**Review: *Coup de Grâce* by Sofia Ajram – A Haunting and Surreal Descent into the Mind**

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️☆ (4/5)

Sofia Ajram’s *Coup de Grâce* is not an easy read—but it’s not meant to be. This is a novel that traps you inside its labyrinthine corridors just as it does its protagonist, immersing the reader in a surreal, disorienting world that mirrors the oppressive weight of depression. It’s an ambitious, experimental horror novel that won’t be for everyone, but for those willing to surrender to its strange, poetic, and at times claustrophobic prose, it delivers a deeply unsettling and thought-provoking experience.

The novel follows Vicken, an EMT who has reached his breaking point and plans to end his life in the Saint Lawrence River. But when he steps off the subway, he finds himself stuck in a never-ending Montreal train station, a shadowy purgatory where the rules of reality no longer apply. As he searches for an exit, he encounters vast, impossible architecture, eerie presences, and the creeping realization that he is not alone. The novel’s horror isn’t in jump scares or gore—it’s in the existential dread of being utterly lost, physically and mentally, with no clear way out.

Ajram’s prose is dense, lyrical, and at times overwhelmingly intricate. There are moments where the writing borders on self-indulgent, with descriptions that stretch on longer than necessary, and the novel occasionally loses itself in its own stylistic ambition. However, the atmospheric power of the book is undeniable—the suffocating, oppressive tone perfectly captures the despair and isolation of its protagonist. Readers who appreciate the dreamlike horror of Mark Z. Danielewski’s *House of Leaves* or the cerebral intensity of Ligotti’s fiction will find much to admire here.

One of the novel’s most fascinating elements is its structure, which offers an unconventional narrative flow and even a “choose-your-own” aspect that plays into its themes of fate, choice, and mental entrapment. It’s a bold move that adds an unexpected layer of interactivity, making the reader feel as if they, too, are trying to navigate Vicken’s inescapable maze.

That said, *Coup de Grâce* is not a book for every horror fan. The pacing is slow, the plot is often secondary to the novel’s philosophical and psychological explorations, and the experimental nature of the writing will be divisive. Some readers may find the style pretentious or needlessly convoluted, while others will be drawn to its hypnotic, poetic quality.

Final Verdict: *Coup de Grâce* is a bold and challenging horror novel, one that prioritizes mood and existential terror over conventional storytelling. While its prose sometimes overreaches, its eerie atmosphere and thematic depth make it a compelling, if emotionally exhausting, read. If you enjoy cerebral, unsettling horror that lingers in your mind like a half-remembered nightmare, this is a journey worth taking. Just be prepared to get lost in the dark.

Felt pretentious and over-written, I didn't connect with this at all. Your mileage may vary though, it's unique enough, and if you dig the ending, maybe it'll make up for the rest (didn't work for me!)

I value the opportunity I was given to read this in advance, but I still haven't read this. With so many books ahead of me, I cannot return to this title.

Interesting concept and idea for the plot, but I feel like the writing fell flat. I just couldn’t get into it unfortunately.

I'll be honest, this book just wasn't for me. As someone who can relate a little too closely with the topics in the book, it triggered a lot more trauma than I anticipated and I had to DNF.

Coup de Grace is an engaging read with elegant prose and a compelling atmosphere. While some moments felt slower, the story’s depth and style make it a worthwhile experience.

I was so excited to read Coup de Grace but unfortunately it fell short for me. This is a very experimental horror about a suicidal man who gets trapped in a neverending Montreal train station.

The idea was good and I was enjoying the first 25% of the book. However, the line writing really ruined my enjoyment of the story. The vocabulary choice was very outlandish in an insanely pretentious way. The sentence structure was often so run-onish that everything seemed to lose its meaning and impact. I heard someone say it felt like a teenager put their writing into AI and asked them to use a thesaurus and make it sound smarter to reach a required word count. This is unfortunately exactly how I felt.

Thank you to Netgalley and the Publisher for the free digital ARC in exchange for an honest review.

The book kicks off with Vicken, a depressed EMT who's taking a train somewhere to end his life but finds himself instead stuck inside a horrifying labyrinth that he cannot escape, which sounds like a good concept but delivered absolutely nothing cause never has it taken me SO LONG to read a novella of 144 pages.

It was overwritten to the point of being dull and by the time we got to the big gimmick (which I'm pretty sure was the main idea that the book was then written around), I didn't care at all what happened to him.

Thanks to NetGalley + Titan Books for the arc - sad this didn't work at all for me

Special thanks to NetGalley and Titan Books for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

This book pretty aims to show the struggle it is to live as someone who is mentally ill. It’s messy, complicated, and at many times needlessly confusing, alternating between excess to minimal detail.

I loved this book for reasons I can’t really put to words. It was imperfect in a way that felt intentional. I had formatting issues with the last few chapters of the book which made the already distorted ending more confusing which led me to lower my review, but ultimately I will recommend and most likely re-read this book.

This was wordy to the point of being almost unreadable. I enjoyed the beginning and some of the horror elements but it became aggressively overwritten shortly in and the ending gimmick was too awkwardly lighthearted compared to the wrenching darkness of the middle of book.

Have you ever read something so horrifically fascinating that resonates with you on a level you weren't prepared to face and have to question everything you know and what you consider to be a sense of your own morality before the inevitable...end?

I imagine that's how Vicken felt by the end of his adventure, if it did. Every page is haunting as the main character lives through what feels like a punishment for his choice to end his life, which may not even be possible in this new, gray world. By the end, I could only hope Vicken lived (based on my choice, he did) and I appreciated the absolute insanity that the author wrote about this place. I am personally aware of mental health issues and I felt like I was experiencing this bleak and lifeless place right alongside the characters.

