similar to what I was going to give. So
where do I start, then? Well, everybody seems to agree that this is a
love letter of sorts to the scream queens of horror film history, and that's
true. It says so in Ford's forward. And it is good. But
when it all boils down to things, aside from my agreement with most other
reviewers (and their extremely positive reviews) in what they had to say,
I'm going to go this route:
We have a story here where,
in essence, we've heard time and time again. Someone gets pissed off
at their life and decides to go and kill a handful of people in the heat of
being pissed off, and in this case it involves a huge fictitious horror
flick Scream Queen, by the name of Alyssa, who's been screwed by the
business and her ex-boyfriend/film director who has a nice younger
something-something, and throughout the book, we get the picture how her
career and life are pretty much washed up which fuels her ultimately
vindictive fire. It's basic Lifetime movie fare, putting it that
simply, and stripping it down to its bare bones, that's what it is, with
added suspense and gore and a few high-pressure scenes that Lifetime
wouldn't touch but rather the producers of an unrated B-movie film.
People killing people for all the reasons in the world will be written about
until people stop writing.
With that said, the way
Brandon Ford writes this story is exemplary, and I hold his storytelling in
high esteem. Solid characterization and a plot that moves, flows, and
keeps you reading. It's simple in plot, yes, but I love the way he
writes it. It's got what it takes for a potentially mediocre tale
worthy for the masses to read. There were also a few sequences where I
thought things were moving one way, and they went into the opposite
direction. That's a phrase said often in positive reviews, and it
applies here. Brandon Ford, whose Crystal Bay (his first book to
which this is his second) was critically acclaimed, can certainly take a
story formula and tweak it to the extent that it's original because his
writing is original, and in this business, that's part of the battle.
In a world where originality is lacking, it's nice to see a good writer
flexing his muscles even if it's another vendetta/killer entry, and I expect
to see Brandon Ford win awards and go far.
He has the passion and drive for
it, and the talent. Splattered Beauty, as a tight and easy
genre read, is something all should pick up and delight in if for only the
way it's told alone. Along with Alyssa, you'll get
pissed off too and want her to kill someone. I almost, almost,
found myself even rooting for her, and feeling sorry for her fan sidekick
that came into the story with the best of intentions.
