 Brutal in places, uncompromising in its details, and headed by a heroine that gives any member of The Walking Dead a run for their money, this is a sure-fire horror and thriller hit. Apart from her first paranormal series, Black Wings, one Christina Henry novel is not like the others. First she gave us the brutal and intoxicating world of her Alice novels, then a subtle story of love and freedom in The Mermaid, before returning to violence and vendettas for Lost Boy. Whatever common themes they may have, each book is a different reading experience, and the same is true for her newest novel, The Girl in Red. Henry’s skill is in taking an old concept and turning it into something fresh and new. With her earlier works, there’s a strong relationship between her book and the original story. But with The Girl in Red, there are only a few nods to the fairy tale to which the title alludes. The world has been brought to its knees by the Crisis, a plague that has spread across the globe in the tiny droplets produced when people cough. The Girl in Red charts Red’s flight across the country, through woods and fields, to reach the sanctuary of her grandmother’s house. Every step is filled with danger not just from the virus, but from the wolves in men’s clothing who seek to harm Red and many others just trying to find their way in this devastating new world. Aside from Black Wings, Henry had given her previous books either an historical setting or a purely fantastical one. Both are set aside for The Girl in Red, which is a contemporary post-apocalyptic novel. Red, the main protagonist of the novel, is a character filled with suspicions about the world who always prepares for the worst. Her whole family might pack their bags ready to go at a moment’s notice, but it’s only Red who knows where her bag is at all times. When her father parks the SUV on a supply run, she advises him to turn it around before they park, so that they’re facing the right direction if they have to leave in a hurry. There are hundreds of quirky little comments or actions by Red throughout this novel that build her up into the most competent individual in the book, even if the price of that competency is that she’s permanently suspicious and on edge. Another interesting element to this book is the focus on a family unit. The protagonists in Henry’s previous novels have been loners who find their own family. But Red starts out with a family, and her interactions with them and her responses to the various losses she endures adds a unique depth to her character. As she makes her way through this strange, new world, Red refers a lot to horror films that she has seen and tries to assess what the outcome of her actions might be. Generally, I find that such allusions break the reader’s immersion in the story: it reminds you that the fictional outcomes they are considering are just as unlikely as the fictional situation you are currently reading about. However, Henry manages to make Red’s allusions to horror movies an intrinsic part of her character and so avoid this jarring effect. There is often a lot of black humour involved in Red’s comparisons to the world of Hollywood and the world she currently finds herself in. One passage in particular stuck with me: It is astonishing how much crap humans need to survive, Red thought... in the old [Godzilla] movies there was inevitably a scene in which Godzilla would be destroying some prefecture and a person would be fleeing with literally every single thing they owned on a little cart. There would be furniture and dishes and all this other random crap, and of course a baby perched in a basket at the top of the pile like an afterthought, like, “Oh, we’ve got Mother’s tea set packed, maybe we should bring the baby, too. We have space.” There are also instances when Red is presented with a conundrum: if she walks across the wide open space to the apparently empty warehouse that might have food stores, will the inevitable monster chase her down? Or is approaching the warehouse actually completely safe and it’s only her knowledge of horror movies that is making her think it isn’t safe? Sometimes her suspicions grounded in horror movies save her life, while at other times they potentially deny her food and resources. It is at this point I feel it is necessary to note that Red is a woman of colour with a prosthetic leg. I believe it’s important to mention these particular traits because they are sadly lacking in protagonists in mainstream horror novels. However, I’ve left it until the last point because Red is absolutely not defined by her skin colour and her disability. They are simply parts of her character rather than her defining features. Although she encounters racism, sexism, and is constantly aware of any hindrance her disability might cause in perilous situations, these factors are interwoven with her other fears and concerns without them in any way taking precedence over her other traits. I read this book before the pandemic hit, so I wasn’t particularly affected by the fact that the “Crisis” that has consumed the world was carried by airborne germs and it was essential to wear a mask if you had any hope of survival. However, if you would find Stephen King’s The Stand uncomfortable reading given the current climate, then you’d best steer clear of this novel since it cuts a little close to the bone in that respect. However, once you feel up to post-apocalyptic fiction, this novel should be at the top of your reading list. Brutal in places, uncompromising in its details, and headed by a heroine that gives any member of The Walking Dead a run for their money, this is a sure-fire horror and thriller hit.  From the New York Times bestselling author of Alice and Lost Boy comes this dark retelling of Red Riding Hood It’s not safe for anyone alone in the woods. But the woman in the red jacket has no choice. Not since the Crisis came, decimated the population, and sent those who survived fleeing into quarantine camps that serve as breeding grounds for death, destruction, and disease. She is just a woman trying not to get killed in a world that was perfectly sane and normal until three months ago. There are worse threats in the woods than the things that stalk their prey at night. Men with dark desires, weak wills, and evil intents. Men in uniform with classified information, deadly secrets, and unforgiving orders. And sometimes, just sometimes, there’s something worse than all of the horrible people and vicious beasts combined. Red doesn’t like to think of herself as a killer, but she isn’t about to let herself get eaten up just because she is a woman alone in the woods…   the heart and soul of horror fiction review websitesComments are closed.
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