Reprieve
Books | Fiction / Literary
3.6
James Han Mattson
"Like Whitehead's The Intuitionist, Alyssa Cole's When No One Is Watching or Zakiya Dalila Harris' The Other Black Girl, Reprieve straddles genres in the best possible way. . . . Sure to spark conversation and debate at book clubs across the land." – LOS ANGELES TIMES "An eventual American classic that is unrelenting in its beauty and incisive cultural critique." – KIESE LAYMON Recommended by New York Times • Los Angeles Times • NPR • Today • Esquire • O Quarterly • Boston Globe • Chicago Tribune • Harper's Bazaar • Shondaland • Thrillist • The Millions • Crimereads • XTRA • Tor • Literary Hub • and more! A chilling and blisteringly relevant literary novel of social horror centered around a brutal killing that takes place in a full-contact haunted escape room—a provocative exploration of capitalism, hate politics, racial fetishism, and our obsession with fear as entertainment. On April 27, 1997, four contestants make it to the final cell of the Quigley House, a full-contact haunted escape room in Lincoln, Nebraska, made famous for its monstrosities, booby-traps, and ghoulishly costumed actors. If the group can endure these horrors without shouting the safe word, "reprieve," they'll win a substantial cash prize—a startling feat accomplished only by one other group in the house's long history. But before they can complete the challenge, a man breaks into the cell and kills one of the contestants. Those who were present on that fateful night lend their points of view: Kendra Brown, a teenager who's been uprooted from her childhood home after the sudden loss of her father; Leonard Grandton, a desperate and impressionable hotel manager caught in a series of toxic entanglements; and Jaidee Charoensuk, a gay international student who came to the United States in a besotted search for his former English teacher. As each character's journey unfurls and overlaps, deceit and misunderstandings fueled by obsession and prejudice are revealed, forcing all to reckon with the ways in which their beliefs and actions contributed to a horrifying catastrophe. An astonishingly soulful exploration of complicity and masquerade, Reprieve combines the psychological tension of classic horror with searing social criticism to present an unsettling portrait of this tangled American life.
AD
Buy now:
More Details:
Author
James Han Mattson
Pages
417
Publisher
HarperCollins
Published Date
2024-04-16
ISBN
0063079933 9780063079939
Community ReviewsSee all
"Terrific writing, imaginative story, outstanding character development. I found the racial overtones, however, unnecessary & distracting for such an exiting, novel premise. Didn't quite understand the villian's motivation."
Anne G
"OBSESSED with this book. I couldn’t stop talking about after I finished. I must have raved about this book for months, and even now, about a year later, it still comes up in conversations with me. Huge fan "
E
Eve
"This book ended up being a bummer for me. I think most of it is because I was expecting an escape room/haunted house thriller. This book does have an escape room/haunted house (Quigley house) but it is paced very slow and not very thrilling. Most of the book is following characters before they enter the Quigley house. It's not until the last little bit of the book that you figure out how they all get summoned to the house or why you've been following them all. There are little bits in the Quigley House sprinkled throughout the chapters where you are following the characters, but they are very short and vague. In some situations short and vague dual timeline chapters build suspense; the suspense builds in this book but the payoff just isn't there. Also the villain felt very predictable and obvious."
Kayla Stroup
"This book is a creepy and agonizing to read - in the best way. A bright floodlight on the crusty, rotting underbelly of American culture. Well-painted characters, each swallowed up by the darkness of their desire to belong and connect. "
Caila Conklin