Author: Alex Grecian

Published: 2023

Mood: If it’s been too long since you felt pure joy and your idea of joy is curling up by a warm fire with a good book that has an extremely high body count.

I read somewhere that whatever you’re doing when you start the new year, that’s how the rest of the year will go for you. Or maybe I made that up. Either way, I started reading the Western folk-horror novel Red Rabbit over the holidays, so I must be in for a great f*cking year of reading.

This book is not to be missed. It’s SO GOOD.

Red Rabbit delivers an adventure that’s on a level with some of the most famous ‘epic journey’ books, like The Odyssey and The Wizard of Oz. It’s packed with dark fantastical situations, it pits wits against strength, it tests its heroes to their limits, and it has a strong underlying moral compass. It just also happens to have quite a bit of blood and gore and guts.

The characters span an impressive range – cowboys, outlaws, witches, ghosts, cannibals, a demon, a witch master, a deadly supernatural huntsman, and a schoolteacher. Friendships are formed, lives are lost, a head is chopped off and mounted on a saddle horn while the corpse is animated to perform a dance…

I can’t say enough about Red Rabbit. You absolutely have to read it.

Red Rabbit begins with a group of ranchers believing that a witch caused a young woman’s death. They decide to form a posse, and put a bounty on Sadie Grace.

My initial expectation was that it would be the false accusations typical of that time, maybe against a single woman who has cats and is really good with medicine. But Sadie Grace is actually a witch – she just didn’t do most of the things everyone says she did.

A different trio of men are travelling toward the town of Riddle. Tom Goggins is supposedly a witch master and plans to collect the bounty. He also has a mute child in his care, although it’s unclear why. Moses and Ned are drifting cowboys, and aren’t really invested in a witch hunt but are headed in the same direction. They all come upon the home of Rose Nettles, a former schoolteacher who is trying to work the farm after her husband’s death. Rose feels compelled to go with them and care for the child, a girl who is called Rabbit for reasons soon to be revealed.

Unbeknownst to the group, there are multiple other entities with eyes on this journey. The ghost of Rose’s husband is following them and having his own side-quest encounters. Sadie Grace sends a powerful being to stop the witch master, and he ends up joining their party. A demon who burps toads is on a killing spree that he intends to conclude with Sadie Grace. And of course, the original posse of ranchers is still assembling.

You know when movies show a map with animated dashes and markers indicating all of the characters’ paths towards a central point? The reader can feel those dashes getting closer and closer to one another, and to a massive showdown in Riddle.

Red Rabbit’s time, place, and the majority of its people are unquestionably Western.

But the book is so much more than a period novel. It’s fast-paced and full of action, yet sometimes funny and even sweet. It’s also somber and dark, frequently gory and brutally violent with a high body count, yet overall it’s somehow oddly heartwarming and hopeful. This heady mix keeps you eagerly turning the pages, deeply invested in the characters, and feeling mopey when it’s over and you’re supposed to move on to another book.

My favourite thing about it is that the core travelling party is basically the perfect party for a D&D campaign. Ned brings strategy and skill with a gun, plus a hidden ability to see dead people. Moses is also good with a gun, and is a former army medic. Tom can actually do a bit of magic. Benito can shoot and has potent charisma. The Huntsman can kill pretty much anything and is a powerful tracker. Rose has high intelligence and is good with medicine. Rabbit’s skills will be revealed at the end.

And they’re all so well-written. Each character gets their time in the spotlight, feels three-dimensional, and adds something memorable to the plot.

I’m also fascinated with how author Alex Grecian handles the horror element. Although there are many creepy, twisted, or downright brutal scenes, the overall tone isn’t terrifying. The descriptions of things like cannibalism, shattering bones, and body-snatching demon-toads have a straightforward, non-emotional manner that reminds me a bit of The Sisters Brothers and The Winter Family. Like even though what you’re reading should be shocking, you feel so comfortable with your narrators that it doesn’t bother you as much.

This is a book I would read again, and I rarely read books more than once. I’m too slow and life’s too short. But I just know that I’d find even more to love about it on further reads. Plus, it would be so fun to revisit this weird-Western world that Grecian created. No notes, Red Rabbit is perfect.