The Nightmare Room (Messy Man series, vol. 1) by Chris Sorensen

Harmful Monkey Press, 2018

ISBN: 978-0-908342-41-2

Available: Paperback, Kindle edition

The Hungry Ones (Messy Man series, vol. 2) by Chris Sorenson

Harmful Monkey Press, 2019

ISBN: 978-0998342-42-9

Available: Paperback, Kindle edition

The Nightmare Room and The Hungry Ones are the first two volumes in an ongoing horror series by Chris Sorenson.  Despite being billed as stand alone novels, they do need to be read in order. Otherwise, the second volume won’t make any sense.  The initial book, The Nightmare Room, features Chris and Hannah Larson, a couple in their mid-thirties who have suffered through the tragedy of losing their only child to cancer at a young age.  In an attempt to put the past behind them, they uproot themselves from New York City and move back to Peter’s hometown of Maple City, Illinois.  Peter’s parents live there in an assisted living facility, and his dad suffers from dementia.  Peter and Hannah move into an abandoned farmhouse owned by Peter’s dad, and Peter soon has to deal with spectral events (strange audio recordings, scratching sounds, ghostly figures) in the house, which tie back to his own upbringing.  The Hungry Ones is more of the same in Maple City, but with a different protagonist (Jessie Voss) and a different haunted building:  an old, abandoned motel with a history of murder being done within its walls.

Both books are similar in their writing style, although The Hungry Ones is clearly the stronger of the two.  The first book feels like an author taking his first trial steps at writing a full length horror novel.  It’s written in a sparse fashion, without a whole lot of description.   That works for certain types of stories, but when dealing with the supernatural, it helps to go heavy on explaining what’s happening.  Sorensen’s writing is vague enough in the first book that understanding what is going on can be confusing at times, when Peter is combating the antagonist, known as the “Messy Man’. The second volume in the series is an improvement over the first.  The descriptions are better, and the hotel is a much more interesting backdrop.  Sorenson peppers it with a variety of ghostly characters, and he wisely intersperses the narration with brief chapters explaining how each of those spirits came to be.  These interludes provide some of the best writing in the book, as each character proves to be entertaining, with a unique backstory.  Jessie Voss also proves to be a more interesting protagonist. She got a large sum of money in an accident settlement, and decides to invest it all in revamping a motel with a tragic past.  She’s a headstrong woman, and holds the attention better than Peter’s character. Jessie’s friend Stephanie also adds some depth to the story.  The variety of characters in The Hungry Ones accounts for a good deal of the improvement over the first volume.

Both books combined give a decent start to the series, but as noted, explaining things a little better would help the series in the future.  The character of Woodrow in the second book was important to the plot, but it was difficult to understand his reason for vaping fluid with bits of bone mixed in, as well as his control (or lack thereof) over three ghosts that occupy the same room as him at the hotel.  Peter’s dealings with the Messy Man and his melding with him were also difficult to follow.  Example: at one point, Peter threatens the spirit attached to him with “if you try to stop me, I’ll split myself in two and drown you in life, every single second of it.”  It sounds good, but what does it actually mean?  Writing in a metaphysical sense sometimes works, but in this case, and in many other places in the book, the flow would be helped if it were more straightforward.

If you are okay with some things not making total sense, and you like supernatural stories with minimal gore, this is a book series you could probably get into.  These books could probably be classified as ‘horror lite’, so they would be perfectly suited for YA readers looking to start getting into ghost and horror reading.  Veteran readers of ghost and horror stories may want to look elsewhere.  Both books are quick reads, clocking in at under 300 pages.  The easily readable length, combined with the style of writing, make them perfect gifts for literary kids around Halloween.

Contains: mild violence, mild profanity.

Reviewed by Murray Samuelson