Wanderers by Chuck Wendig
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
I think that horror is at its best when it keeps its core idea simple. WANDERERS is elegant in its simplicity and bold in how slowly and meticulously it builds on a seemingly banal occurrence.
One morning, a teenage girl starts sleepwalking. And she can’t stop. And she’s unresponsive to her family as she trudges out into the country. When her sister tries to physically stop her from walking, something horrible starts to happen to the sleepwalker that causes extreme pain. To stop her from walking may be to kill her.
And then, up the road, she is joined by another sleepwalker…
And I’ll stop there. You’re either intrigued or you’re not, and the pure slyness of the story is how little information you need to keep enthralled by the direction the story takes. Like the work of Kafka, the mundane is where the danger resides. Totally original and sublime.