book in less than an hour due to the gripping plot and the easily comprehensible flow of the story. In this psychological horror, the story follows a group of teenagers who want to play a prank on their friend who works in a movie theater by placing a mannequin in one of the seats. However, the plan doesn’t go the way they want and at the end of the movie, the mannequin gets up and walks out of the theater. After one of the teens in their friend group dies, the main character is convinced that it’s their old mannequin he saw walking out of the theater getting revenge on them after abandoning it all those years ago. The more the story unravels, the more the main character’s mind does as well. The book explores the way our minds exaggerate the unknown and the consequences we must face when we try to solve problems on our own instead of leaning on the support systems we have. <br/><br/>The book’s writing style is very conversational and follows the thoughts of the main character. This style of writing complements the story perfectly as it allows us to follow the thought process and reasoning for the main character's actions as the story continues. There were no unnecessary parts of the story and all the details that were included both enhanced the world as well as gave us more context for events that occur later in the story. The author does a great job of getting the reader to understand the reasoning behind the main character’s actions through their thoughts while also allowing us a glimpse into the way the other characters feel after the beginning event.<br/><br/><br/><spoiler> Review (Spoiler):<br/><br/>My jaw was on the floor when I got to the first kill. His best friend sleeps in his bedroom and gets murdered by the person he would least expect. The main character continues on the killing spree of his friends from the mannequin that made one appearance in the book and the main character’s kills were fueled by paranoia and psychotic reasons. The reader gets the sense that the main character is becoming an unreliable narrator around the first kill that the main character does as the character’s reasoning devolves past the events of what has actually occurred. <br/><br/>The ending made me sorrowful of the lives that were lost due to the main character’s paranoia and once the main character is reunited with their friend that they believed the mannequin had killed, we’re able to see that the pinnacle of why the main character is killing his friends isn’t valid and the main character is forced to continue his plan to make their actions justifiable. I don’t know why this happens almost every time I finish a book, but I cried at the end of this story. The final showdown, unreliable narration, and sorrow built up toward the end was very well done and it got me to cry. The ending, I felt, was left open-ended, and we the reader are left to infer and imagine what happened after the chilling murders and to our main character. <br/><br/><br/>My Rating (contains spoilers):<br/><br/>I’m rating Night of the Mannequins by Stephen Graham Jones 3 out of 5 stars. A constant theme about what I felt about this book was “It’s not what I would like, but it works for the book.” This includes the writing style of the book. I had to get used to the voice of the main character to grasp what they were saying and the underlying tones of why the reader needed to know certain details. After chapter 3 of reading it alone, I had to go back and reread it with the audiobook which helped to compliment the conversational and personality of the main character’s voice. The next thing is the scenes with the mannequin or the lack of it. The mannequin is talked about but is only in the character’s presence in the very beginning. This does work for the book due to the reader discovering that the main character is coming up with paranoid reasons as to why the mannequin is hunting them without the mannequin ever being seen after the prank. Lastly, the ending leaves us with no consequence for the main character or concrete understanding of what happened, however, this flows with the continuous thought process of the main character that we’ve had throughout the book so ending on the main character still believing that they did the right thing is a perfect end to what the main character saw his own story as. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and would recommend readers to give it a try. I was gripped by the audiobook and will add this book to one of my favorite horror books read this year.<spoiler>"