Horrorstor: Retail Meets Horror

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Horrorstor_final_300dpiAny employee of a retail chain can attest, the day to day life of a retail employee is hell. From maintaining a perfectly conformed shopping experience to daily affirmations of employee loyalty, a retail job can feel like it is eating your soul. In Grady Hendrix’s new book Horrorstor, losing your soul is a genuine possibility. College dropout Amy is desperately awaiting transfer to a new Orsk store. Orsk is admittedly a knockoff Ikea with cheaper furniture and lower prices. Amy’s manager Basil is constantly coming after her, insisting she improve her performance. When Amy and her coworker Ruth Anne are called into Basil’s office, Amy expects to be fired. However, Basil has a proposition for them; spend the  night in the Orsk store to find out who has been responsible for nightly acts of vandalism, or expect things not to go their way. As the group begins their overnight experience, they discover two other sales associates which have snuck in to try and record paranormal experiences in the store. After a seance, it becomes clear that some will survive the night in the underpriced furniture store and some will disappear for good.

Grady Hendrix’s book is fascinating. The book is designed to look like a furniture store catalog, such as one might grab while wandering Ikea. Each individual chapter features drawings of a piece of furniture, complete with a description. As the book goes on, these pieces of strangely named furniture rapidly become illustrations of torture devices. Even just for the visual quality of the book, it is more than worth the purchase price. The glossy cover will easily hide in a reader’s bookshelf, acting as an unassuming catalog full of terror.

Due to the construction of Horrorstor and the Hendrix’s story, it is easy to whip through the pages in only a few hours. I found myself unable to stop, pushing through page after page like someone lost in an Ikea showroom. Readers of horror and retail slaves alike will enjoy picking up this book.
Horrorstor is available from Quirk Books September 23, 2014.

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