Bark at the Ghouls

A shitty man is about to surprise his shitty wife with an “I want a divorce” pronouncement but she foils his plans with an announcement of her own and this sets into motion a strange series of events that escalates into an all out disgusting display of over the top sexual nastiness and other grossities.

If this is your thing you will have fun. I suppose fun might be the wrong word choice but if you picked up a book called Ritualistic Human Sacrifice I think you'll get what I’m trying to say here.

The story is told from Nick’s POV and, excuse my bluntness, Nick is a prick. He is a germaphobe and he is revolted by everything that isn’t young and perfect, and perfectly clean and fresh smelling. You will despise Nick, most likely. His wife isn’t a whole helluva lot better either. They’re both selfish and passive-aggressive and kind of deserve each other, if you’re asking me. Midway through the book I caught some clues that Nick was too dense to notice because he was too busy scrubbing his hands and thinking ugly thoughts about everyone. I anxiously listened and couldn't wait for some terrible things to befall some of these terrible people.

The terrible things take quite a while to happen. Much of the book is spent listening to Nick bitch about everything and silently put down everyone around him. He’s a gross person. I don’t know if I made that clear enough already, haha. But the fun of this book is the anticipation. I knew something strange was going on and something horrible was going to happen and I could NOT wait for it to begin! I mean, if you are dumb enough to buy a house that smells of death and of poo simply to spite your wife then you probably deserve whatever hell is hiding behind the black door.

I was not let down. This is an extreme horror novel and it is VERY porny. Trust me. Please tread lightly here if you don’t want to read graphic sexual violence. It over floweth in the final chapters. This is not a gentle warning. Also take a good long look at that cover. It gives you clues as to what might be in store for you. I’ve been reading gross things since I was a kid and I can stomach a lot but some of this was a bit much even for me. Fortunately there were moments of sick humor here to lighten up the mood and keep things readable. You’ll either want to read this madness or you won’t. Personally, I thought it was gross (oh yes) and ridiculously over the top but seeing Nick have to deal with it all was worth it to me.

I knocked off a star because it took too long to get going and my pesky brain couldn’t make sense of some of the plot turns. I also wish it had been even more brutal in the end for one particular person but there may be something wrong with me.

Narration Notes: I think narrator Anderson Prunty did a fantastic job with the voices. The tone fit the characters and his female voices didn’t make me cringe. Major points for that. The straight up narration bits felt a wee bit underplayed at times but it might’ve been a good choice considering how insane the story got near the end.