Spoiler-free
'It's not a cult' (it's definitely a cult) follows the story of a band with no name from the northeast of England and their rise to fame. Their songs tell the stories of the Solkats: fictional northern gods of small things, mishap and mayhem. They are a small band. However, after a public incident at one of their gigs, they go from having a cult following to a cult, following...
I read this, as it was in the halloween box from the Broken Binding. It even has a cute little pumpkin stamp!
Despite being the featured halloween read, this book is actually not so heavy on the horror. It's much more of a punk infused phycological thriller, with a folk horror twist.
The band is formed of 3 members:
- Mel - The messy, free spirited, fuck everything punk front woman.
- Cal - The maker of the music and folklore attatched to it.
- Al - The shy, quiet drummer. The one who records everything on camera.
The different bonds between the band members felt very authentic, albeit somewhat mysterious. Al is our narrator. Al doesn't speak, or at least have much dialogue, but records everything on their camera (Which Al avoids being on at all costs). Therefore, we see the story unfold through their literal lens. Having the book play out in this found footage style was really cool and helped to ground the characters into reality. Despite the majority of the story being from Al's first-person perspective, they are probably the band member we learn the least about. Having a narrator who's mainly an observer to the action, as opposed to being a participant, was an interesting decision. One, that paid off in terms of having this found footage format, but I'm not sure paid off with developing Al as the main protagonist.
The events that unfold in this book are wild! To be honest, by the end, I didn't buy everything that happened. Given how grounded and realistic the book began, it became too farfetched and make-believe too quickly, and unfortunately, lost me. However, the ride to get there was a lot of fun. I definitely perfered the first half to the second half. Seeing the band's initially struggle evolve as they went viral was very compelling. It felt very much like how bands such as Sleep Token and President receive an enormous amount of success, seemingly, overnight. Social media is a crazy thing, and that's what happens here. One video of one incident from one gig goes viral, and thereby, so do the band. The cult fandom begins...
We see this fandom grow through a side perspective of Kaylee. She is an influencer/streamer who is wrapped up in the obsessive fandom culture suffocating the band. She is constantly streaming to her fans, discussing everything and anything to do with this band and the Solkat lore behind it. Having this POV completely separate from the band was a good choice and enabled us to have an outside perspective of the fans, whilst still retaining that found footage eeriness.
Overall, the book got off to a great start, but lost its way with all of the crazyness by the end. It explores a lot of themes and ideas without fully developing any individual one. I loved the setting of northeast England. I loved the styling of everything being in this found footage format, and the Solkat lore was fascinating. I wish it delved more into these horror elements and less so into the crime elements. This would just suit my personal taste more. Nevertheless, I enjoyed my time reading, and I would recommend it to anyone who wants a fun band story. Just don't go into this expecting a full on horror book like I did!
🌕🌕🌕🌑🌑 - 3 Stars
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