Synopsis
Noah Fairchild has been losing his formerly polite Southern parents to far-right cable news for years, so when his mother leaves him a voicemail warning him that the “Great Reawakening” is here, he assumes it’s related to one of the many conspiracy theories she believes in. But when his own phone calls go unanswered, Noah makes the long drive from Brooklyn to Richmond, Virginia. There, he discovers his childhood home in shambles, a fridge full of spoiled food, and his parents locked in a terrifying trance-like state in front of the TV. Panicked, Noah attempts to snap them out of it and get medical help.
Then Noah’s mother brutally attacks him.
But Noah isn’t the only person to be attacked by a loved one. Families across the country are tearing each other apart-–literally-–as people succumb to a form of possession that gets worse the more time they spend watching particular channels, using certain apps, or visiting certain websites. In Noah’s Richmond-based family, only he and his young nephew Marcus are unaffected. Together, they must race back to the safe haven of Brooklyn–-but can they make it before they fall prey to the violent hordes?
This ambitious, searing novel from “one of horror’s modern masters” holds a mirror to our divided nation, and will shake readers to the core.
Review
A huge, huge thank you to Quirk Books for sending an ARC my way!
Clay McLeod Chapman is an author who specializes in the unhinged. For every thought or feeling that has been experienced within the human experience, Chapman has found a way to explore and elevate even the smallest of emotions into the grotesque, horrific, and unforgettable. In his previous novels, Chapman has elevated explorations of grief through disturbing fungi, phone calls from the beyond, and even boys that are more crustacean than human. Above all, Chapman makes these things that feel absurd on their own entirely something else, something that has form, meaning, and feeling. It is abundantly true for this same sentiment to be imparted regarding his upcoming release, Wake Up and Open Your Eyes, a novel that takes every anxiety of living in the modern world and cranks every dial to ten.
“There is nothing to fear but fear itself.” This is a phrase from Franklin D. Roosevelt’s inaugural address back in 1933, a sentence that is uttered in hopes of assuaging fears of the future and unknown. But what if you live in fear, past, present, and future? What if you know fear all too well as a friendly face, a constant, that sits alongside you every day of your existence? And what if the reality of your world is worse than what you’ve come to know?
Wake Up and Open Your Eyes is not a novel that takes place in some mystical land or forgotten planet in which new political regimes are up for grabs. Unfortunately, the current state of America, and quite frankly the world, feels perfect for Chapman’s horrific playground in which possession becomes a reality through various means, chiefly media screens. And I must note how ironic (or maybe hypocritical?) it sounds to be typing out and sharing this review through, you guessed it, a screen. While the biggest contributor to this dissemination of possession seems to be “Fax News,” Chapman is not out to bash any one person’s political leanings with this book. No, quite frankly, no one is safe. Rather, Wake Up and Open Your Eyes supplies profoundly disturbing commentary on the disconnection of our society thanks to misinformation, loss of meaningful bonds, and sorry substitutions for human presence. Is there a timelier read on our shelves? Hell, no.
Clay McLeod Chapman brings to life one of the most disturbing, horrific, and insane ideas of mass possession through the means of our very real functioning in today’s world. We think we know our fears well, but Chapman begs to differ with this novel which is an unrelenting assault on every single one of our senses. This is horror in every shape or form come to life to run rampant in the streets of America, bloodthirsty and deranged. And the reason these terrors scare us so well is because we know this horror isn’t that far off the mark of our reality. Yes, the direct culmination of these ideas may seem darkly (and I admit a little humorously, although I’m not sure what that says about me) absurd on these pages. But, ask yourself, how many times do we point out our misinformation every day? What’s that screen time number every week? What are we missing that has brought about so much division? These are points that Chapman punctuates with the goriest bouts of body horror, disgust, and revulsion, ensuring that this is not a story soon forgotten.
Wake Up and Open Your Eyes by Clay McLeod Chapman is an unrelenting tour de force in cultural horror specific to the crisis we face in a land absent of checks and balances. Chapman crafts the kind of horror that crawls from deep within your gut only to lodge itself in your throat with only a scream fulfilling that sweet release of cold comfort. Unhinged, depraved, and frighteningly timely, Wake Up and Open Your Eyes is a mean horror novel with a formidable message, one that while terrifying is deeply important.
Wake Up and Open Your Eyes by Clay McLeod Chapman releases on January 7, 2025, from Quirk Books!
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