In these days of Facebook, Snapchat and yes, blogs and websites like this one, it can sometimes be suggested that the time of the good ol’ horror story is dead. After all, what place is there for ghostly spirits in a world with wall-to-wall Kardashians and when you can put the details straight away onto You Tube or such like?
Jason’s novel is one that tries to show how in the 21st century blogosphere it can be done. And it generally does it very well.
The titular Jack Sparks is the typical media everyman of the 21st century. He’s witty (at least in his own head), ironic, snarky, self-obsessed – a cultural author with a rock n’ roll attitude and a series of well-publicised and bestselling books such as Jack Sparks on Gangs and Jack Sparks on Drugs. Think of him as a Russell Brand for the zeitgeist, with the contemporary voice of a generation and the snark of a nihilistic cynic.
His next book involves him investigating the supernatural. He is a sceptic, and fiercely admits that he is looking to debunk it rather than prove it. Through his notes, transcribed interviews, emails and phone call recordings, we see this process. The conceit of the novel is that this book is what remains of the notes that the now-dead Jack Sparks wrote, published by his estranged brother Alastair. Alastair has added to it relevant interviews and comments throughout.
The story begins with Jack observing and describing the ritual exorcism of a young girl, Maria Corvi, in a Roman Catholic church in Rome under the supervision of a celebrity priest, Father Primo Di Stefano.
Things do not go well, partly due to the fact that Jack gets a fit of the giggles in the middle, drawn to the absurdity of it all. He’s seen it all before, from the tales he’s read to movies like The Exorcist and the many video clips he’s seen online.
Afterwards a mysterious video appears on his blog, with no clear knowledge of where it has come from or who made it. This creates a social media storm as Jack tries to work out where it is from.
This investigation means a journey to Hong Kong to interview and observe Sherilyn Chastain, a combat magician – “If exorcism is judo, then combat magic is ju-jitsu”, she explains.
Further research leads to Jack going to the USA to meet Astral Way, leader of the Hollywood Paranormals group, determined to recreate ‘The Harold Experiment’ – an investigation from the nineteen-seventies that tried to determine whether the human mind could create a bespoke ghost, a ghost of their own, from scratch, so to speak. Jack sees this recreation as a perfect way to show that ghosts are a myth.
Throughout all of this, as you read, we find that different accounts shown here alongside Jack’s – emails, letters and transcripts – suggest that the version we are reading written by Jack is often quite different to the one others tell. Jack may not be a reliable witness and as the tale progresses we begin to discover things get stranger and stranger….
This was a surprisingly good read. Think of it as a traditional horror story brought up to date, a fashionable take on an old trope. It is un-avowedly ‘of the now’, managing to combine contemporary concepts with old ideas of the supernatural, combining different styles of writing to make its point and often showing opposing views with confidence. This will appeal to the modern up-to-date reader, accustomed to social media, the Kardashians and Snapchat, as well as those of us older readers looking for a good old creepy horror story. The clever thing is that The Last Days of Jack Sparks keeps you guessing – is it a drugs-related hallucination, a figment of Jack’s deteriorating mental health or even a genuine supernatural phenomenon?
Much of the first half of the book becomes part blog, part travelogue as Jack travels around trying to deduce whether the supernatural is ‘real’ or not. Much of this is reportage style endowed with a certain enthusiastic (if rather bleak) humour, which Jason has written very well. Despite all of his faults, this sets Jack up as a flawed but often likeable character, who is aware of his own personal limitations. About halfway through in the book, things change into things quite sinister, and which, like the best ‘scare-em’ movies, can cause quite a jump. As Jack’s possible descent into madness and cause of death (not a spoiler – the clue’s in the title!) is revealed, there’s a big plot development just before the end, which I must admit I did see coming but helps bring things to a satisfactory conclusion, even though it didn’t quite hold it all together at the end for me.
There are moments when things definitely creep, which in a horror story can only be a good thing. The Last Days of Jack Sparks shows that there’s life in the old, seemingly-dead, horror story yet. For most of the ride it’s terrific fun.
A great read that may generate a few chills for those on hot summer beaches.
The Last Days of Jack Sparks by Jason Arnopp
Published by Orbit UK
432 pages
ISBN: 978-0356506852
Review by Mark Yon
