Author: Ryan C. Thomas
Genre: Horror/slasher
Pages: Paperback, 186
ISBN: 9781977576088
Opening Lines: "To avoid the nightmares of that summer, I take caffeine and diet pills, any type of speed to keep me up for as long as possible."
When Roger Huntington comes home from college for the summer and is met by his best friend, Tooth, he knows they're going to have a good time. A summer full of beer, comic books, movies, laughs, and maybe even girls. The sun is high and the sky is clear as Roger and Tooth set out to shoot beer cans at Bobcat Mountain. Just two friends catching up on lost time, two friends thinking about their futures . . . two friends suddenly thrust into the middle of a nightmare. Forced to fight for their lives against a sadistic killer with an arsenal of razor sharp blades and a hungry dog by his side. If they are to survive, they must decide: are heroes born, or are they made? Or is it something more powerful happening to them? And more importantly, how do your survive when all roads lead to death?"
~ Jacket copy
The slasher genre has long been seen as the bastard child of the horror movie genre. Despite the critics, slasher films have always held a special place in horror. Looking closely, it supports conservative paradigms and beliefs--don't have sex outside of marriage, listen to your parents, don't drink, and so on. The unfortunate victims of the slasher always violate some type of boundary and are punished for their infraction. However, the 2000s have taken the slasher genre and started to morph it into something different--pseudo gore porn. The Summer I Died is not any different.
