Don't Fear the Reaper (The Indian Lake Trilogy #2) (Hardcover)
Other Books in Series
This is book number 2 in the The Indian Lake Trilogy series.
Staff Reviews
"My Heart Is a Chainsaw" was one of my favorite books of 2021; it's knowing, self-referential tone mixed with its wonderful heroine, Jade Daniels, reminded me of my favorite slasher films of times past. I had high hopes for "Don't Fear the Reaper". As a sequel, it should be bloodier, wilder, and more audacious than its predecessor, with both a new antagonist and a few throwbacks to past dangers. Stephen Graham Jones knew this, and boy, do things go off the rails immediately. While "My Heart Is A Chainsaw" had a slow burn to its violence, "Don't Fear the Reaper" revels in danger and fear right off the bat. At the center of the chaos is the reluctant Final Girl, Jade, who'd rather just be a supporting player getting her life back together after fighting legal troubles for the last few years. Unfortunately, Jade has to use her wits and horror movie knowledge to get her and her friends out of death-by-hook range, and of course, the horror is happening during the worst blizzard that Proofrock's ever seen... I loved this book! It started with a bang, had lots of great return characters, some new characters, and a truly terrifying antagonist. If you love Stephen Graham Jones's writing style, you'll get a lot out of this one - it's more of what you loved from "My Heart Is A Chainsaw" in the goriest, most action-packed sequel. This book was apparently 500 pages? I had no idea. It blurred past as I had to find out what happened next to our heroes! — Whitney, Snail Readers Circle
February 2023 Indie Next List
“Not just a worthy sequel to My Heart is a Chainsaw, but one that, after you’ve read it, you can’t imagine the first book without. Jones has a true gift — he can make you shudder in horror and tear up in the same sentence.”
— Olivia Morris, Harvard Book Store, Cambridge, MA
Description
December 12th, 2019, Jade returns to the rural lake town of Proofrock the same day as convicted Indigenous serial killer Dark Mill South escapes into town to complete his revenge killings, in this riveting sequel to My Heart Is a Chainsaw from New York Times bestselling author Stephen Graham Jones.
Four years after her tumultuous senior year, Jade Daniels is released from prison right before Christmas when her conviction is overturned. But life beyond bars takes a dangerous turn as soon as she returns to Proofrock. Convicted Serial Killer, Dark Mill South, seeking revenge for thirty-eight Dakota men hanged in 1862, escapes from his prison transfer due to a blizzard, just outside of Proofrock, Idaho.
Dark Mill South’s Reunion Tour began on December 12th, 2019, a Thursday.
Thirty-six hours and twenty bodies later, on Friday the 13th, it would be over.
Don’t Fear the Reaper is the page-turning sequel to My Heart Is a Chainsaw from New York Times bestselling author Stephen Graham Jones.
About the Author
Stephen Graham Jones is the New York Times bestselling author of The Only Good Indians. He has been an NEA fellowship recipient and a recipient of several awards including the Ray Bradbury Award from the Los Angeles Times, the Bram Stoker Award, the Shirley Jackson Award, the Jesse Jones Award for Best Work of Fiction from the Texas Institute of Letters, the Independent Publishers Award for Multicultural Fiction, and the Alex Award from American Library Association. He is the Ivena Baldwin Professor of English at the University of Colorado Boulder.
Praise For…
* “Horror fans [will] be blown away by this audacious extravaganza.”—Publishers Weekly, Starred Review
* “This extraordinary novel is an essential purchase.”—Kirkus, Starred Review
"Stephen's writing is a chainsaw and every sentence in this book drips with blood, every paragraph is clotted with skin, and every period is a bullethole. He makes me feel like an amateur."—Grady Hendrix, New York Times bestselling author of The Final Girl Support Group
"A homage to slasher films that also manages to defy and transcend genre. You don't have to be a slasher fan to read My Heart is a Chainsaw, but I guarantee that you will be after you read it."—Alma Katsu, author of The Deep and The Hunger
"Brutal, beautiful, and unforgettable, My Heart Is a Chainsaw is a visceral ride from start to finish. A bloody love letter to slasher fans, it's everything I never knew I needed in a horror novel."—Gwendolyn Kiste, Bram Stoker Award-winning author of The Rust Maidens
"Stephen Graham Jones can't miss. My Heart Is A Chainsaw is a painful drama about trauma, mental health, and the heartache of yearning to belong...twisted into a DNA helix with encyclopedic Slasher movie obsession and a frantic, gory whodunnit mystery, with an ending both savage and shocking. Don't say I didn't warn you!” —Christopher Golden, New York Times bestselling author of Ararat and Red Hands
“An easy contender for Best of the Year. A love letter to (and an examination of) both the horror genre and the American West, it left me stunned and applauding.”—Brian Keene, World Horror Grandmaster Award and two Bram Stoker Award-winning author of The Rising and The Damned Highway
“Stephen Graham Jones masterfully navigates the shadowy paths between mystery and horror. An epic entry in the slasher canon."—Laird Barron, author of Swift to Chase
"An intense homage to the classic horror films of yore."—Polygon
"At once an homage to the horror genre and a searing indictment of the brutal legacy of Indigenous genocide in America, Stephen Graham Jones’ My Heart Is a Chainsaw delivers both dazzling thrills and visceral commentary... Jones takes grief, gentrification and abuse to task in a tale that will terrify you and break your heart all at the same time."—Time
"Sneaking in right at the end of the summer is the best horror novel of the year... A loving homage to meta-horror classics like Scream and Cabin in the Woods. Hilarious at one turn and outrageously gruesome at the next, it’ll be the perfect book to read after dark over Labor Day weekend."—GQ
"Stephen Graham Jones continues his reign as a horror maestro with My Heart Is a Chainsaw. This brutal homage to slasher films focuses on Jade, a young half-Indian woman who finds comfort in horror movies after feeling abandoned by her family and her town."—PopSugar
"Stephen Graham Jones is a star when it comes to melding horror with literary fiction, exploring themes of colonialism and racisms alongside Indigenous experiences. He hasn’t been described as the Jordan Peele of horror fiction for nothing... A masterpiece."—Book Riot