Haunted by his tragic past, Jack LeBlanc, a scarred introvert living in the bayous of southern Louisiana, signs up for a clinical trial to test the miraculous new tissue-regeneration drug, Obsidian. It isn’t long until Jack and the other lab rats discover that the medication is not what was promised. They’re about to find out the hard way that the pills have nightmarish consequences.
From the author of Bad God’s Tower and The Rictus Grin and Other Tales of Insanity comes a riveting tale that is equal parts medical thriller, psychological thriller, and monstrous body horror. Vanity Kills delves deep into body dysmorphia, narcissism, and revenge as the ensemble of richly developed characters embark on a quest for visual perfection that will chill you to the bone.
Based loosely on Summers’ 2020 feature film, Obsidian, Vanity Kills will have you questioning the side effects of every pill you take.
Dark bleatings, my beautiful tribe. I’m here with another book from Erica Summers today – an author whose work seems to be a continuous hit with me this year. This is the story of Jack, a man who is physically (and mentally) scarred from an accident, who goes to a medical study to undertake an experimental treatment for the removal of scar tissue. There is a group of people there, each of them with their own stories and scars to prove them, hoping to be cured of their “disfigurements”. As someone with a hefty amount of scar tissue myself, I was especially intrigued by this concept and instantly invested. The medicine is a black substance called ‘Obsidian’.
To complicate matters, the doctor running the trial doesn’t actually reveal himself until all of the participants are locked in (so to speak) and have signed their contracts. Jack knows him, and they have a mysterious history that will not be explained until later in the story, but it’s so bad that Jack almost pulls out of the trial.
There’s a weird little cabin on the grounds.
So, as in most medical trials, some of the group are destined for the real deal, whilst others will receive placebos. Unfortunately for the doctor, one of the participants (with a history in dealing drugs) breaks into his office and switches things around, for fun. When the doctor realises that his control group is messed up, he absolutely freaks out… like… WAY more than he should, if the medicine is actually what he says it is.
This story is, in short, a whole load of fun with excellent horror that escalates as the story progresses, and it’s also infused with a lot of dramatic weight. There are funny moments, absolutely horrific scenes, and some really thought-provoking themes and ideas to explore. On the surface, we have a group of people who want to be rid of their scars. Some people might call this vanity, but honestly, those people are probably lucky enough not to have significant scarring, or scarring caused by a traumatic event. Depending on how a scar is received, there is a lot of emotional weight tangled up in it and the self-consciousness that comes with the disfigured appearance of a patch of your flesh can be compounded with the traumatic memory of whatever put it there. I really enjoyed how the author explored this seemingly “surface level” idea, especially because there’s a detail towards the end about Jack’s scarring that pulls together several plot threads so beautifully that I was floored by how excellently she tied it up.
Outside of the medical aspect of the story, we also get to delve into a whole bunch of relationships – some old and some brand new, and I thought the group dynamic and all the separate little bonds forming was done so well. I was interested in every single character and was very much engaged with all the little subplots – which all complimented and fed into the main plot beautifully.
Honestly, I could probably talk all day about the many merits of this story, but ain’t nobody got time for that, so let me start wrapping up on the actual horror elements… ooh the delicious horror elements! The setting – a medical trial facility – is great. A group of (mostly) strangers thrown together with an experimental drug and some already strained relationships is an intriguing, tense start. Then we have that dread creeping in when the doctor freaks out about the samples being switched. Then there’s that creepy cabin on the grounds… and the thing lurking inside it. And then we get to add in some extreme violence and gore, some rampaging killings, debauchery, deception, and blood splattering all around. And that’s not even just in the final act, when the ante is upped. There’s a scene from someone’s past in this book that makes the hobbling scene from Misery look like a mild accident by comparison.
This is a bloody great book, basically, and I’d recommend it to horror fans galore. If you’d like to get a copy or check out the author, I’ve popped some links below for you:
Bleeeat!
Happy Goat Horror 
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