Every morning, Kris Pulaski wakes up in hell. In the 1990s she was lead guitarist of Dürt Würk, a heavy-metal band on the brink of breakout success until lead singer Terry Hunt embarked on a solo career and rocketed to stardom, leaving his bandmates to rot in obscurity.

Now Kris works as night manager of a Best Western; she’s tired, broke, and unhappy. Then one day everything changes—a shocking act of violence turns her life upside down, and she begins to suspect that Terry sabotaged more than just the band. Kris hits the road, hoping to reunite Dürt Würk and confront the man who ruined her life. Her journey will take her from the Pennsylvania rust belt to a celebrity rehab center to a satanic music festival. A furious power ballad about never giving up, We Sold Our Souls is an epic journey into the heart of a conspiracy-crazed, pill-popping, paranoid country that seems to have lost its very soul.

My Best Friend’s Exorcism by Grady Hendrix is one of the biggest emotional gut-punches I can recall reading. I went into it thinking it was gonna be a horror-comedy, kinda schlocky, and fun. And it is those things. But it’s also so fucking gorgeous & emotionally charged…and I just didn’t see it coming. I’ve probably mentioned this here before, but it’s a rare thing for a book to make me cry. A car commercial with an old dog in it? Sobbing. But with books, it’s just different for me. At any rate, there were more than a few tears shed reading My Best Friend’s Exorcism.

I’ve been super excited to finally check out We Sold Our Souls, and October seemed like the best time for it! And while it didn’t quite murder my feels in the same way as MBFE, this is another book written with tremendous heart, and a lot of love for both heavy metal & horror, two of my favorite things!

This is the story of Kris Pulaski, former guitarist for the band Dürt Würk. They were a metal band in the late 80’s/early 90’s, and they almost had it all. They achieved a decent level of fame, going so far as to even open for Slayer.

Only to be kicked off the tour for the behavior of their lead singer, Terry Hunt.

Things continued on a downward trajectory for Dürt Würk, ending in a mysterious disaster known as “contract night.” When we meet Kris, she’s in her 40’s, working nights at the front desk of a hotel, and has no contact with any of her former band members. She’s also quit playing guitar and seems deeply unhappy.

Meanwhile, Terry’s star has continued to rise with his new band Koffin. After the announcement of a sort’ve One Last Tour (but not really) for Koffin, Kris decides to embark on a cross country journey to reconnect with her bandmates, and to confront Terry about what exactly happened on contract night.

We Sold Our Souls is seriously such a fucking wild ride. Like, this book goes places I never imagined it going, and it goes there…TO ELEVEN! It’s very much a love letter to heavy metal (but never, ever, nu metal), and to the friendships forged through music. But of course it’s also a horror novel, and a great one at that. We Sold Our Souls also features a scene that is so unbearably claustrophobic that I was physically uncomfortable reading it…like, holy fuck!!!

I played in bands for a big chunk of my life, so a lot of this book resonated with me deeply. The intensity of creating something that feels so personal, and trying to balance that across everyone’s different personalities…when it works, it works. And when it doesn’t…oof. And the early scenes in this book kicked my ass, especially. When Kris was just a teenager, playing guitar for the first few times. Fumbling through songs, shredding her fingers, thinking of quitting, loving it, hating it, and ultimately, needing it.

I really dug the hell out of this. I love how Grady Hendrix is able to balance out the horror, heart, and humor in his books. It makes for some incredibly emotional reading. We Sold Our Souls is just a fucking treat…I think this will hit metal fans a little harder in the feels, but really, any lover of music & horror would enjoy this!