This tale was a bit slow moving, in my opinion. The narrative was awkward and strained. I didn’t hate the book, the subject matter being interesting, so will try this author again.
Thanks for the ARC opportunity.

I've read A LOT of Stephen Graham Jones in my anticipation of this novel, and I do agree with many others who say he is one of the best modern horror authors. His writing is genuinely frightening and unarguably authentic. My Heart Is A Chainsaw is another revisit to the slasher genre but offers a completely new take.

I love Jade as the protagonist. She's annoying, obsessive, and borderline insane for most of the novel but is so unapologetically herself. Jade is convinced she's living in a real-life slasher and brings it onto herself to mentor who she thinks is the "final girl". She's a walking Wikipedia of information and attempts to prepare for impending doom to her lakeside community.

Fair warning: My Heart is A Chainsaw is an investment. It's long and can be tedious at times (especially if you aren't a horror fanatic), but ultimately does pay off. SGJ creates stories that stick with you, even ones that you might not enjoy reading.

Really enjoyed this one too, definitely one of the better horror novels I've read this year. Thanks Gallery Books and Netgalley!

A very slow burn until the blood-splattered explosive ending! I loved all the elements the author interweaves into the story: unreliable narrator, epistolary material, and lots of playing with inter-mingling genres.

Jade is a fully devoted fan of the slasher films and has her own internal library of the genre. Her only dream in her life is for her town to once again become the setting for its own horror. Her mother moved out years ago and left Jade to live with her father, an alcoholic who couldn’t care less about her. Jade may or may not graduate from high school and has been making a small paycheck for herself working as a part time janitor.

Her hopes start to rise when a series of horrific events start making their way to the surface in her town. Also exciting for Jade, the new girl at school who has full final girl potential.

This book takes its time to put everything into place for the last 40% of the book, which moves quickly. It is even more devoted to the Slasher genre than Jade is, which is saying a lot. And If you come into this book not knowing a lot about Slasher films, Jade will give you her full course by the time you are done reading. And it is thoroughly scary, which I love in a summer read or moving into spooky season. Thank you to NetGalley for providing a free copy of this title. I decided to share my review for fellow readers.

I think SGJ's writing style just isn't for me. I know a lot of people love his books and his narratives, but I just... don't like it. And I feel BAD that I don't like it because all signs point to yes and my brain just says no.

I'm not sure what it was but something about this book just didn't resonate with me. I am a huge fan of horror movies and thought this one would be really good but I just didn't like it much.

The book opens with a very dark and creepy prologue – but I’ll admit that I wasn’t crazy about the two foreign tourists and was happy to meet the actual protagonist, Jade Daniels. Now Jade is everything a horror lover as myself loves, in fact had we been in high school together we would’ve had slasher sleepover parties. Jade is cool in the way that girls that love gore are – meaning her styling choices are questionable, her social skills nonexistent except when she’s spouting slasher speak and slasher trivia – and honestly I ADORE HER FOR IT.

We follow Jade – a recent high school graduate as she slowly begins to believe that a slasher film is unfolding in her very town. This convinces her to see beautiful rich girl Letha Mondragon as a potential final girl – and ultimate savior. For a slasher fan as myself I reveled in the slasher speak and pop culture references. I know many have mentioned this in other reviews, but the only fault this novel has is that it’s a slow burn.

Honestly, if Jade weren’t such a compelling character I don’t know if I would’ve enjoyed the journey so much but Jade is a total badass and I know that Jones’ delivers when it comes to horror and gore – so I patiently waited for the bloodbath. To say that Jones’ doesn’t disappoint is an understatement – if this were a movie, Jones’ budget would’ve blown just on the fake blood expense because there is SO MUCH OF IT & I AM HERE FOR IT. I mean, I directed a short where we used almost ten gallons of corn syrup, because I literally wanted to be drenched in it. And by the time you’re finished reading the gory, batshit crazy final pages you’re going to feel like you just waded in ten gallons of blood too.

Don’t walk but RUN to buy this book if you’re a fan of all 70’s & 80’s slasher flicks, cause you will LOVE this. Also, have I mentioned how awesomely badass Jade is? Go on, you know you want to get to know her! This book is fucking brutal and a wild ride.

*Thank you so much to NetGalley and Gallery/Saga Press for the digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!

Now that I'm getting accustomed to SGJ's writing style, I can see why he appeals to so many. His stories are fast and furious. Though this title didn't have the unique feel of The Only Good Indians, this novel was frantic and violent. I'm not a fan of the slasher genre, but I had fun with My Heart is a Chainsaw. My full review will come soon to my normal outlets.

This is a great year for horror fans as Stephen Graham Jones shares his newest edition to the genre, My Heart Is a Chainsaw.

