7. My Heart Is a Chainsaw

By Stephen Graham Jones    

When I heard about My Heart is a Chainsaw—a meta-horror novel about a First Nations high school misfit recognizing signs that a serial killer is preying on the small town Proofrock because she happens to be obsessed with slasher movies—I knew in my bones that I had to read it!!  I’ve watched many of the slashers that My Heart Is a Chainsaw constantly references.  I was also curious to read something by S.G. Jones as his previous work sound so promising.  Last Christmas, I saw the hardcover at Dark Carnival but hesitated about the extravagance (glad I listened to my instincts back then).  But when Paul Tremblay name-dropped Jones as a talented writer, my curiosity got the better of me and I requested My Heart Is a Chainsaw for my birthday.

From a review:

There is not a lot going on in Proofrock, (which MUST BE a reference to T.S. Eliot’s first published poem, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, which, according to Wiki, is a dramatic interior monologue of an urban man, stricken with feelings of isolation and an incapability for decisive action that is said “to epitomize frustration and impotence of the modern individual” and “represent thwarted desires and modern disillusionment.”) Jade provides that inner take here. She certainly experiences isolation, and endures frustration and impotence, not to mention personal abuse. Jade is both wishing for the slasher to be real and for him not to be real. Great, if it is. You were right all along. Take a bow. On the other hand, you are likely to be killed. Hmmm, decisions, decisions. She is actually eager for the inevitable bloodbath to begin, finding this strangely exciting. Well, maybe not so strange for a kid with suicidal impulses. She’s got her reasons.

I so so SO much wanted to enjoy MHiaC, but sadly, this turned out to be the most disappointing read this year.  First, I couldn’t get into the narrative style, a first person plural delivery apparently inspired by Jeffrey Eugenides’ The Virgin Suicides.  The novel was told from the POV of our young protagonist, Jade, BUT via the third person in a stream-of-consciousness inner babbling of a typical 17 yo girl.  Jones tried so very hard to emulate a tough yet vulnerable teenage girl in denial of her past trauma, and it was awkward as hell.  At some point I realized it wasn’t just the self-conscious writing style that was the problem, the story was simply not very well written. 

With a thin plot and characterization, including the under-developed relationships Jade had with Mr Holmes, Letha Mondragon and Shooting Glasses, the novel still clocked in at almost 400 pages.  What could be taking up so many pages?  There were the essays that Jade wrote for her teacher Mr Holmes – which were interesting at first, as they provided the necessary background for Proofrock’s gruesome history and legends.  But the essays, like the novel, kept rehashing the same content over and over.  The meandering mess of MHIAC could have been edited down to half its length and would’ve come out stronger.

And the ending was so… abrupt.  Jade was trying to stop the wildfire from reaching Proofrock by breaking into the control station of the dam and manipulating a bunch of controls to send the floodwaters to quench the fire.  She saw a mama bear and cub fleeing not just the forest fire but an enraged male grizzly.  And then the story just ended.  I’ve read enough novels that experimented with style and/or structure, and can distinguish good writing that happen to not work with my individual taste, but MHIAC just came across as poorly written to me.  Its messy execution ruined what was a potentially awesome premise.

What was predictable:  that Jade, instead of Letha, turned out to be the final girl after all (though Letha was mistakenly regarded as the hero).

What I considered to be a “cheat”:  having two killers – the human one, Theo Mondragon, and a supernatural one, Stacey Graves. 

Nonsensical plot devices:   

• Theo’s motive for his killing spree didn’t make any sense… so he messily murdered a bunch of people to cover up his white collar crimes?  That’s a lot at stake for such a visible community member, successful businessman and family guy.  And he’s willing to kill his own daughter?  Did he just switch on “Psycho Mode”? 
• The young Dutch couple as the first human sacrifices.  When one of the bodies was discovered, it made no sense that Proofrock wasn’t crawling with federal and international authorities coordinating and overseeing an extensive search for the other body, not to mention the victims’ families arriving from the Netherlands.  But there was nothing like that.  A missing young Dutch couple who met their demise via obvious foul play in small town America would’ve attracted international attention.  It made no sense to not portray that and to see some of that through Jades’ eyes.
• As for Stacey Graves, at least there was an attempt made to explain why she started killing generations later, ie. the Terra Nova development which resulted in the disturbance of the protected park.  

From a review:  Indian Lake was the place where, during the town’s initial period of settlement, a young Native girl named Stacey Graves was outed as a witch when a childish prank went wrong. Graves is rumored to be behind a series of murders in town, including a spree of deaths which occurred at the now abandoned summer camp — dubbed “Camp Blood” by the locals — just years prior to Jade’s birth.

The playing and flouting of genre conventions was also annoyingly inconsistent.  Theo was a red herring with the actual big bad killer being undead Stacey Graves.  I was fine with that, but throughout the novel, it kept toying with the idea that a slasher movie was being played out "for real" (which was what Jade really wanted) so that Jade, who knows the genre “rules” by heart, can use them to her advantage.  Then fun meta-horror gimmicks kept getting counter-balanced by hard reality, to remind Jade (and the reader) that she’s in the Real World.  Either Jones couldn’t decide which way to go or he wanted to have it both ways, but in doing so, failed to achieve a satisfying narrative arc.  Another theory, which is common in the mystery genre, that in order to keep the reader guessing who the killer(s) are, the author can follow, or not follow, the rules of the game. 

When I finally got to the big massacre, it felt underwhelming, despite the carnage and bloodshed.  The main reason was that I simply didn't care about any of the characters.  To add salt on the wound, there was no satisfying conclusion for the reader either!  And I wasn’t alone about the ending.

After the fiasco that was The House in the Cerulean Sea, I still haven't learned my lesson. Where did I go wrong?  First, I got mislead by Paul Tremblay when he name-dropped Jones.  He had raved about Sarah Gran's Come Closer, which thankfully turned out to be a great read. Perhaps Jones’ previous efforts are better?  The horror homage premise of MHIAC was also irresistible to me and I fell for the marketing, bloody hook line and sinker.  I even looked at all the glowing 5 star reviews on Goodreads.  There was only a small minority with the opinion:  “I don’t know what it is but I really struggle to connect with SGJ’s books. I want to love them but I just can’t?!”   Maybe younger readers appreciate SGJ better?  I should learn my lesson now and improve on my due diligence with better research in future.  There’s a risk in knowing too much about the plot, but in the end, I could save myself hours, if not days, of wasted time.

It's unfortunate because I want to read more fiction by indigenous writers.  When Olman heard how disappointed I was with this book, he highly recommended Eden Robinson's Son of a Trickster, which is available at our local library.