The Only Good Indians Book Review
Synopsis
The creeping horror of Paul Tremblay meets Tommy Orange’s There There in a dark novel of revenge, cultural identity, and the cost of breaking from tradition in this latest novel from the Jordan Peele of horror literature, Stephen Graham Jones.
Seamlessly blending classic horror and a dramatic narrative with sharp social commentary, The Only Good Indians follows four American Indian men after a disturbing event from their youth puts them in a desperate struggle for their lives. Tracked by an entity bent on revenge, these childhood friends are helpless as the culture and traditions they left behind catch up to them in a violent, vengeful way.
REVIEW
Okay, what the hell did I just read? Ha…
I picked up The Only Good Indians because I’d read The Buffalo Hunter Hunter earlier this year and was drawn in by Jones’ entirely unique storytelling. And while that continues to be the case here, I found this book oddly… slow? But not generally in a suspenseful way—that is, until he really hits you with it in the final maybe third of the book (in which I was fully invested in). Anyway, did I enjoy it? I’m not sure… But did I hate it? Also not sure.
P.S. I wouldn’t necessarily classify this a typical horror, but there were definitely moments where it gave me Final Destination vibes (IYKYK).
Thanks so much to Saga Press, an imprint of Simon and Schuster, for the gifted copy!
Original publication date was 14 July 2020.
Author Profile
Stephen Graham Jones is the New York Times bestselling author of The Only Good Indians, My Heart Is a Chainsaw, and I Was a Teenage Slasher. He has been an NEA fellowship recipient and a recipient of several awards including the Ray Bradbury Award from the Los Angeles Times, the Bram Stoker Award, the Shirley Jackson Award, the Jesse Jones Award for Best Work of Fiction from the Texas Institute of Letters, the Independent Publishers Award for Multicultural Fiction, and the Alex Award from American Library Association. He is the Ivena Baldwin Professor of English at the University of Colorado Boulder.
