JennyJen

I wasn’t sure what to expect of this one. I’ve seen the movie a lot of times. A LOT of times. Despite its poor quality special effects and overzealous acting, it’s a seriously creepy movie that goes to some very ugly places. Rest assured, the book does, too.

I was pretty surprised to see that the movie is nearly word-for-word like the book. That threw me off at first, because it all seemed so anticlimactic. With as many times as I’ve seen the movie, how could anything in this book surprise me? But, though the plot was extremely familiar, the writing really grabbed me. Even with knowing how certain scenes would play out, the author’s perfect wording put a like-new sheen on everything. Made the two experiences unique, despite their being very little differences between the paper and reel versions.

Blatty can induce a cringe like it’s nobody’s business. He was also fantastic at setting the perfectly creepy mood. No details are spared here and it all works beautifully to both intrigue and repel you. There were a lot of perfectly-placed words and abrupt phrases that made big impacts. I am, though, left wondering how I would have pictured this, had I not already had a brain full of imagery. That's just curiosity speaking.

The one negative is that it’s wordy. I wouldn’t say it’s Stephen King-level wordy, but still. It’s pretty wordy. Especially because a lot more focus is put on diagnosing Regan’s condition. In the movie, a lot of that is glossed over and condensed, but here, you have to read through Father Karras’ inner musings and a couple of doctors’ testings and findings. This didn’t detract too much from the story, but it did create lulls in between the real action and what we all came for – REGAN’S CREEPY ASS. The scenes with possessed Regan are scary and disconcerting as expected. I just wish there were more.

All in all, The Exorcist is definitely one of the better horror books I’ve read, if only because of its uniqueness and the author’s ability to go to CREEPY-ASS places.



Buddy read with Shandra and Athena.