A Head Full of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay

Little Miss Reality TV Exorcism

A Head Full of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay is a supernatural thriller in which a teenage girl diagnosed with schizophrenia becomes the subject of a reality TV show, when her Catholic Dad decides she needs an exorcism.

Story  ☆★★★★

A Head Full of Ghosts is a single story told from three different points in time by Meredith.  She is the younger sister of Marjorie, who is the subject of the exorcism.  She writes about the TV show, The Possession, under a pseudonym in her horror blog, answers questions posed by her biographer, and narrates the story as it happened.

Frequent references are made to Blatty's The Exorcist, and there are role calls of various horror stories and movies that involve haunting or possession.  This is a story that clearly frames itself within a canon, and is acutely aware of its surrounding literature.  It might be surprising, then, that it still manages to keep the material fresh.  

We are told from the outset that, at least in hindsight, Meredith believes her sister to have been schizophrenic and doesn't believe there was anything supernatural about her illness.  Still, the narration from a child's point of view skews the perspective somewhat, in a similar way to Emma Donoghue's Room.  There is both an innocent and ominous tone to the writing.  The sisters at the start of the novel are close and write stories together.  When Marjorie's stories turn dark and become based on real events, Meredith struggles to understand what is happening to her sister.  She speculates, based on her existing understanding of the world, and the reader is left peeking between fingers as she stumbles into frightening situations.

Those expecting wall-to-wall expletives and twisting heads will likely find themselves disappointed.  Marjorie's 'possession' is fairly subtle, much to the disappointment, at times, of the TV show producer.  The last hundred pages, however, are a horror rollercoaster delivering plenty of surprises and one moment which made me go, "Ewww!"

Style  ☆☆★★★

The book opens with what we learn is Marjorie's blog, written under a pseudonym.  The voice here is pretty annoying, with frequent asides and sections written in the third person.  The writing is hyperactive, with run on sentences and unnecessary parentheses.  But it can't be denied that the woman writing it is incredibly knowledgeable in her field.  This, I think, is one of the many ways Tremblay makes us think about how women and girls are judged.  Later in the novel, when the priests and Marjorie's Dad are in their huddle repeatedly saying, "A girl couldn't know that," about facts that could be learned from a basic internet search, I thought back to my impression of Marjorie the blogger and felt a little guilty.

The different styles of the book do a lot to show Meredith as a mercurial character.  She can be hyper and attention seeking, perceptive, shy, precocious, but almost always desperate to please.  Despite what happens to her and her family, Meredith is almost never a tragic figure.  And even though she admits her accounts of the events as a child were unreliable, the reader still trusts adult Meredith to give a faithful account of the story.  I would say more on this, but don't want to spoil anything from those last hundred pages.  I'll just say that one theme in the book is the question of who is really possessed, and I wouldn't remove Meredith from that enquiry.

Substance  ☆★★★★

As I've already mentioned, there's a strong feminist slant to this book.  Even as she's being exorcised, Marjorie narrates the happenings, pointing out the patriarchal nature of the church.  Meredith also follows this theme, claiming that the TV show itself promotes patriarchal ideas of family values.  It's true that the TV show essentially fills Meredith's home with men and, it's implied, that men have editorial control over what is shown about their experiences.

I think that A Head Full of Ghosts also say interesting things about mental health and the expectations around mental illness.  Marjorie is first treated for schizophrenia and, given the ending of the novel, I'd say that's not a bad shout.  The story shows Marjorie suffering from the side effects that frequently come with anti-psychotic medication -- extreme lethargy, feeling like a zombie, nausea, difficulty controlling temperature, and so on.  The thing that struck me, though, is how quickly the family (specifically Meredith's Dad) decide that medication isn't working.  Anyone who has been through this process knows that finding the right medication is a long process, one that can take months or even years to show a consistent positive result.  Long before that, John is impatient to see the problem resolved and goes to the church for a quick fix.

Which brings me neatly to John himself.  Marjorie repeatedly claims that he is the one who's possessed, but this is always treated as an exaggeration by the people around her.  John's fuse is short, and gets shorter through the book.  We find out towards the end that this has been exacerbated by the stress of Marjorie's illness, but his temper has always been there.  This was the truly frightening part of the story, for me.  The way that Marjorie's support structures crumble at a time when she needs a consistent, patient home environment.  

The Verdict  ☆★★★★

This is a surprisingly fresh story of exorcism, given a patina of surreality when the TV cameras show up.  Meredith is an intriguing narrator, and the story leaves the reader with plenty of questions.  That the book acknowledges the canon in which it sits is a nice touch, and helps to mark out that this is something new and original, despite the well-known collage of possession horror that surrounds it.