This is not a horror novel that’s going to fill you with icy knives of dread or cause you to fundamentally question the nature of human existence.
But it is a pretty fun read.
The setup is that a female protagonist moves into the Manhattan apartment of her recently murdered grandmother. It turns out Granny had some dark secrets that may be connected to the stone gargoyle that seems to shift between nearby buildings. And the dead bodies piling up.
Massa has an interesting writing style. It’s so sparse that you never really get a sense of the characters, but it does propel the story along very nicely. And sometimes story is what really matters.
As monsters go, I consider gargoyles kind of dopey. But they are delivered in a creepy way here. I rarely feel a chill while reading, but I did with this book.
This is basically a 1980s straight-to-video movie in book form. If you know what you’re getting into, it can be quite entertaining.
I would have preferred a darker ending. This borders on urban fantasy.
Nonetheless, I absolutely will read Massa’s work again.
