Howard Browning, an aging actor who played slasher movie villain The Reaper in the 80’s, is tired of his new life of signing autographs for the very few fans that still show up to events to see him. But when the studio announces a reboot of the franchise, Howard is disappointed to hear that he has been replaced by Trevor Mane, a former child star fresh out of rehab who’s looking for a fresh start. Howard tries to accept this as a way for him to let go of his past life, however, The Reaper has gotten into his head. He needs more blood, and he will make Howard do anything to get it.

     This book started off very strong for me. I found the writing to be very engrossing from the start. My favorite part about it were the script scenes, in which we get a snippet of the killings from the infamous slasher franchise that the book is about. I was always excited when I got to one of those scenes! I also really enjoyed Howard and The Reaper as characters. They were equally interesting and I needed to know what was next for them throughout the book.

     But, speaking of characters, I couldn’t stand Trevor. This book is dual pov and although, after reading the whole book, I do see why we needed Trevor’s point of view, while reading it felt very superfluous and boring. He wasn’t an interesting character, he didn’t add much to the story, he was just there. He should not have had an equal amount of chapters with Howard. I feel like I could’ve skipped almost every chapter from Trevor’s point of view, and missed nothing until the end. I would’ve enjoyed the book much more without so much of him in it. Also, I thought the story dragged a little bit from about 50% to 80% in. I feel like the book could’ve been a little shorter. I almost didn’t finish the book at 73%, but I’m glad that I stuck with it because the ending was great and very satisfying! The ending was what I was expecting for most of the book, more action!

     Although I had some complaints, I still enjoyed this book! If you’re looking for a full out slasher novel, like I was going in, this isn’t that, but it was a great homage to slasher films of the 80’s and it was such an interesting concept.

Thank you Skyhorse Publishing and NetGalley for this arc. All opinions are my own.

TW: addiction, drug use, animal death, suicide attempt, use of the r word, miscarriage and child abuse mentioned