Audiobook Review: We Sold Our Souls by Grady Hendrix

In the 1990s, heavy metal band Dürt Würk was poised for breakout success -- but then lead singer Terry Hunt embarked on a solo career and rocketed to stardom as Koffin, leaving his fellow bandmates to rot in rural Pennsylvania.

Two decades later, former guitarist Kris Pulaski works as the night manager of a Best Western - she's tired, broke, and unhappy. Everything changes when she discovers a shocking secret from her heavy metal past: Turns out that Terry's meteoric rise to success may have come at the price of Kris's very soul.

This revelation prompts Kris to hit the road, reunite with the rest of her bandmates, and confront the man who ruined her life. It's a journey that will take her from the Pennsylvania rust belt to a Satanic rehab center and finally to a Las Vegas music festival that's darker than any Mordor Tolkien could imagine. A furious power ballad about never giving up, even in the face of overwhelming odds, We Sold Our Souls is an epic journey into the heart of a conspiracy-crazed, paranoid country that seems to have lost its very soul...where only a girl with a guitar can save us all.

GENRE: Horror

PURCHASE LINK: Various Links

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Grady Hendrix is the author of the novels Horrorstör, about a haunted IKEA, and My Best Friend's Exorcism, which is like Beaches meets The Exorcist, only it's set in the Eighties. He's also the author of We Sold Our Souls, The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires, and The Final Girl Support Group!

He's also behind the Stoker award-winning Paperbacks from Hell, a history of the 70's and 80's horror paperback boom, and the screenwriter behind Mohawk.

Review

I rarely seek out horror just for the heck of it, and especially not one by a traditionally published or super famous author. But I decided to try this out as I was searching for comps for my cyberpunk/horror Little Mermaid retelling and this sounded like it would be close to what I'm going for.

I'm not a metal fan, but I know enough about the music/entertainment industry to understand what the big deal was with Terry "selling out" and leaving his bandmates. And it's actually terrifying how the horror elements could possibly come to life in the real world given the state of things today. Kris' escape from the rehab center might be the most visually scary for me, but the festival? Downright c r e e p y.

Speaking of Kris, I LOVE her as a protagonist. She's strong and badass without being annoying — the kind of character who I'd love to be my friend! Many of the other characters were interesting, too.

The audiobook was narrated by Carol Monda, whose voice I found really fitting for the story. I also loved there being lyrics to the songs (were the songs ever actually produced, that would've been so cool!) and the whole Troglodyte chapter was just 👌

My Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️️

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Hi! I'm Marie, a Filipino SFFH author and book reviewer currently based in the UK. I’m the co-author of The Prophecies of Ragnarok, a Norse myth new adult urban fantasy trilogy, and I also have several short stories published in anthologies and literary journals.

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