Heads Will Roll - Josh Winning

 

"After sitcom star Willow tweeted herself into infamy and had to be dragged blind-drunk out of a swimming pool, her agent shipped her off to the woodsy and wonderfully anonymous confines of Camp Castaway. Tucked away in the trees of upstate New York, Castaway is a summer camp for adults in desperate need of leaving behind their mistakes, their social media accounts, their lives. No real names, no phones…no way to call for help.

Willow is relieved to find that her fellow campers seem okay. To her shock, her own favorite actress is here, sitting by the campfire and roasting a s’more. And did that jaded writer, Dani, just wink at her? But the peaceful vibe is shattered when a terrifying woman pops shrieking from the wardrobe in Willow’s room. Soon after, one of the campers vanishes. Is Willow about to get cancelled all over again, this time for good?

Soon, terror grips the group, campers begin to lose their heads—literally!—and Willow and her new friends are on the run. As paranoia grows and disturbing past deeds come to light, this escape from their shallow lifestyles might just lead to a set of shallow graves."

What Worked for Me:

The set up for this worked fantastically.  I loved the idea of this 'unplugged' camp where folks can just decompress and disconnect.  It easily solved the problem in modern slashers of the 'why didn't they just call for help' trope and didn't feel overly contrived.  We get a good mix of characters at this camp - all with different reasons for wanting a reset which helped with the balance.  I also enjoyed the fact that since this camp was basically anonymous, there were some good red herrings when it came to figuring out who the killer might be. 

I also loved the folk horror aspect and there were times where I wondered if we were going to get into supernatural horror territory.  I think the legend was a perfect mix of a little over the top combined with plausible.  Like we could 100% see the real story behind the campfire tale.   

What Didn't Work for Me:

I wanted more character development before the bodies started dropping.  I know that is sort of the point of a slasher is that the characters are basically cannon fodder which normally I'm ok with.  However, with how emotional the other characters got at certain deaths, I felt like there was a disconnect between the characters and the reader.   

I felt the social media message was a little heavy handed in this and at times, felt like this was an 'issue' book instead of a slasher that had some commentary on modern day media.  I think maybe that sort of overt messaging would be better suited for maybe a younger YA book.  I think the message is important, but I just didn't need to be hit over the head with it - the overall plot made the point clear enough.

Most of the kills were off page and the characters would find the body afterwards.  I didn't particularly mind this, at first, due to the overall folk horror elements.  However, there was one fantastic fight scene that just made me wish we got of that action on page.  We do get more as the book progresses, mostly due to the fact that our MC is now involved in the action a lot more, but I think maybe some multi-POV so we could see more of this killer would have been fun.

Overall, I think this just ended up in the 'not quite for me' category.  I really liked the set up and setting, but wanted more character development before the bodies started dropping.

Thanks to NetGalley and Penguin Group Putnam for the ARC.  Publication date was July 30, 2024