Heart-Shaped Box

Hill, Joe. (2007). Heart-Shaped Box. New York, NY: William Morrow.

ISBN: 9780061147937

Pages: 376

Genre: horror

Annotation: Jude Coyne buys a ghost and becomes hunted by evil.

Summary: Jude Coyne has his assistant buy a suit with its attached ghost online. He does it as a practical joke, but finds the ghost is real. The ghost wants to make Jude and anyone connected to him suffer for reasons of its own. Jude and his girlfriend will have to find a way to stop the ghost or they will soon join him.

Evaluation: good read

King’s characters are multi-dimensional. I don’t like the things Jude or Marybeth have gotten into or choices they have made, but the idea that they did it out of pain at their pasts comes through loud and clear. It reminds the reader to not just judge people but wonder why they are as they are. His storyline carries the reader along: it did not feel slow and the horror stayed at a high pace until the end. The atmosphere felt believable: the idea that the supernatural is tied to evil human actions and that being into the supernatural due to pain came through clearly. A good read for horror especially ghosts.

What else to read (supernatural stories):
Other books by Joe Hill. 

Nightmare House by Douglas Clegg with a grandson battling the supernatural force in his grandmother’s house.

Adam’s Fall by Sean Desmond is a Harvard student versus the suicidal ghost of his roommate.

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson involves a ghost versus four people trying to study the supernatural.

The Mammoth Book of 20th Century Ghost Stories for a variety of tales featuring ghosts.