Night Film, by Marisha Pessl 

A woman is dead and the suspect is her reclusive, cryptic filmmaker father who makes cult, underground horror movies. The films are avant-garde experiments, like YouTube videos of people trying to sell budget clothes, and just as unsettling. 

It’s up to an investigative journalist and his two sidekicks to get to the bottom of what really happened. There are twists and turns and a lot of spooky vibes. Is it supernatural? Is it real? Is it both!? Fun stuff. 

But there are two downsides to this novel:

First, it uses the gimmick of multimedia files to tell the whole story. So you might need to log onto a computer from 2010 to access everything. Say hi to Tumblr for me! 

Second, the author uses (abuses?) italics. There is italics in nearly every sentence. Every sentence suddenly has added emphasis for no reason. If a metal band has a gong on stage, the true artists will know to only bang the gong once or twice when necessary. Marisha Pessl, bangs the gong on every page. We should be thankful that she only italics groups of words and not individual letters. 

Is this a nitpick? It’s hard to say if it’s a nitpick. Only the italics will reveal the truth.

But besides that, this is a very effective thriller that would be made even better if you “Select All” and click the Italics button twice.

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