The Damage Done: Unforgettable Horror by Tony Tremblay

The Damage Done by Tony Tremblay, a horror book review by Tony Jones.

If Tony Tremblay invites you to Goffstown…..

JUST SAY NO!

I first reviewed Tony Tremblay back in 2018, giving his wild debut The Moore House, which later reached the Final Ballot of the Bram Stoker Award in the First Novel Category, a stellar five star review. It was an outstanding haunted house tale, which was backed up with exorcisms, dodgy priests, sexy nuns, demons and other colourful characters who sat on both sides of the fence, good and evil. If you have never come across it, I would highly recommend tracking it down.

Although Tony’s second novel Do Not Weep For Me was not billed as a direct sequel to The Moore House, it features many of the same characters and, equally important, is set in the same town where the unexplained is rather normal. Unbelievably, the ‘sequel’ even tops The Moore House for violence, over-the-top action and spectacular demon inspired kill scenes, stunning decapitations, detached talking heads and enough gross bodily fluids to drown you in yuck. That previous sentence makes Do Not Weep For Me sound trashy; it was nothing of the sort and was a very clever and absolutely perfectly paced horror novel in which the unbelievable becomes perfectly acceptable within the boundaries of the amazing story. I recommend reading these awesome two novels back-to-back and they deserve to be much better known in the horror world and are perfect preparation for this highly anticipated third instalment.

In The Damage Done Tony Tremblay has lost none of his swagger

As we head back to Goffstown (New Hampshire) for another very bad in the town which must have the highest mortality rate in the States. Is there ever a good at Goffstown? (Ask the author as he lives there!)These are standalone novels but I would recommend tackling them in the correct sequence for a deeper and richer reading experience via the existing connections to the characters.

In this third outing many familiar faces from The Moore House and Do Not weep for Me return and Tremblay puts most of them through another intensity wringer, both emotionally and physically. New characters do appear, some do not last long before being brutally killed off. I’m still twitching at the dysfunctional (and then some!) relationship between father and son, Greg and Trevor Dearborn, who become victims for the supernatural malady which ails Goffstown and is a crucial plot sequence in this story. 

Although there are lots of recurring characters in The Damage Done

It is the Goffstown location, and the enigmatic Gabriel Smith, which ground these terrific novels. Smith is the mysterious owner of the Goffstown Pawnshop, which seems to have the ability to relocate and exists to fight battles against evil and the supernatural (they never seem to sell very much gear). The reader is drip-fed snippets about the enigmatic ‘Smith’ who is significantly more than he claims to be and reminds me slightly of a more dangerous and less bumbling version of Giles the Librarian from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Maybe one day the author will delight us with an ‘origins’ story regarding the pawnshop owner.

This latest return to Goffstown is slightly more expansive than its predecessors in that the action does not takes place in a haunted house or hidden away location and fans out into wider locations. Using Korean folklore and supernatural entities. a mystery develops after an American Korean teenager, Choi, spots her boyfriend with another girl in the local park. This leads to a horrific incident where many other teenagers start to levitate high in the air before brutally falling to their deaths.

Whilst this is playing out Mick and Adam are robbing houses and by coincidence find themselves in Choi’s house in the aftermath of the park episode and things spiral wildly out of control. Soon Mr Smith and his very cool sidekick Rex are roped into the mystery involving powerful emotions, hallucinations and exceptionally strong human monsters.

The Damage Done has many highlights

One of my favourite scenes was the wild battle to the death between Rex and a creature, which was once human, with Rex for once, coming up against somebody bigger and more powerful than himself. If you have read the other books you will be pleased to hear the exorcist Father MacLeod returns, as does reporter Manuel Chance, police chief Jack Pendeleton and the nuns Agnes and Nora. The police narrative allows some mystery to be thrown into the mix, which complements the supernatural narrative, and various characters clashing. 

The Damage Done was a satisfying easy read for fans of this supernatural, mystery, horror series, which has a nice balance of characterisation, the otherworldly and action. I do not think the creepy Korean plot was quite as strong as the evil faced in the previous two books, nor was it quiet as violent, so if Mr Smith is going to return for a fourth outing Tony Tremblay must make sure the dark side is as vicious and nasty as humanely possible. Regular readers demand blood and lashings of it. 

Tony Jones

The Damage Done by Tony Tremblay

Lured by a prank phone call to a local park, Choi Lee, a Korean high school student living in New Hampshire, is unwittingly pushed to her breaking point. Since she was little, Choi’s parents have instilled in her a need to check her emotions, emphasizing that the damage done if she lost control would be catastrophic. With that phone call, Choi, her boyfriend, and her classmates will discover just how catastrophic after Choi is provoked to the point of no return.

Everyone in the park—the guilty, the innocent, the bystanders—they all die.

Inspecting the bodies littering the grass, Captain Pendleton, new to the Goffstown Police Force, walks the grounds of Barnard Park. His men are calling this event a microburst, but Pendleton had never seen a microburst decapitate, flatten, or twist a body inside out such as this. While at the park, he receives more unsettling news. There is a fatal incident at the local tavern with several people unconscious and at least two dead. Arriving at the tavern, Pendleton wonders if things could get any worse. It turns out they can. His men discover more bodies in a house next door to the tavern that a Korean family owns. The only survivor – a young girl named Choi, who has been shot in the head.

In the coming days, the gruesome deaths pile up.

Captain Pendleton’s investigation leads him to the owner of a local pawnshop. Together, they attempt to piece together Choi’s involvement with the deaths in the park, her home, and at the restaurant. However, Pendleton and the pawnshop owner are dealing with unfamiliar forces, and Choi’s ties to the supernatural and Korean folklore test the resolve and sanity of both men. It was Choi who initiated the events that led to the death of so many townspeople, and she is the key to stopping more.

The thing is, Choi is technically alive, but her brain is dead.

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