2015 Reading Challenge Book 037 Ghoul by Brian Keene

TITLE-Ghoul
AUTHOR-Brian Keene
FORMAT-Paperback
FIRST TIME READING-No
COST-$2

I discovered Brian Keene back in 2008. While shopping at a used bookstore I was needing 2 more books to get a nice discount. I had heard of Mr Keene before that day. And saw his novels were being published by Leisure Fiction.So I grabbed this book and another one from Mr Keene.

Set back in the early 80s during the summer,Ghoul is about 3 pre-teen boys. All three of them are fans of horror movies and comic books. They have been building an underground clubhouse out near the local graveyard.One of the boy's father is the groundskeeper of the graveyard. He is also a boozing abusive piece of shit. His son always wonder's where his dad keeps getting various pieces of jewelry. And late one night the son finds out where these ill gotten treasures come from.

There is a ghoul who lives under the cemetery. Since the drunken father is helping provide the ghoul with bodies to eat,the ghoul gives the piece of shit father rings,watches,necklaces and earrings he has found in the graves.

After the boys learn of the ghoul they start trying to figure out how to kill it. Of course the boys triumph over the undead beast. After this we fast forward about 15 years. The lead boy is a grown man and he comes back to the town. The groundskeeper's son is now in charge of the graveyard. We get to meet his son. And find out the cycle of abuse is continuing.

Pretty sure this is the first Keene novel I read. While reading it I kept thinking about Stephen King's book It. Now this book isn't as good as It. But it is a decent read. One drawback is it suffers from something that at least half the Keene novels I have read suffer from,in that it has a shitty ending. Keene keeps building to this great final fight between the boys and the Ghoul. When the ghoul is defeated it feels tacked on. Like Keene had no idea how to kill the ghoul. Then the epilogue is so paint by numbers that it hurts a pretty decent book.

Since I read this book the first time a movie came out based on the novel. It premiered on Chiller. And wasn't that bad. It stars the two young male teens from Modern Family. My main complaint was how shitty the Ghoul looked. And a badly tacked on explanation of the creature.

Ghoul by Brian Keene gets a 2.55 outta 5.