Hello Blogging World!

Jonny

I’m Jonny, and I love, love, love creature features!

Iseult

Hi, I’m Iseult, and I’m a video nasty!

This buddy read and rant is for Melon Head Mayhem by Alex Ebenstein.

Blurb:

Have you ever wanted to live inside your favorite horror film? Prove you have what it takes to fight Freddy? Destroy Jason? Mangle Michael?

Cousins Carson and Sophia are in town for their grandma’s funeral and are, unknowingly, about to live out the nightmare that is every horror fan’s dream.

After they find an old unfamiliar VHS tape tucked away in grandma’s house, they figure the worst that can happen is a few cringeworthy moments and 90 minutes wasted. Instead, the video summons the movie monsters—local urban legends called melon heads—into their very real lives!

The destruction caused by the blood thirsty melon heads has Carson and Sophia fighting to survive and sets them on a deadly path to the shores of Lake Michigan, home of the devilish beasts. They vow to destroy every last one of the melon heads and make sure these monsters never get a sequel.

Will they survive? Would you fare better?

It’s a creature feature. It’s a throwback. It’s… MELON HEAD MAYHEM!

GoodReads

Amazon

***Brief disclosure***

Jonny is an Amazon affiliate and earn a tiny commission for purchases made through the Amazon links in this post. It’s a great way to help him keep things running on his blog if you’re already intrigued enough to make a purchase. 

Buddy Read Book Rant:

Jonny

Thanks so much for giving this read a go with me. What did you think overall?

Iseult

You’re welcome! I love our buddy reads, and it’s great to discover new writers.

I enjoyed this book, but I’m torn. It captured the feel of a horror B movie really well, but I wanted there to be more to it. What did you think?

Jonny

Yeah, I was a little disappointed with this one. It did have all that nostalgia that comes with a B movie, but it fell a bit short.

I love fast paced books but the monster reveal and action came too soon for me. I wanted more depth and interactions from the characters first.

Iseult

I agree. It jumped into the action pretty much straight away, and I thought “where is it going to go from here?”. I would have loved to have learned more about the melon heads, but the back story wasn’t as detailed as I would have liked. I also didn’t find the melon heads very threatening.

Jonny

Right! I think if they’d done some scenes of the funeral for Carson’s grandma and stressed his ties to his hometown it may have helped give him more depth.

Yeah, I wasn’t really frightened at all by the monsters. I get what they were going for with the backstory behind them, but I think they could’ve make it more menacing and added more to it.

What did you think of his bestie partner in crime?

Iseult

I agree. I liked the backstory with Carson and his family, but it didn’t seem to tie into the story or his character arc.

I think Carson reconnecting with his cousin was a great idea. Unfortunately, I couldn’t take to Sophia. I didn’t get why she was so glib about hunting the melon heads.

Jonny

I think it was totally possible to incorporate him more into it, but it just didn’t happen.

I have to say, Sophia was my favorite character. I loved her sass and scrappy characters are always my fave. But her reasoning behind wanting to hunt the monsters didn’t make enough sense for it to be believable. If you’re bored with your relationship you go bungey jumping, not monster hunting lol.

Iseult

Haha! I agree! There are better ways to get an adrenaline rush!

I liked that Carson was more timid and Sophia was more action orientated, but at times it seemed like that was all there was to them. This did fit in with a B movie theme, where characters are often not particularly complex.

What did you think of the melon heads themselves?

Jonny

Exactly! One thing I really liked is that they didn’t shy away from the blood and gore. They got that part right, but with the other bits not being so great it didn’t quite even out.

Yeah, we really needed more to these characters. They were just too simple to really connect with.

I did like the melon heads backstory in that they had a medical condition (was it hydrocephalus or something?) that was responsible for the way they looked, but I wasn’t sure where the claws came from.

Iseult

Yes, the blood and gore was good.

I thought the melon heads were cool. I liked that they looked like actors in rubber suits and a deceptively simple Achilles heel. With their ability to sense where people were, and hunt down their location really fast, I thought they would be a more formidable enemy. At times they seemed more like a creature from a 1950s science fiction movie than a 1980s horror.

Jonny

For sure. It really helped up the ante.

Yeah, it was campy but it totally worked just like all those great horror movies we grew up watching. You know, now that you say it they did seem to have a 50s style to them as well. I hadn’t thought of that.

I also didn’t think the writing itself was bad by any means. It was easy to read which is always a plus in my book.

Iseult

It was well written and great fun to read. I read it very quickly and I looked forward to finding out what happened next. Some of Sophia’s antics had me groaning, but in a good way! It was fun how easily she took to being heroic. I empathized much more with Carson. He found the whole experience much more disturbing than his cousin. I particularly felt for him when his laptop was destroyed. It was his lifeline to work, so that was a truly horrific moment!

I love the idea of the Killer VHS series, and I’ll definitely check out more books in the series, as well as more books by Alex Ebenstein.

Jonny

Oh I would lose my mind if I lost my laptop! There were definitely some good parts to this novel. It just ended up being a mixed bag.

Yeah, for sure! I’ve been eyeing Candy Cain Kills for a while too, so I may check that out soon.

Thanks for trying this one out with me, book bestie!

Iseult

You’re welcome! It’s been great fun, as always. I’m so happy to be doing Buddy reads with you again.

I want to give a shout out to Marc Vuletich and Alan Lastufka for the amazing cover of Melon Head Mayhem. I love the artwork and the vintage video cassette case design.

Jonny

Me too! Life after grad school is such a relief with plenty of time to do these great buddy reads with my book besties.

Ooo, yes, yes! All the kudos to the cover artists for making a stellar cover that made me wanna try this one out.

Until next time, friend!

That’s A Wrap!

Thanks for joining us on our buddy read and rant of Melon Head Mayhem! We had a lot of fun, and hope you did too! We will definitely be doing some more buddy reads in the future, so stay tuned!

In the meantime, why not check out Iseult and Jonny’s other fun buddy reads?

Buddy Reads & Rants: The Worm and His Kings

Buddy Read & Rant: The Forgotten Island

Buddy Read & Rant: Stolen Tongues

Buddy Read & Rant: Parachute

Buddy Read & Rant: A Door Into Evermoor

Buddy Read & Rant: The Haunting of Trinity House

Buddy Read & Rant: Dark Waters

Buddy Read & Rant: The Ten Thousand Doors of January

Buddy Read & Rant: Until Summer Comes Around

Buddy Read & Rant: The Upheaval

Buddy Read & Rant: Thornhill

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