This is the story of Jade Daniels, a slasher movie fan angry with the world after her painful upbringing. Her life of writing slasher related essays and working as a janitor begins to dramatically change when bodies began piling up around her small town. Is this the slasher that Jade has always been hoping for?

I want to begin by saying I think this was a great book that just did not work perfectly for me. Stephen Graham Jones is an author that I have always wanted to become a favorite, but the two books I have read from him did not vibe with my reading preferences as much as I would like. His writing style is just not for me, but I am so glad that so many other people love it.

There was a lot that I liked about this novel, most notably the protagonist, Jade Daniels. She is so different from any other characters I have read, but that did not stop me from connecting with her. I also enjoyed the conversations that it brings about colonialism and gentrification. Because while this story has the gore and scares that you would expect from the genre, there was also the horror that was never explicitly written on the page.

I thought the last act was easily some of the best horror that I have ever read, but the journey to get there sometimes felt a little long and sluggish. There were definitely important elements to the story that took place during that time, but I just felt as though they page count could have been cut in half, and it would have the same effect. Something else that I struggled with was the constant slasher movie references. I understand how much of a passion project this was for Graham Jones, and that so many mega slasher fans are going to love the references, but for someone who only has an average knowledge of the genre, it became confusing at times.

With that being said, I do and will continue to recommend this to all my horror fans out there. Especially if you have loved past work from Stephen Graham Jones. Prepare for a journey that is both terrifying and heartbreaking.

This was my first novel to be read by Stephen Graham Jones. I've had a couple on my TBR for some time that I hadn't gotten around to, so was very excited to crack this one open.

The story follows Jade, a Horror movie fanatic battling personal demons and hoping to get the chance to live out her fantasy of her own personal horror story. Part of this must come from the legends of the old campground located in her small town of Proofrock, home to its own deaths that have plagued it's past. As bodies started to pop up around town, Jade starts to picture the various characters and plot points, trying to figure out who the slasher is and who will be the Final Girl to survive.

I did really enjoy the old school horror vibes and references littered throughout, with Jade's extra-credit essays at the end of each chapter providing some good pops of it. The story itself does take a bit of time to get going, but it really gets amped up as the tone shifts for the last 1/3 of the book.

Overall, it was a good introduction to the author and I look forward to reading more of his stories.

A big thank you to Netgalley for this early preview.

This book was a wild ride! I saw someone else describe the vibe of this as 'fever dream,' and I feel like that is really fitting.

An awesome homage to horror movies (old and new), the main character Jade is constantly referencing a large array of slashers. But you get the sense early on that following Jade's perspective is somewhat unreliable. Throughout the novel, as Jade notes she is losing sleep and losing time, the plot gets slightly more difficult to follow. She is not completely sure what is going on, which therefore raises a lot of questions to readers.

Between each chapter is a snippet of an extra credit paper that Jade has done for history class, on- you guessed it, slashers! Slasher themes, specifically: final girls, red herrings, lore, revenge, etc. Each 'paper' mirrored a plot point of the novel as well.

The last 80 pages is WILD and QUICK. To be honest, I might need to go back and re-read this part to see what I missed. This portion is gore-heavy. If you are squeamish, beware.

Overall, this book was not quite as expected, but definitely a fun and crazy read! (Please note I will list CW below)
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CW: Animal cruelty/death, child sexual abuse, bullying, detailed suicide attempts, detailed murder/gore, alcoholism, abandonment.

DNF. Found it to be very dull. While the thriller parts are recognizable I couldn’t really get into this book.

**I was provided with an electronic ARC from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for honest review.**

Stephen Graham Jones returns with his newest homage to slasher films in My Heart Is a Chainsaw. Jade is the horror chick in her senior year in her small town. She has an encyclopedic knowledge of slashers through the years. Which makes Jade the resident expert who can identify when the slasher cycle begins in her town.

This novel is every bit an ode to horror, an ode to the slasher, and also manages to push beyond that and make it deeper. I am able to recognize all that it accomplished in those areas, and still recognize that I was left feeling lukewarm. The opening scene was pretty good. Then stagnant.

I wanted to DNF at many points, but that feeling came through strong at 40%. This was the slowest of slow burns, and I even looked up other reviews which encouraged me to hang in there until 60%. Well, things picked up at 67% and from there the slasher I had hoped for set in. From there to the end, the action was pretty non-stop and had constant twists and turns and the bloodbath commenced. However, I have to acknowledge not really having a great time for basically two-thirds of the book. Perhaps if I was more of a horror buff (beyond being able to recognize the references and actually entering the point of being excited by their presence), I might not have found the pace to be so slow. The ending did bump this up from a 2.5 to a 3 without any qualms from me. The ending was absolutely solid.

