The Girl Next Door
By Jack KetchumPublished: 47North, 2005
Pages: 386
Genre: Horror
Amazon, Goodreads
After that day I was like an addict, and my drug was knowing. Knowing what was possible. Knowing how far it could go. Where they'd dare to take it all.
The Girl Next Door is like a gory, terrible car accident that you can't take your eyes off of.
OK, so I downloaded this book without really reading the synopsis and realized while reading that I had watched the crazy, twisted movie based off the novel. As such, the cruelty and violence and the big climax didn't take me unawares.
The major thing you need to know before reading The Girl Next Door is that I definitely would not recommend it to those who don't read horror on a regular basis. It's very gruesome and unhealthy and graphic.
The novel had me hooked from the beginning. The way Ruth is characterized, it's easy to see she's deeply unhinged and severely mentally ill. The way she views women and inappropriately socializes with the pre-teens makes me think she was abused by a major mother figure during childhood. I think Ketchum did a good job in writing the characters and crafting a horrific atmosphere that grabs readers by the chest and doesn't let go until the end.
However, I caught several grammatical and spelling errors. I'm not fussy about one or two - I work in the media industry and I know it's impossible to catch every single mistake. There were several larger errors, though, that I believed could have been corrected with more thorough editing.
It's hard to rate The Girl Next Door because I don't want to say I enjoyed it. Read at your own risk.
RATING (out of five puppies):
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