I quickly finished reading Night Film just for you blog lovers! Honestly, I could not stop reading it! It was a novel I couldn’t put down but the tone of the novel made me afraid to read it; let me elaborate.
The novel begins with disgraced journalist Scott McGrath trying to move on from his libel suit against cult horror film director, Stanislas Cordova. When Cordova’s daughter is found dead from an apparent suicide, McGrath’s interest in the world of Cordova’s films is renewed with new passion and interest. After finding two unlikely sidekicks, they promise to unravel the mystery of Ashley’s death and the mystery of where Cordova has been hiding for the past 30 years. Their adventures take them into the world of black magic, an underground speakeasy, and most of all deep into themselves when they must decipher between what is real and what is Cordova’s dark fantasies.
Pessl’s world of Cordova includes Rolling Stone interviews, internet message boards and complete descriptions of all of Cordova’s disturbing films. It was easy to get confused with what was real versus what was a false lead and what was imagined by the characters. Her writing style was beautiful; I found myself re-reading several phrases because of the fluidity of her vocabulary. The only negative for me was her overuse of italics; I found myself distracted because every page had at least 10 italicized words, some for emphasis but some seemed italicized for no reason.
Favorite Quotes:
“…[He] spoke delicately, as if every word were something to be carefully dusted off and held up to the light.”
“…their dark, elongated shadows were suddenly tossed against the wall in front of me — two long black tongues sliding down it, licking the cracked brown tiles and vanishing.”
“The dark side of life has a way of finding us all anyway, so stop chasing it.”
Overall, I really enjoyed the novel, obviously. If you want to read something creepy for Halloween, definitely save this one. It has all the ingredients for a good scary October book!
I am still searching for my next read, I will let you all know if it is something worth sharing!
Happy Reading!
-H
Untamed Shrews 