L.J. Dougherty's Reviews > Rotten Tommy

As if Michael Meyers were dropped into a David Lynch film. An unstoppable maniac barreling through a nightmare-scape. A surrealist fever dream that feels like the terrifying nightmares you have after watching a great horror film- that uncanny place where your mind takes whatever was scary on-screen and amplifies it and multiples it by your own personal fears, culminating in a personally curated terror show. I don’t know that most people consider David Lynch horror, but I certainly do, and entries like Blue Velvet, Mulholland Drive, and Lost Highway standout as prime examples of this, the latter of which, I imagine, was an influence on Rotten Tommy, from the voyeur-esque sequences that on simple reading may be chalked up to found-footage films, but remind me more of Robert Blake’s Mystery Man leering from behind his camcorder with a perma-grin. I’ve read all of Sodergren’s novels, and this one is easily the scariest. It’s not my favorite - that honor is still held by Maggie’s Grave - but it ranks in the top 4, just below Dead Girl Blues and The Haar. I’ve loved all his books, but the ones set in Scotland tend to rank highest. Maybe that’s coincidence, or maybe it’s because Sodergren paints such an alluring picture of the drizzling landscape that I can’t help but wish I was there while reading his books.
Rotten Tommy is a thrilling read, with a fantastic protagonist that keeps you turning the page so quickly you’re bound to get a few paper cuts. I can’t recommend it highly enough.