The book is gripping, unsettling, and evoking nightmares. Author has done deep exploration on poignant emotions. There is a labyrinth and a man is trapped there. It felt like reading the diary of a man who has been forever trapped trying to find his way out. Thanks to the Publisher

Wow this book was difficult to read but in the best way because it felt relatable.

This book was me a few years ago.
This book is still me but like the ending I got—-there’s more hopeful days than not. (That’s right. There’s a choose your own in this. Incredible.)

Coup de Grâce is depression hidden inside a concrete labyrinth. It is surreal, lonely, angry and numbing all at once. I thought this was fantastic and the author did a really wonderful job

Coup de Grace is a unique horror with a terrifying premise. It is experimental while some parts worked for me, a lot of it did not. The main character Vicken is contemplating ending things and gets stuck in a nightmare. The premise was interesting and Vicken is a complex character. However, the language used throughout was too grandiose and felt unnecessary. This took me out of the story. I commend the uniqueness but it was not for me.

Thank you to NetGalley and Titan Books for the ARC.

The experience was both captivating and unsettling, leaving me with a sense of unease and discomfort, as if I was being enveloped from all sides. While the story's setup and cosmic themes were engaging, the execution felt somewhat forced. However, the interactive choose-your-own-adventure style ending successfully drew me in, making me complicit in determining Vicken's fate and thus invested in the story's conclusion.

I can understand the comparisons to other horror fiction, but as many others have pointed out, the depictions of depression and suicidality in the book seem a bit too real to be a fictional character -- instead, it seems like the author's own views and experiences, told through a fictionalized account. I'm not sure whether this is a fault on the part of marketing or my own inability to read between the lines, but the gulf between what I wanted and what I got from this book is wide enough to sail a ship in.

"Even the language we use to describe sickness is, at its best, rife with rote metaphor, and, at its worst, profoundly dehumanizing. It inscribes a lack of control: we "battle" insomnia, we "suffer" a heart attack, become "victim" to dementia. We "collapse," and at times even "succumb" to sickness. Yielding to death."

TW: Coup de Grâce deals entirely and explicitly with suicide, depression, and self-harm. That is the entire crux of this novella, and if that is in any way triggering to you, you might want to skip this book altogether.

Despite some good The Magnus Archives-esque storytelling, Coup de Grâce is not horror, nor is it a fiction novel. As much as this book is marketed as literary horror, in my mind, there is no question that it is a memoir told through a fictional character's voice rather than Ajram's own. The only things horrifying in Coup de Grâce are the realities of depression, and nothing more.

From the premise, Coup de Grâce sounded like a fun, mind-bending romp: a never-ending, abandoned Montreal subway station that refuses to let our narrator Vicken go? Amazing premise - and it's queer, too! That kind of thing is right up my alley. But this novella is nothing like its synopsis, and no matter what you're expecting to read here, you're wrong. Tonally, it's mind-bending in the way that it is bogged down in literary metaphor and description, so much so that it's almost impossible to tell what the rooms Vicken is standing in look like because Ajram is too busy crafting language to remember that he's telling a story.

While there are a few body horror-ish moments, what Coup de Grâce is is a personal reflection on depression, self-harm, and suicide. From his writing, Ajram clearly has a personal, complex relationship to these topics: and if Coup de Grâce had been marketed as a memoir or a mental health nonfiction book, this review would be a very different thing. The way Ajram describes so much of Vicken's mental health is aching, and beautiful, and horrible, and cruel, and breathtaking. There's no doubt in my mind that Sofia Ajram is a great writer - but not of fiction.

On top of this, I will flag one moment in this book that really just didn't sit right with me: the Elisa Lam comparisons. There is a point in this book where Vicken reflects on the very real death of Elisa Lam - if you're a horror or true crime fan, you probably know plenty about the Elisa Lam case - and starts talking about how Elisa must have felt, and describing how his body feels similar to that of her corpse's. Elisa is brought up multiple times in this book as almost a foil for Vicken, which feels really disgusting, because Elisa Lam was a real person. Elisa had real friends and real family, is not just a victim in a case you heard about on a podcast to be exploited, or to be woven into your fictional novel after her death. I could go on a long rant about the commodification and depersonalization in true crime, but the key point for Coup de Grâce is that Ajram should not be bringing the death of a real person into their fictional book at such length, particularly discussing her dead body and the circumstances of her death. Ajram seems to really be indicating that he thinks Elisa's death was a suicide, and again, this is not the time or the place to be speaking about that. This is a fictional book about a fictional character lost in a fictional subway tunnel, but sure, tell me more about this real girl who tragically lost her life and how similar she is to your fictional character. Yikes.

Again, if Coup de Grâce had been made into something like a collection of personal essays on depression, suicide, and mental health, I think this could've been a really moving, heartbreaking, well-written book. Instead, it's a memoir trying to pass as something it isn't, seems over-complicated and somewhat pretentious at times, and capitalizes on real-world deaths to make us better relate to a fictional character. Really disappointed with this one.

Think house of leaves as novella form set in 2000's. Defiantly do not read if triggered by mental health or suicide as this goes very in depth into thoughts and feelings during depression episodes (although as someone who does struggle with this, I do believe it to have been written very well). The writing style is a little too 'floaty and descriptive' for me and sometimes it does feel as if the character is going way off into a tangent to what they were originally saying. Horror parts were very good and did give me a chill a few times.

The liminal visuals of this are stunning. There's a moment at the end of the book that turns into something really fun! While I DO wish there was more to the story, and while I was totally rooting for one plotline to happen, I still liked this very, very much.

I don’t even know how to begin explaining how I felt about this. It was wonderful and horrifying all at once. It made me feel heavy and uncomfortable, and at times I felt like the walls were closing in on me from all angles.

A book I will read again many many times, experiencing new dread every single time.

✩✩✩✩✩