Horror Book Club: A Head Full of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay

[@ruthypoo2675]

Sorry I missed your live. SPOILER SPOILER It was my understanding that Marjorie was hopeless and probably had suicidal tendencies, but more importantly, she could see that the best chance for Mary to have a normal and happy life was if her mother, father, and sister were forever out of the picture, so she made it happen out of sisterly love (?). And didn’t something happen in the last few pages of the book where the temperature dropped suddenly in the little cafe where they were having coffee, which left you still questioning, “Well, maybe the Devil is around and used Marjorie for the evil poisoning… and Mary will always be at risk?” Or maybe it’s just a metaphor for Mary being unable to relieve herself of the guilt and it will continue to follow her around for the rest of her life?? I liked the ambiguous ending very much. 😈

[@ThechannelofEric503]

There is another short story that ties into this book. Last story in growing things-Paul T.

[@wadejohnston4305]

Thanks for the review. It could also be said that everyone who was ever supposedly possessed could have simply just been suffering from one or more psychological/mental problems. I'm personally on the fence about whether she was and I hold the same stance on real life possessions/exorcism. Glad I've stumbled upon your channel again. I watched a video forever Go I believe the first disturbing books video but then couldn't remember your channels name so when I saw you up on my home feed I was very happy

[@margaretm526]

I finished this book this morning!!

[@TatumWritesBooks]

Personally, I am attracted to the idea that this was indeed the work of some great evil. In my interpretation, Marjorie is possessed or driven mad by some sort of evil source, whether that be a demonic possession or not. For me, the evidence is her sudden personality change, the excessively cruel and demented things she did and said to her parents and eight year old sister. She drops hints of something 'so old' haunting her, that she hears voices and needs music playing at all times to drown the voices out. There are many scenes in the book where I'm just like, yup, this girl has a demon inside her, but I very much like the ambiguous sides and the fact that this could all very easily be explained by mental illness as well. She could have been mentally ill- but my reason for believing this could all be more elaborate than that is this: Being mentally ill isn't enough explanation for me in this case. Being schizophrenic or unwell just doesn't satisfy how this fourteen year old girl went from being a loving big sister, to one who tortures Merry and scars her intentionally for life. There is another clue that disturbs me though- at the beginning of the story, Merry says she used to tie floss to a loose tooth but she was always too scared to let Marjorie pull it out in case she was tempted to pull out all her other teeth. Was Marjorie a psychopath from the very beginning? Merry cannot pinpoint to her interviewer when the story started. Is this because Merry was always disturbed by an unhinged, sociopath for a sister? Or am I totally wrong on that and was Marjorie perfectly normal and loving and then changed? Either way, creeeeeepy. I read this book in one sitting and couldn't put it down.

[@jimmlygoodness]

Hope you're doing well man!

[@jaida9468]

this book is in my tbr

[@mmegrey]

I had the same interpretation as you did. SPOILER Margaret was not possessed and knew when she came up with the spaghetti plan that she was intending the murder / suicide of the family via Mary. I really liked the portrayal of the manipulation and desperation of reality tv production. The Dad was a piece of work. He exploited his daughter’s condition, which made it worse, while he, in turn, was exploited by the show producers. Since you liked this so much, check out PT’s short story collection “Growing Things”. The title story has a few familiar characters :)

[@justhereforagoodtime88]

I read straubs Ghost story and honestly didn't care for it that much. Spoiler below: I don't find shape shifters that scary. And some of the story line was almost identical to the turning of the screw book. There were some scary sections especially with the twins but the ending was quite lame and didn't gel with the overall feeling of the book.

[@AuthorJamesFlynn]

Could you remind me what your email address is, please?