Cry for the Strangers: Horror Meatloaf

Somedays it's all a little too much. You're tired, maybe you had a pissy day at work, all you know is you want to be comforted. Many people turn to the aptly named comfort food to start feeling better. Everyone has one, that one dish that while nothing fancy immediately brings you back to your childhood. Maybe it's the special casserole your mom always made, roast chicken pieces, or a good ketchup slathered meatloaf. John Saul's Cry for the Strangers very much reminds me of that meatloaf.

Dell's 1986 edition of Saul's 1979 novel

John Saul is one of many authors who got chunked into the same bucket as Stephen King although at one point during the horror boom everyone was either the next Stephen King or had a blurb from King praising their work. But unlike his contemporary Dean Koontz, who desperately wanted to be Stephen King, John Saul was perfectly content in his own corner. Part of this contentment had to have come from the fact he had a formula and an infinite amount of ways to make that formula interesting. From what I have noticed about Saul's horror novels especially during the boom, is that they 1) all feature small towns, 2) feature an average someone who is a stranger to said town or outcast in some way, and 3) a mysterious event normally tied to town history is connected to recent violence normally acted upon children or townsfolk (Saul seems to like killing kids in his books). Cry for the Strangers is no different. Taking place in a fictional Washington Coastal town that is already unfriendly to non locals, psychiatrist Brad Randall intends to move there to write a scholarly book. Upon investigating the town he realizes the parents of one of his former child patients has moved there as well, upon noticing the positive change in their son within minutes of being at the town's beach. They are soon to learn that the beach used to have the quaint name Sands of Death and was the ritual murder spot of the local Indians who would bury strangers there for the sea to kill. Out of towner's start dying again and Brad begins wondering if the past is repeating itself. Once the novel gets going you pretty much see the bad guy from a mile away but that's not the point. The whole point of a Saul novel is like watching a solid B movie. Your leads are likable enough that you want them to live but you're still thrilled by the violent deaths that happen around them. To Saul's credit his towns always feel real and he's adept enough at crafting average Joe's that you don't mind how paper thin the characterizations are. This right here is why I lovingly equate his work with meatloaf. He cobbles together likable elements from all sorts of horror subgenres and tropes and to make sure it holds together he coats it in an ample ketchup of satisfying death scenes and mayhem. It's always satisfying and in a way comforting to read something where unlike real life, you know who to root for and who's the bad guy. So if you're having a bad day there's nothing wrong with reading the dependable Cry for the Strangers.