Imagine a demon that possesses people through technology (social media, online chats, the news), it radicalizes them and then makes them decend into societal chaos and self destruction. Fanatics created and radicalized by the media they consume; it sounds a lot like real life, right? If you don't think so then maybe
You need to wake up, and open your eyes!
So the above is the premise of book Wake Up and Open Your Eyes by Clay McLeod Chapman.
The horror of this book is not so much the gruesome violence it portrays, but more that everything feels all too real. I definitely felt a level of stress as I was reading it.
The book is obviously a commentary on the world today. In the book the news station that people watch is called "Fax News," which is an obvious reference to Fox news. On Fax, an angry newscasters spews polarizing garbage to anger and radicalize its viewers. They relentlessly endorse their catch phrase, that what they are reporting are "Just the Fax." I found the parts about the news to be the most distressing to me actually.
The demon in the book also manifests itself as a guru style self help influencer who corrupts folks through toting a variety of health and wellness trends.
The book does a good job making things feel too real and making the reader feel uncomfortable.
The genre is horror. Its a mid-sized book of about 380-ish pages (I read it on an ereader so I don't know the exact count).
In looking up reviews I noticed that readers thoughts on it were as polarizing as the politics that it was trying to convey. People seem to either love it or hate it. For me, I enjoyed it but I did find it to be repetitive at times and a little predictable in the end. I don't know how many times I read the phrase
You need to wake up, and open your eyes!
Actually I didn't mind reading that phrase at all. The repetitiveness manifested in other ways for me, mainly in the way that it switched between only a few characters as we witnessed them slowly being corrupted by the demon.
It also did this thing that was kind of like the book World War Z where it included little snippets at the ends of chapters from random perspectives, like a news report or social media video post. It was a good way of letting the reader know what was going on around the country beyond the perspectives of the characters that the book followed. At the same time, I found those part to be unenjoyable to read and a little boring. They were short though, and they served a purpose, so I can't fault the book for them really.
In the end I gave this one 4 stars for delivering on the horror and discomfort. So anyway, if this book sounds interesting to you then I suggest that
You need to wake up, and open your eyes
And give it a read.
