Tomorrow a book I've been waiting for is released:  NOS4A2 by Joe Hill.  In honor of that book, I'm going to review another of his works, Heart-Shaped Box.

It's no secret that I love a well-told horror story.  And this one is told extremely well.  An aging rocker, along the lines of an Alice Cooper or Ozzy Osborne, adds to his collection of macabre memorabilia by buying a ghost in an online auction.  The story starts simply, but the artistry in this book is the way the story, and the characters' back stories, unfold like a multi-tiered flower.

Just when you begin to think you don't really like Judas Coyne, the protagonist, you realize there's more to him than his impatience and gruff exterior.  The ghost, while at first seeming to be on a righteous revenge mission, never becomes a sympathetic character.  Jude's girlfriend, annoying in the beginning, becomes his partner in salvation.  Telling you much more would give away too much of the plot, and I encourage you to let it unfold for you.

A book this good doesn't come along very often.  And a man with this much talent for writing doesn't either.  Take my advice - read this book.  While Joe Hill comes from a talented gene pool, his voice is his own and I can't wait to read the new book.