News flash! Joe Hill is Stephen King’s son. Yes, that Stephen King. Although, if you’re reading this review, chances are that this isn’t news to you. The secret has been out on Mr. Hill’s real identity for a while now. I guess you have to credit the guy for not coming out of the gate riding his immensely famous father’s coattails. Talk about an in! The truth is that he didn’t need to ride his father’s coattails, nor anybody else’s for that matter. Because this guy can write as he so aptly demonstrated with his debut novel, Heart Shaped Box, and his excellent and much lauded short story collection, 20th Century Ghosts. Now he’s back with another novel, this one called Horns. And the obvious question would be: Does it live up to the standards of the first two outings?

Horns open with a rather intriguing first line:

Ignatius Martin Perrish spent the night drunk and doing terrible things.

It seems that our protagonist, Ig—as he is known to family and friends—was so drunk that he can’t recall just what, exactly, those terrible things might have been. All he knows is that he has a world class hangover. Oh, yeah, and that he now has a pair of knobby little horns growing out of his head.

It isn’t long before Ig discovers that along with the horns he has developed some rather extraordinary powers which can only be of supernatural origin. The first of these powers to present itself is not one that overly thrills him and over which he seems to have very little control. It seems that anyone he now comes across feels the need to tell him some very bad things about themselves, dark secrets they would never share with those close to them let alone with a complete stranger. And the things revealed to him by his live-in sort of girlfriend, Glenna, and his family members threaten to immediately and irrevocably destroy whatever relationships he may have had with these people, the few left in town who have not turned their backs on him. It’s no secret that the vast majority of the local townsfolk do not think too highly of Ig these days. You see, a year earlier Ig’s longtime girlfriend, Merrin, was found raped and brutally murdered beneath a tree out near a local, long abandoned foundry. Ig was the prime suspect but ended up staying out of prison do to the rather timely destruction of some key evidence in the case. Sure, Ig knows that he is innocent. He would have never hurt Merrin. Never. Not like that. She was the love of his life. Even if their relationship did fall on some rough times shortly before she was found dead. But most people think he is guilty. Even certain members of his family question his innocence, he comes to discover, thanks to the power of the horns. A power he certainly did not ask for but which he comes to realize may be able to help him find the person responsible for Merrin’s death.

HORNS is several stories rolled into one. At its heart, it is a detailed account of Ig’s physical and spiritual transformation into something demonic. It is also a revenge tale as Ig unravels the mystery of Merrin’s death and sets out to enact his vengeance upon the killer. It is also a love story told in flashbacks that reveal, almost poetically at times, the fairytale romance that Ig and Merrin once shared.

If there is a failing to be found in Joe Hill’s recent outing, it has to do with its slightly inconsistent tone. The half of the story taking place in the present, the one in which Ig uses his demonic abilities to track down Merrin’s killer, has its share of campy moments and scenes of over-the-top violence. Whereas the other half of the story, the one set in the past detailing Ig’s relationship with Merrin, can accurately be described as a poignant and touching display of young love. The juxtaposition of these two styles makes for a bit of an uneven narrative at times. Ultimately, however, HORNS has a compelling enough plot and strong enough writing to make Ig’s journey through the darkness consuming his life and soul one worth undertaking. Does Mr. Hill’s latest literary offering measure up to its predecessors? Maybe not completely. But sometimes that can be difficult to achieve when the bar has been set so high.