Jorie Stroud has started a new life with her son in Vermont, a life now utterly removed from the horror genre to which she previously devoted her life and career. A decade prior she was part of The October Film Haunt, a team who blogged about their love for horror and wrote about experiences camping out at famous horror film locations. Just as they were on the rise as Internet sensations and attracting the attention of genre celebrities and more fans, the team visited a graveyard from Proof of Demons, a bizarre cult film rumored to be an occult ritual embodied in film, and whose director Hélène Enriquez remains shrouded in mystery.
Their post about that visit helped ignite a firestorm of online hysteria, and soon led to two tragic deaths: one fan and one member of The October Film Haunt Team. Facing guilt and harsh backlash, Jorie distanced herself from her surviving blog team member and the horror community at large.
But now Jorie has received a strange video cassette in the mail with footage the reenacts that key graveyard scene from Proof of Demons with subtle differences. Jorie soon realizes that someone is shooting a sequel to the original cult film and that this unknown person or persons is making Jorie and all the others involved years ago into this new movie, which might be looking to open a portal that would let the demons through.
Michael Wehunt’s debut novel The October Film Haunt combines a lot of horror genres and tropes that I enjoy — the cursed object, demons, and slashers — and puts unique spins on them each in addition to the style of their combination. The demons here are purposefully divorced from Judeo-Christian traditions of fallen angels or of spiritual evil somehow incarnate. A major theme of the novel (and of the in-novel plot) is in fact consideration of what secular demons might be, and what they might mean. The slasher elements of the novel combine with cult horror elements through the devotees of director Enriquez (referred to as Rickies) that take a guerilla film-making approach to an extreme.
Along with books, movies would be my other favorite in that cursed objects sector of stories and Wehunt takes a deep dive into cinematic inspiration to build the plot and fill in the details here. The October Film Haunt often feels written like a cinematic experience happening before the viewers’ eyes, particularly in moments that describe the creepiness of scenes and unconventional shots. For instance a ninety-second shot for a character’s head to slowly swivel towards the camera, or the six-minute static shots described in Proof of Demons that fans of the film call Transfigurations.
When talking about The October Film Haunt it is difficult to separate the fiction from the truth, just as the characters have difficulty watching Proof of Demons and concluding what is real or not. Wehunt puts in just enough details to real movies, real directors, real authors from the horror genre field to blur the lines and heighten the unease that reading the novel can bring.
And this is probably the most effective and successful part of Wehunt’s novel. It is scary and unsettling, and I could see parts of in entering into a readers dreams, or nightmares. Like the film at the center of its plot, it will stick with those that experience it.
The other success is that Wehunt very skillfully takes the classic cursed film kind of story and post-modernizes it into the modern age of social media. The novel explores ways in which technology upsets and destroys our lives so easily, how easily it can hurt and dehumanize.
The main criticism I would have of The October Film Haunt is that does get rather convoluted, and it could have stood to be edited down from some of its side plots/POVs. The novel shifts around a lot, and this makes it more difficult for readers to get their bearings, particularly with so many of the important plot points having taken place in the past. Readers have a lot to catch up on, and the connections between characters (or who characters actually are) aren’t usually immediately clear.
One such character (in fact the most important POV after Jorie) is Coleman Smith, an older man with stage four cancer who is still dealing with the loss of a brother who disappeared under mysterious circumstances while they were children. In contrast to Jorie, Coleman has never had any interest in or experience with the horror genre. Yet his past and future have direct connection to Proof of Demons that he slowly comes to realize (and the reader along with him).
My thoughts on the novel (and therefore also this review) are quite convoluted themselves, jumping from place to place as the novel itself. This is because Wehunt puts a lot of inspiration, a lot of themes, and a lot of interconnecting pieces into The October Film Haunt, and making the connections doesn’t necessarily flow in an easy linear order. The meta nature of the plot also enhances the convolution.
The October Film Haunt demands reader attention, and open-mindedness. And it can be brutal. While it could have been simplified or cleaned up some to better serve its pacing and flow, it’s nonetheless a very rewarding horror read, particularly at the time of the year and for people who love horror and are looking for the unsettling and possibly even frightening.
