Presenting Author-Joe Hill

[Emily Spencer]

**WARNING** Joe Hill's books are meant for an adult audience. They contain mature themes and graphic depictions of violence and other things of adult nature. NOT RECOMMENDED for anyone under the age of 17. You have been warned

Name of the author: Joe Hill
Main genre: Horror, Dark Fantasy, Science Fiction
Main audience: Adult
Main books: Heart-Shaped Box, Horns, NOS4A2, Locke & Keye, The Fireman
Short summary of the author: Joe Hill is the son of Stephen and Tabitha King. It's no wonder, really, why he has a taste for delicious creepiness; one could say he it's almost a family legacy. At any rate, his first official foray into the genre was in front of the camera rather than via written word. At age 9, he appeared in the 1982 film Creepshow, which was written by his father (who was also his co-star). Much to his credit, when he decided to pursue writing as a career, he wanted to do so on his own merit, thus why he chose an abbreviated form of his middle name (Hillstrom) instead of writing under the moniker of King. He publically confirmed the rumors of his real identity in 2007, a year after his first novel debuted.

He has a number of awards under his belt, including the William L. Crawford Award for best new fantasy writer (2006). the Bram Stoker Award for Best Fiction Collection (20th Century Ghosts), and the Eisner Award for Best Writer for his long-running comic book series, Locke & Key, just to name a few. He has been published in such magazines as "Subterranean Magazine", "Postscripts" and "The High Plains Literary Review", as well as several anthologies.

Like his father, several of his works have been adapted for film and television. In 2014, his novel, Horns, was adapted for the big screen, starring Harry Potter himself, Daniel Radcliffe as the central character. A television series based on the novel NOs4A2 ran on AMC from June 2, 2019, to August 23, 2020. An adaptation of his graphic series Locke & Keye began streaming on Netflix in February 2020.

In his personal life, In 1999, he married Leanora King, whom he had met at Vassar College. They had three children (the eldest among them being Ethan King, now an actor). The couple divorced in 2010 and in 2018, he married publisher Gillian Redfearn of Gollancz Publishing. The couple maintains a house in New Hampshire.

One of my favorite quotes by Hill is his response to the question, "What defines a good horror story?".

His response:

“Horror” is a word that describes what you feel when you or someone you care about is faced with the worst. When a work of fiction stirs a sense of “horror,” we’re entering a heightened state of empathy. Someone is in terrible trouble – the swamp monster has a girl by the ankle and is pulling her down into the weeds – and we want her to escape, to paw her way back to the surface of the water, to taste the air again.

This is why the most important ingredient in any work of horror fiction is not a cleverly engineered supernatural menace. It’s your central characters. If they’re well developed, well imagined, unique, and uniquely lovable, we will feel horror for them when the army of laughing, knife-wielding puppets comes for them. If they’re unexceptional “types,” they’ll just bore us. Instead of rooting for them, we’ll be on the side of the puppets, cheering every time one of our straw man heroes is cut down.

With this in mind, it’s easy to see that a lot of the slasher films of the 80s failed as horror, but sometimes worked in the way the Warner Brothers cartoons work: as giddy, silly slapsticks.

Full confession here, I have only actually read one of Hill's novels, and have never seen any of his film adaptations. Somehow, I just never got around to it, and quite honestly, I was afraid that I would come away severely disappointed as there was no way (in my rather limited opinion) that he could 'hold a candle to his father (who I actually really like). I must say that I was pleasantly surprised and will definitely be looking into Mr. Hill's other works. I won't say that I like him as much as I do his father, but he certainly holds his own.

[Emily Spencer]

Title: 20th Century Ghosts
Author: Joe Hill
Genre: Horror
Series: No

**READER WARNING** Joe Hill writes for a mature audience, and this book is no exception. Mature themes and situations make the book not suitable for younger readers.

Brief Summary:
The book is an anthology of fourteen stories by Joe Hill, ranging from science fiction to things-that-go-bump-in-the-night, with a shade of romance thrown in for good measure. The range of characters varies from a bullied balloon boy, a movie-loving ghost, a 6-foot tall insect, and a kidnapping victim, just to name a few. The stories themselves run a broad spectrum from bone-chilling to downright fantastical. It's Twilight Zone meets the Underworld with a brief foray into Neverland, so be prepared for an exciting journey.

Here is a Kirkus Review (The Kirkus Prize is one of the richest literary awards in the world, with a prize of $50,000 bestowed annually to authors of fiction, nonfiction, and young readers' literature.) about the book:

The book is a collection of pleasantly creepy stories which follows Hill’s debut novel (Heart-Shaped Box, 2007).

Published in a number of magazines from 2001 to the present, most of the stories display the unself-conscious dash that made Hill’s novel an intelligent pleasure. In addition to the touches of the supernatural, some heavy, some light, the stories are largely united by Hill’s mastery of teenaged-male guilt and anxiety, unrelieved by garage-band success or ambition. One of the longest and best, “Voluntary Committal,” is about Nolan, a guilty, anxious high-school student, Morris, his possibly autistic or perhaps just congenitally strange little brother, and Eddie, Nolan’s wild but charming friend. Morris, whose problems dominate but don’t completely derail his family’s life, spends the bulk of his time in the basement creating intricate worlds out of boxes. Eddie and Nolan spend their time in accepted slacker activities until Eddie, whose home life is rough, starts pushing the edges, leading to real mischief, a big problem for Nolan who would rather stay within the law. It’s Morris who removes the problem for the big brother he loves, guaranteeing perpetual guilt and anxiety for Nolan. “My Father’s Mask” is a surprisingly romantic piece about a small, clever family whose weekend in an inherited country place involves masks, time travel, and betrayal. The story least reliant on the supernatural may leave the most readers pining for a full-length treatment: “Bobby Conroy Comes Back from the Dead” reunites a funny but failed standup comedian with his equally funny ex-high school sweetheart Harriet, now married and a mother. Bobby has come back to Pittsburgh, tail between his legs, substitute teaching and picking up the odd acting job, and it is on one of those gigs, a low-budget horror film, that the couple reconnects, falling into their old comedic rhythms.

Not just for ghost addicts.

My Take:
I like anthologies, so I did enjoy the book. That being said, I enjoyed some stories more than others. I am not the biggest fan of ambiguous endings, which some of these stories did use. In this sense, Hill is not quite as successful (in my opinion) as his father, Stephen King. King has left nuggets of ambiguity for his readers to puzzle over and draw their own conclusions while Hill's attempts just left me scratching my head in confusion. Or maybe I'm just one of those people who prefer to have everything wrapped up in a nice little bow.

That said, I greatly liked the variety of stories. It wasn't just garden-variety horror, and it was quite refreshing to get science fiction and fantasy as well as the supernatural. Put it this way, I liked it enough to consider reading more of Hill in the future. A word of warning, however. Don't go looking for a Stephen King knock-off when you read this book. While it is quite easy to see King's influence on his son's stories, Joe Hill forges his own path in the literary sense. I'm glad I took the leap and went along for the ride.

[Louis Walles]

Title of the book: The Fireman

Authors: Joe Hill

Genres: Fiction/crime/horror

Short summary of the story:
There is a virus on the loose but no one knows anything about it. FOX News said it has been invented by terrorist groups. MSNBC said that it was created by engineers at Halliburton and stolen by culty Christian types.

When a pregnant nurse, Harper Grayson becomes infected, she is determined to find a way to survive - at least long enough to see her child born.

Good points / bad points:
I love the book and how it made my imagination run wild if we look at the current pandemic. It was the first time I have read a book by Joe Hill and I definitely will read some more of his books because I really like the way he writes.