*SPOILERS* This is not so much a book review as me unpacking what I just read.
I love a good, old-fashioned possession story. I am a huge
sucker for classic good vs evil stories, God vs, the devil, that is my jam.
Unfortunately, this is not a story about demonic possession. I remain puzzled
about why the author chose to reveal to the reader so early on that Marjorie
was faking, I would have liked to decide for myself.
Despite the obviousness that there is no demon present in
Marjorie, there is still a lot to unpack in this book that is worth talking
about. Well, let me take a step back. I think there is a snobbish part of my
brain that wants to point out how
obvious everything was, but there are many breadcrumbs left by the author that led
down alternate paths.
For example, when Merry claims that she “swears she
remembers” seeing her mother tie her sister down before the exorcism, that is
our first clue that memory is not absolute, and we have an unreliable narrator
on our hands. The only confession we have that Marjorie was faking is relayed
to us through Merry and her memories from (15, I think?) years ago. How
trustworthy is that information, really?
Also consider that we know for a fact that Merry has historically
lied about Marjorie’s antics. The basement scene! This was not a “whoops, I
didn’t see what I thought I saw moment,” this was intentional deception. We can
be certain that Merry cannot be trusted.
And this is where the book falls apart a bit for me. The
author badly wanted us to look to Merry and question who in this story was, in
fact, possessed. But the pieces just don’t fit, and in a way I resented how
every theme of the book felt so…glaring. The blog passages from “Karen” were
entertaining, but I don’t particularly need a stand-in character for me, the
reader.
Overall though, I enjoyed the hell out of this book. It has
some genuinely creepy moments, and it’s a fun love letter to the demonic
possession genre. My largest gripe is the lack of subtlety, but I definitely recommend
it and look forward to reading other people’s thoughts on the themes.
