Synopsis
After a small coastal town is devastated by a hurricane, the survivors gravitate toward a long out-of-service payphone in hopes of talking out their grief and saying goodbye to loved ones, only for it to begin ringing on its own. As more townspeople answer the call, friends and family believed to have been lost to the storm begin searching for a way back home.
This novelette features several new illustrations by Trevor Henderson.
Review
In the wake of a traumatic hurricane, a telephone booth allows you to speak to the ones you miss the most, those who have passed on from this life to the next. Clay McLeod Chapman is easily one of my favorite modern horror authors for his subtle genius in turning the mundane into something otherworldly, in this case, an artifact of days past. Stay on the Line is his most recent novelette which is set in Brandywine, Virginia, a place that shouldn’t be a stranger to folks who have read his previous novel, What Kind of Mother. Of course, the magic of this telephone isn’t really magic at all, but rather a malevolence that preys upon the living in their most vulnerable state, their grief.
The brilliance of Stay on the Line lies in the story’s duality to be effective in a very logical, horrific sense and in a state of metaphorical terror. Our main character, Jenny, is the surviving parent of Shelby following the assumed death of her husband, Callum, during Hurricane Aubrey. This loss in and of itself is a thing of horror with the love of her life being present one moment and gone the very next. Yet, the surviving townsfolk of Brandywine discover the one remaining, seemingly nonfunctional, phone booth in the parking lot of the marina, a phone that connects them with their departed loved ones. Of course, these calls don’t come without a price tag, and the fate befalling those who answer the call is grisly. To think an unknown, inexplicable force would feast upon the living in such a way is bone-chilling before examining all the subtleties at play.
Chapman personifies Hurricane Aubrey as a vengeful woman who stole Callum away, a remarkably apt comparison for one of Mother Nature’s most unnerving disasters. Surviving a hurricane means literally weathering the storm with no power or means of communication, hearing every creak, moan, bang, and shudder of your dwelling fighting to remain standing against the ferocity of what feels like chaos. In other words, it is utterly terrifying. In this way, Hurricane Aubery feels like a vengeful woman indeed, set on deploying vast amounts of destruction on Brandywine, something that is clearly accomplished through the number of deaths left in her wake.
Additionally, the fact that evil takes root in, of all things, a phonebooth, speaks volumes on the eeriness of a way of life long forgotten. Payphones and phone booths are a thing of the past given the emergence of cell phones. In a way, this illustrates the past literally coming back to haunt the surviving folks of Brandywine who are yearning for a time before tragedy struck. Even more poignant, the phrase that is repeatedly uttered by the ghostly versions of the deceased is, “Stay on the line.” Brandywine is a town that exists thanks to its close proximity to water, its economy thriving on fishing and trolling. Much like a fish being hooked, “staying on the line” means more than not leaving the phone call. The citizens of Brandywine are “on the hook” for more than they bargained for when they picked up the phone for the first time.
In the sweet span of less than 100 pages, Clay McLeod Chapman gives us a frightful time in the town of Brandywine, a place that has endured the wrath of Mother Nature and possibly something much more nefarious. Stay on the Line toys with the idea presented in Stephen King’s Pet Semetary (insert Jud Crandall voice here) that sometimes, dead is better. Aided by the delightfully dreadful illustrations by Trevor Henderson, eeriness thrives in every layer of this novelette, an impressive addition to Chapman’s already extensive catalog.
You can also read fellow FearForAll members’ reviews here:
Sean’s Review: https://fanfiaddict.com/stay-on-the-line-by-clay-mcleod-chapman-illustrations-by-trevor-henderson/
CJ’s Review: https://fanfiaddict.com/review-stay-on-the-line-by-clay-mcleod-chapman-w-illustrations-by-trevor-henderson/
Stay on the Line by Clay McLeod Chapman is officially out on July 30th from Shortwave Publishing, the link to preorder and directly support Shortwave is here: https://shop.shortwavepublishing.com/products/stay-on-the-line-a-novelette-paperback
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