The Angel of Indian Lake by Stephen Graham Jones

The Angel of Indian Lake

By Stephen Graham Jones

Saga Press 2024

Four years after the events of Don’t Fear the Reaper. Eight years after the Independence Day Massacre. Jade Daniels is back for one last fight in The Angel of Indian Lake by Stephen Graham Jones.

This time, Jade is working as the high school history teacher, taking on the role of her My Heart is a Chainsaw mentor, Mr. Holmes. Her students are presenting video projects and naturally one of them chooses to do their project on the violent history of Proofrock, Idaho. As if summoned by the insensitive young person and their poor choice of topic for the project, something wakes up and begins killing.

“Horror’s big on anniversaries,” and this final volume of the Indian Lake Trilogy is the anniversary installment of the horror movie franchise. Villains from Proofrock’s past—and some new ones from its present—return to torment the town one last time, as Jade fights to put her personal demons and those of Indian Lake to rest for good.

In a major change from the previous two books in the series, The Angel of Indian Lake is written entirely from Jade’s point of view. The success of this book really hinges on how readers feel about Jade as a character, and how they react to being in her head for the bulk of the narrative. Jade is at turns abrasive, flighty, unfocused, and—as always—overflowing with horror references. As Jade struggles to cope with yet more improbable violence unfolding before her, the horror references come faster and faster as her ability to maintain a steady train of thought declines more and more.

Yet it’s easy to feel immense sympathy for this character. The girl who cried slasher eight years previously. The girl who fought to be taken seriously, to be believed when she said bad things were coming. Jade is a survivor. From the relatively mundane traumas of an abusive childhood to the more extraordinary traumas of fighting for her life against numerous slasher villains, she’s been through a lot. It is not surprising that her head is not the most comfortable place to be. Jade’s narration is at times laser-focused on the issue at hand, and at other times easily distracted going off on tangents and avoiding confronting whatever is immediately in front of her. Through all of the chatter in Jade’s narration, readers come to appreciate how the events of the previous two books have shaped this young woman into the person she’s become.

Jade remains consistent in her tendency to seek comfort and safety in the predictability of the narrative structures of the horror genre. Jade often thinks about the events unfolding around her in terms of horror movies explaining that, “Slashers come in two basic flavors, revenge and mad-dog,” both of which readers have seen over the course of this trilogy. Toward the end of the novel, she refers to the inevitable “third-reel bodydump.” And she contextualizes her recent job as the high school history teacher as, “more Letha’s redemption arc for me than anything I ever had planned.” The type of slasher she’s in, her role in the slasher, what locations to avoid because they would make particularly good locations for slaughter, are all details Jade considers as she maneuvers her way through the growing pile of bodies.

Jade’s role in the slasher movie of her life has often been a subject of her musings, because from the beginning of the trilogy Jade has been convinced that she can’t possibly be the final girl. She’s just the guide, there to help prepare the real final girl for what she’s going to have to do to stop the slasher cycle. The final girl is Letha Mondragon, Jade naturally thinks, because she’s pretty and rich and new to town. Or maybe it’s Jocelyn because she, “manages to let the trap clap shut and, in the same action, catch her falling axe,” an action which Jade sees as obvious final girl behavior. But, of course, readers of the series have always known better.

As the final installment in a trilogy, The Angel of Indian Lake has two very important jobs to do. It needs to bring every important plot point to a conclusion and leave readers feeling satisfied. There were always two ways this series could end. There are, after all, two ways a final girl’s story ends. She lives or she dies. Either way, the slasher cycle concludes. Jade’s ending is the perfect final statement about our final girl, bringing to a close this trilogy which has been dark, moving, and full to bursting with love for the horror genre.

Amberlee Venters is a freelance editor and writer living in Northern California.