Title: Headless

Author: Scott Cole

Release date: March 5th, 2024

A few years back, I read Cole’s bonkers novella, ‘Crazytimes,’ about the world suddenly becoming unhinged and infuriated and bloodthirsty maniac’s. Meteors are falling and everyone is out to kill the people around them.

When I saw Cole announce ‘Headless,’ with a synopsis that mirrored ‘Crazytimes’ to a degree, I was excited. In this one, strange ‘bouncing’ hail/rain is falling from the sky, satellite dishes are crumbling and re-entering the atmosphere and every where around the world, heads on top of shoulders are suddenly changing color before they explode. But once the heads go ‘pop!’ the bodies keep moving.

Cole has a knack for believable bonkers, so with ‘Headless,’ I was chomping at the bit to see just what in the hell he’d created this time.

What I liked: The story opens up with three different characters living their lives. Joanna just wants to be known as Joanna, not Joe, and is grabbing her groceries. Linzy wants her significant other to get home so they can get it on. This headache she’s been fighting isn’t leaving and maybe a quick romp will alleviate it. And Carter lives a solitary life just down the hall from Linzy. Working from home while being a bachelor.

Then, Linzy’s dealing with her boyfriends head missing, and the world is flipped upside down. The three of them are thrust into Carter’s car, escaping the city and driving to find somewhere ‘safe.’ But just where is that safe place? Infrastructure is crumbling, people’s heads keep exploding and the car’s gas tank gets lower and lower.

Cole does a great job of throwing these three at the reader, but also forcing them together to overcome and try to survive the seemingly unsurvivable.

As the story progresses, the trio travel further, eventually having to stop to find gas and food. It’s here where the most extreme moments occur, some that’ll potentially be the DNF point for readers, but Cole handles it like the master of extreme he is, and uses it to push the emotional boundary, as well as the ‘what would I do’ should I ever find myself in that situation.

The ending is spot on and executed so very well. It shouldn’t have come as a surprise – and won’t for many readers – but I was rooting for these folks and when you get to that point, it because difficult to let some characters go.

What I didn’t like: Two things really. At first, I wasn’t really sold on the trio as separate story lines. Because the chapters are short and snappy, I didn’t get to really know any of them until they all came together. It was necessary, but at first was a bit chaotic trying to learn who was who.

Secondly, I’m not totally sure I’m sold or was ever sold, on the necessity of the alien interludes. Sprinkled throughout are small, paragraph length chapters, told through the alien’s POV. It’s used to create sentience, or to educate the readers that they have a plan, but I found it kind of took me out of the story, even in that brief moment.

Why you should buy this: Fans of Cole’s will be all over this, as will fans of anything Grindhouse Press releases. For fans of extreme/Splatterpunk, you’ll have a field day with this one. It’s kind of like ripping through a dusty road at 100 mph knowing full well that the vehicle you’re in has no brakes. Ruthless, breakneck and vicious, Cole did a wonderful job of ripping everything apart.

5/5