While this wasn't my favorite of Stephen Graham Jones' works (which is The Only Good Indians), I have no hesitation in picking up more of his work in the future.

A logical mess.

I'm sorry. I can't go on reading this book. There are too many common-sense issues in just the first few pages.

1. Two young people go skinny-dipping in an Idaho mountain lake in March when there's still snow on the ground?? Forget about anything scary in the water. You'd die from the cold.

2. Rich people drive up and leave their cars at the pier. Ok. This makes sense. But what doesn't are the models of cars left at the pier. No one drives an Aston Martin or a Maserati into the mountains to get to their vacation home. Land Rover = yes. Collector sports car = no. There's no storage space in a sports car to bring up your bags. This doesn't make sense. Sports cars are for the joy of driving. Also, with all this talk of rich people coming into town ... there's no mentioning of the supporting businesses rich people expect, like restaurants and shopping. Or even a good grocery store. The economy of this town doesn't make sense (and I get REALLY hung up on the economy not working in stories).

3. The descriptions of past fashion say "a decade-old" but then mentions shoulder pads. What decade is this? Shoulder pads were in the '80s, not the 2010s. Is this supposed to take place in the '90s?

4. Jade watches movies on tape. Which would be super hard to get these days. DVDs are easy and cheap. But not tapes. Tapes would take a lot of work to hunt down. Like first edition records, it's not something you just stumble upon.

5. Jade crashes what I can only describe as a hobo memorial and starts talking about mass murder. Wow. Yeah. That's beyond crass and just weird, especially because everyone just goes with it. I don't know how to handle this one.

The writing is off-putting. The sentences are super long and try too hard to be witty.

This took me a while to get into. As a slasher fan I had a great time with all the references throughout but ultimately for me the book was just....okay.

This was my first Stephen Graham Jones book, and I'm just not sure he's the author for me. I found this book very slow and ultimately too boring to enjoy. Jade's life and circumstances are heartbreaking, and Jones presents an unflinching look at what gentrification does to struggling communities and shows stark juxtaposition between a long standing impoverished area and newly developed elite/rich neighborhood across the lake. This was well done, and just so so real and so sad. So it's no wonder Jade is desperate to lose herself in something else, it's just a bit unusual that that something else is an intense love for slasher horror. Her disillusionment with her life and the world is so bad that she begins to hope for a new slasher killer to enter her little town, to the point where she sees everything as a sign of things to come, of gruesome murders to come. The entire concept was interesting - that's why I picked up this book! But the execution was just to plodding and slow and depressing to want to keep going. It also requires a lot of slasher film lore knowledge, as Jade's horror-focused history papers act as chapter breaks and go into the stuff behind the films. This strategy is also used in Grady Hendrix's "Final Girls Support Group" and a few other final girl/slasher horror based novels - must be a trend. But I just wasn't pulled along enough to find this to be a good book for me.

3.5 stars…it took me a long time to get into this one. I didn’t get interested in the story until I was around 50% of the way through. I was obsessed with horror movies in middle and high school…but Jade’s confidence, or one could more accurately say desperation to see day-to-day life in the town of Proofrock explode into an orgy of blood and gore was annoying. Fortunately, things pick up at the midway point and by the end the story is out of control like a car with shot brakes hurtling towards a cliff.

This is an ode to slasher films. It doesn’t have the depth that some of my favorites from SGJ have….but as always, it’s a fun and interesting time!

Thank you to NetGalley for this Advanced Reader Copy of one of my most anticipated 2021 releases! I read 'The Only Good Indians' and became absolutely entranced by Stephen's work-- and I knew I had to have more. Not only that, but the premise for this novel sunk its hooks into me; not unlike a wicked puzzle devised by Jigsaw himself. I grew up with horror-- was raised by Laurie Strode and Pamela Voorhees, cut my teeth on Candyman and Hellraiser, and found my own Bay of Blood in A Nightmare on Elm Street. In short, I knew I would feel a kinship with Jade. I went into this story with high hopes, and Stephen didn't let me down.

We meet our protagonist, Jade, in the midst of a life that has never felt solidly hers. Her mom left, her dad treats her like shit, and no one quite understands her at school. That is, except for her history teacher. It is under his guidance that she is allowed to explore the background and meaning of the slasher films she loves so much-- detailing what makes up the specific sub-genre and chronicling the progression of the films from its black and white iterations to the newer, fruit-punch-blood soaked offerings. In horror, Jade finds meaning and structure. So, when a body washes up in her town of Proofrock, she recognizes her chance to finally be in the slasher she's been dreaming of for years. However, she decides she is not the final girl, and sets out to prepare a newer inhabitant of the town to take the role before it's too late.

