The Amulet by Michael McDowell

 

When a rifle range accident leaves Dean Howell disfigured and in a vegetative state, his wife Sarah finds her dreary life in Pine Cone, Alabama made even worse. After long and tedious days on the assembly line, she returns home to care for her corpselike husband while enduring her loathsome and hateful mother-in-law, Jo. Jo blames the entire town for her son’s mishap, and when she gives a strange piece of jewelry to the man she believes most responsible, a series of gruesome deaths is set in motion. Sarah believes the amulet has something to do with the rising body count, but no one will believe her. As the inexplicable murders continue, Sarah and her friend Becca Blair have no choice but to track down the amulet themselves, before it’s too late.

Shortly after I read Cold Moon Over Babylon by this author I made it a point to seek out his other works. Somehow I missed out on reading Michael McDowell back in the 80s. I am now armed with a small collection of his books and this is the second one I have read. I'm pleased to say I enjoyed it just as much as my first venture.

This story takes place in Pine Cone Alabama where there is not much opportunity for work other than the munitions factory. Jo Howell, who is as mean as the Alabama sun is hot, blames the munitions factory and just about everyone in town for the horrific accident that put her son in a vegetative state. She is consumed with thoughts of revenge, and she will have it, in the form of a cursed amulet that causes whoever possesses it to murder whoever happens to be handy at the time, before they themselves also die in freakishly bizarre accidents the likes of which I would not expect to see anywhere outside of one of those Final Destination movies. I do wish there had been some explanation of where the Amulet derived this power from but that did not really detract from the gory good time I had reading this book.

4 out of 5 stars

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About the author

Michael McDowell was a prolific horror writer who has distinguished himself with a varied body of work within the genre. He was born in Enterprise, Alabama, in 1950 and passed away in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1999. Among McDowell's other writings is the six-part serial novel Blackwater, a chronicle of a southern family drawn to the supernatural. In addition, McDowell has also supplied the screenplays for various films, including director Tim Burton's horror comedy Beetlejuice and his animated production The Nightmare Before Christmas.