The final girl is a trope in horror films (particularly slasher films). It refers to the last girl(s) or woman alive to confront the killer, ostensibly the one left to tell the story.
– From Wikipedia
MARILYN TORRES: This other man rides up on his motorcycle and he looked so normal, he seemed like an okay guy. … Then the other one came out on the porch with a shotgun.
BOUDE ENRIGHT: Hold on, can you, uh, which other one?
MARILYN TORRES: We hadn’t seen him before. He was fat and short and had on a Confederate flag T-shirt. And a shotgun that was, you know, also short and –
BOUDE ENRIGHT: A sawed-off shotgun?
MARILYN TORRES: Yes, and the man on the bike who seemed so normal he took hold of little Luis, and he, um, he …
– From Chapter 13
So, this is what is meant by “compulsively readable”?
I’d like more, please.
Lynnette Tarkington is a final girl. Or almost so. Where the true final girl survives by vanquishing the monster, Lynnette survived the massacre of her family by playing dead, though coming very close to not just playing. But as with other final girls, her monster arises again a year later. Besides physical scars which will last for life, she is left feeling guilty for surviving, ashamed of her secrets and constantly unsafe. At thirty-eight-years-old, Lynnette is paranoid, even absurdly so: Her best friend is a houseplant, she rarely leaves her apartment and when she does, constantly scans her lines of sight for potential attackers, and when she returns thoroughly searches her apartment for intruders before relaxing. Mostly, though, Lynnette stays home except for the monthly meeting of the Final Girls Support Group with Marilyn, Dani, Jess, Adrienne and Heather.
Is it a coincidence that while in meeting, they learn the one member who hasn’t shown has been murdered? And can It be coincidence that her death coincides with several of the other women having a crisis? Lynnette doesn’t think so and she’s convinced someone is trying to kill them all. The others are convinced she’s nuts.
Of Grady Hendrix’s fiction, I’ve only read, and enjoyed, My Best Friend’s Exorcism. But The Final Girls Support Group works at a higher level. This has the forward momentum of the best thrillers with every chapter informed by Hendrix’s knowledge of the structure, progression, and resolution of the final girl narrative. Fans of slashers may enjoy watching Hendrix weave the plot points of specific real movies into the narratives of his main characters and how their experiences are then turned into (fictional) films. But, unlike most slashers, he avoids the superficial depiction of final girls by filling in the details of their lives in the aftermath of the attacks and depicting the psychological effects of witnessing the slaughter of friends and family. Through this approach he makes his novel both a homage and deconstruction, bringing the reader’s sympathies into play for the recognizable human wreckage of traumatizing events, for believably portrayed survivors of direct, personal and horrific violence. And, somehow, he does this while making the novel intermittently funny.
Hendrix chose his protagonist wisely. Lynnette is paranoid but empathetic, self-loathing but an innate survivor, self-deprecating but persistent, and overly confident of her judgement when not almost paralyzed by uncertainty, yet she keeps going even when she finds her judgement faulty. She believes they are all in danger and continues to act to defend the group even when the forces against her almost convince her of her inadequacy. If Lynnette sometimes seems like she crossed over from a Christopher Moore novel, still her reactions to events and her assessments of people and situations provide humor stemming from character and situation that leavens what could become unbearably sad or a threat so overblown as to be unbelievable. For instance, early highlights of the book include Lynette’s confrontations with her therapist’s eight-year-old son. Even earlier in the novel, her dialog with her houseplant is funny but also sad, speaking to character beyond humor and sadness, showing both state of mind and suggesting the ideal self Lynnette wants to attain.
In this novel, the fantasy of the final girl elicits either of two reactions: For many fans she is a heroine whose pluck, ingenuity, bravery and (especially in the early movies) chastity saves her. For others, she’s the bitch who wronged them and needs to be taken down, while the monster is viewed as hero. Hendrix addresses both, contrasting each to the real world of pain and trauma. He does this through the group’s interactions, through thoughts expressed by Chrissy, a sort of rogue final girl, and by extracts at the beginning of each chapter from diaries, books, articles (most, I believe, fictitious), advertising and, powerfully, police interviews with his characters after their encounters.
Add to this mix what I assume are some Easter Eggs readers well-read in slasher movies might recognize. For instance, a blurb on the paperback edition from Adrienne King, who starred in Friday the 13th prompted me to check the other Final Girl names: Marilyn could derive from Marilyn Burns, who starred in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre; and Heather from Heather Langenkamp from A Nightmare on Elm Street. I expect Danielle and Lynnette have similar sources.
The Final Girl Support Group is an entertaining read if you come for the story, as well as a thoughtful read for the complexity of its approach to the problematic creation and continuance of the final girl as horror movie trope. If you have any inclination to read a horror novel this year, I’d strongly recommend this one.
We all seemed to have liked this one! Rob Bedford’s review of the book is HERE; Mark Yon’s review of the UK edition is HERE.
THE FINAL GIRLS SUPPORT GROUP by Grady Hendrix
Berkeley Books, July 2021
ISBN: 9780593201237
352 pages