Jade's journey is not only a wild ride of references, dead bodies, and missteps, but also one of healing. This is akin to Stephen King's IT in that it is a coming of age story that happens to be set within a bloody tableau. Jade is not only the product of a broken home, but is one of the few Native Americans in Proofrock, which only sets her further apart from her peers. It is amazing to watch her come into her own as this tale unfolds; with each point added to the body count, her spirit grows and her courage manifests in a way that could rival that of an angry mother bear. There are many times in life where we don't feel like the hero of our story, but if this book teaches us anything, it's that we will all rise to the occasion when it presents itself. I really recommend this book for any horror lover, any outcast searching for meaning, and of course-- any Native American hungry for representation.

Thank you to Gallery Books and NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

First off, I was so excited to get approved to read this ARC! Stephen Graham Jones is a famous Native American author, and his books are highly praised everywhere. I hadn't had the chance to read his books before, but I am so excited to support this #ownvoices novel. I hope that there will be even more books published by Native American authors in the future. Thank you again to the publisher for this opportunity!

My Heart Is a Chainsaw by Stephen Graham Jones is a horror novel starring a teen protagonist that will appeal to fans of Fear Street and 80's horror movies. The story revolves around Jade Daniels, a half-Native American high school student with an encyclopedic knowledge of slasher films. When mysterious murders start happening, Jade has to use her knowledge of slashers to figure out who the murderer is and to stop them before it's too late. Interspersed between Jade's chapters are papers that Jade writes for her history teacher recounting the history of slasher films and explaining what they represent.

Here is an excerpt from the opening chapter, which follows two tourists as they row a canoe in Proofock, Idaho:

"The canoe thunking into something where there should be nothing tells her that’s just what it has to be.
She shrieks, can feel sudden tears on her face, her breath the kind of deep she’s about to lose control of.
“Sven!” she screams, holding hard to the side of the canoe, and now, instead of another thunk, what she hears, fast like little footsteps, is a series of . . . not quite splashes, but some disturbance on the surface of the water. Fish in a line, jumping? A formation of bats snatching insects from the top of the lake? A rock someone skipped in the daytime, still making it across to the other shore?
She pushes away from whatever it is.
“Sven, Sven, Sven!” she’s saying, less loud each time, because it feels like her voice is putting a bullseye on her back.
They never should have come to America."

Overall, My Heart is a Chainsaw is a tribute to 80's horror films that will appeal to any fan of R. L. Stine or Stephen King. This book is part slasher, part horror, and also reflects some social issues that teen girls deal with as well. I did take off 1 star, because the book seemed more literary (as in literary fiction) than horror for the first half. Unlike the summer reads on the bestsellers list, this book was quite difficult to read at first. It also took me a while to get to like the protagonist. Halfway through, though, the plot does pick up and starts becoming more exciting as the death toll rises. If you're intrigued by the excerpt above, or if you're a fan of horror novels in general, you can check out this book when it comes out in August!

(Quotes will be added to review publicly only after it's been confirmed in a finished copy).
"Horror's not a symptom, it's a love affair."

Wow, this book was a lot. 'My Heart is a Chainsaw' is a confusing ride inside the mind of an extremely unstable, abused teenager experiencing life the only way she knows how, through old slasher films. I loved all the movie references in this book. Stephen Graham Jones is known for his top shelf prose, stream-of-consciousness style and supremely weird storytelling. His other books, 'The Only Good Indians' and 'Night of the Mannequins' were great but in my opinion this is his best book yet. What I expected was a slow unfolding of flawed characters and creepy twisted setting for this book and it did not disappoint.

Slasher film fanatic Jennifer "Jade" Daniels is a character examination of a dramatic teenage girl surviving a dysfunctional life. She is convinced that cliche horror movie rules exist in real life and is on the lookout for a slasher cycle to start in her small town at any moment. When she accidentally uncovers what she thinks are a series of grizzly murders, she could not be more thrilled. Although Jade's character is funny, quirky and dark I felt like this book went on too long. It could've been a hundred pages shorter. That said though, it does have a cult classic Donnie Darko vibe to it. The sound track would even work here. Although parts are funny (the Sheriff's dictation had me cracking up) the sad underbelly of the story is one of sexual abuse and mental illness. Trigger warnings for suicide, alcohol abuse and child abuse.

"It's good being the horror chick, sure, always standing away from the rest of the crowd, smoking bitter cigarette after bitter cigarette, she’d have it no other way, but it’s nice to make eye contact with someone else with a black heart, too, and then breathe smoke out slow, like judgment."