Josh Malerman’s recent book Incidents Around the House is an interesting one for a lot of reasons. Not only does it check a lot of the boxes I discussed in my recent series on horror, it is an interesting plot written from a unique perspective.
The perspective is straightforward: the book is written from the perspective of Bela, the little girl. This means both that we have a very limited view of what’s happening (which adds to the horror), but it also leads to some interesting editorial choices–the absence of quotation marks and the indentation of quotes instead. I think this works, but it’s probably a testament to modern American illiteracy that they had to include an “author’s note” explaining what was going on rather than just letting us suss it out (I don’t remember whether Cormac McCarthy gave us notes or just chucked us in the deep end).
But the really interesting thing here is the plot, and what it reveals about the characters (which of course is what a good plot will do). “Other Mommy” wants Bela to let her into her heart, which will then trade Bela and Other Mommy. The overtones of the Gospel are pretty obvious here, and this book could have gone in an anti-Christian direction fairly easily.
But the book doesn’t take the easy out. Instead, it raises the hard cultural questions. What does the supernatural look like to people utterly unprepared to face it, who may not even have the capacity to know that there is a supernatural? What tools do they have to understand it? How can they overcome its challenges, if at all?
What we find in the book (mild spoilers here) is that the main thing the family has to face the supernatural challenge is the strength of their bonds as a family. What we Christians would call “common grace.” It’s telling that every one else in the book who comes face to face with the monster lacks any capacity to engage with it or respond in any meaningful way. Only the small (but real) grace of being a family enables Daddo, Mommy, and Bela to face down “Other Mommy” at all, however poorly and blindly.
This is a point that merits more attention by Christians. Yes, we have a higher and greater power behind us than the family–the Gospel sets us free from all these particular kinds of worries. And yet, common grace (particularly in the form of the family) is a real feature of the world that enables even unbelievers to face the unexpected challenges of life. There is real evil out there, and even in this life it can be overcome (temporarily) by the blessings God has given fallen humanity.
Incidents Around the House is a fast-paced read (though not for children, despite being written from the perspective of a child), and one that provides a useful reflection on the showdown between evil and common grace.
Dr. Coyle Neal is co-host of the City of Man Podcast an Amazon Associate (which is linked in this blog), and an Associate Professor of Political Science at Southwest Baptist University in Bolivar, MO
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