In his interview with HorrorCrush, John Dies At The End author David Wong shared that he set out to make an unpredictable horror novel. “Every time the reader thinks they know where the story is headed, it goes crashing through the guardrails and rolling down the mountainside.”

Wong has quite the sense of humor, but he wasn’t joking in that statement.

John Dies At The End is filled with so many overwhelming twists and turns, you’ll feel like you’ve been hooked on “soy sauce” and fighting demons yourself. Even the title John Dies At The End doesn’t give you a clue about the ending nor where the story is headed.

With the perfect mix of absurd humor and gory violence, this book will make you laugh out loud just as much as it’ll haunt your dreams.

And even beyond the crazy puns and gruesome killings, there is plenty of heart and soul to it, including an unexpected romantic subplot that is well-developed and uniquely touching.

This latest edition of JDatE contains some new jokes and ties the various stories closer together, with earlier indications of the major, omnipotent villain. Yet, even with these changes, the novel, having started as a webserial, naturally feels episodic.

It works for this medium, but it also makes one curious how much director Don Coscarelli will faithfully translate to film and which parts he will change.  The first section, for example, takes up a quarter of the book, yet feels like a movie on its own, climaxing in an intense demon-fighting showdown in Las Vegas.  In this case, I’m inclined to agree with the author that capturing the spirit of the novel is a better way to go with the film than translating all 373 pages to the big screen.

While John Dies At The End runs a bit long (mainly in the epilogue), the unique characters and thrilling scenes send the reader on an unforgettable ride.

Buy the book now, read it by Halloween, and immerse yourself in the mad world of John and David.

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