What do you do when the scariest thing isn't the demon — it's watching your best friend become someone you don't recognize?
I was shelving returns at the library on a quiet Thursday evening, the kind where the fluorescent lights buzz just loud enough to remind you you're alone, and I had this playing through my earbuds. Big mistake? Maybe. But Grady Hendrix's My Best Friend's Exorcism is the kind of book that deserves a slightly unsettling backdrop. And let me tell you — the moment Gretchen starts unraveling after that skinny-dipping scene at the lake, I stopped mid-shelf with a copy of Where the Crawdads Sing in my hand and just... stood there. Because Hendrix gets something that so many horror writers fumble: the real terror of losing someone you love to something you can't name.
Shirley Jackson Walked So Grady Hendrix Could Rollerskate Through a Demon-Infested Mall
This book understands that horror isn't about gore — it's about dread. Specifically, the dread of adolescence weaponized. Hendrix structures the whole novel like a mixtape (each section is named after an 80s pop song, which is such a committed bit that I respect it enormously), and that structure does something sneaky: it lulls you into nostalgia before pulling the rug. You're humming "Somebody's Watching Me" and then suddenly Gretchen is vomiting something that definitely isn't food and Abby is the only one who notices anything is wrong. The possession doesn't announce itself with spinning heads and pea soup. It creeps in through mood swings, cruelty, social manipulation — things that could just be a teenage girl having a terrible semester. Still Life does something similarly patient with its dread — the threat stays just out of frame long enough that when it finally lands, you feel it in your chest. That ambiguity is where the horror lives, and Hendrix lets it breathe.
The friendship between Abby and Gretchen is genuinely the backbone here, and I don't say that lightly. So much horror uses relationships as decoration. This one uses the relationship as the entire engine. When the exorcism finally happens in those last chapters — and it's ugly and emotional and not at all glamorous — what makes it land isn't the supernatural spectacle. It's Abby refusing to give up on someone everyone else has written off. I was sitting in my car in the library parking lot by that point, engine off, just listening. And yeah, my eyes were wet. Shirley (my cat) was unimpressed when I got home and tried to explain why. But I was wrecked.
Emily Woo Zeller Mostly Commits — With a Few Hiccups
The narrator commits. That's rare. Emily Woo Zeller's comedic timing is genuinely sharp — her delivery of the teen dialogue feels lived-in rather than performed, which is a difficult line to walk when you're voicing sixteen-year-olds as an adult. The way she shifts between Abby's earnest desperation and Gretchen's increasingly cold detachment creates this gut-punch contrast that works better in audio than it probably does on the page.
But — and this is a real but — there's a pacing quirk that nagged at me. Zeller has these pauses after certain sentences that make them sound disconnected from each other, almost like she's reading individual lines rather than flowing through a paragraph. It's not constant, but when it happens during tense scenes, it pulls you out. And there were a handful of quieter dialogue lines where I had to bump my volume up, then scramble to turn it back down when the narration returned to normal levels. Not a dealbreaker, but noticeable enough that I'd flag it for anyone listening in a noisy environment.
She's still a strong performer — the Earphones Awards aren't for nothing — but this particular recording sits just below her best work. The emotional scenes in the final act? Excellent. Some of the middle-book dialogue? A little flat.
Who Needs This in Their Ears
If you grew up in the 80s, or if you're obsessed with 80s horror the way I'm obsessed with 80s horror, this is a love letter written in blood and Aqua Net. If you want pure scare-you-silly horror, temper your expectations — this is more slow-building unease than jump scares. The disturbing sequences are genuinely disturbing (there are some body horror moments that made me grimace at my steering wheel), but the heart of this book is the friendship. If you can't get invested in Abby and Gretchen's bond, the horror won't land.
Skip if you need fast pacing throughout — the middle section drags in places, and the 80s references occasionally feel like they're doing a bit more work than the plot. But if you want horror that respects the genre while also making you cry about friendship? My podcast listeners are going to love this.
The Lights Stay On for This One — But Only Because I Was Already Crying
Grady Hendrix wrote a possession novel where the exorcism is an act of love. That's not a small thing. The audio experience has its rough edges — volume inconsistencies, some pacing hiccups in the narration — but when it hits, it hits hard. I listened in the dark for the last two hours. Mistake? Maybe. Worth it? Absolutely.
