Being a HUGE Grady Hendrix fan this book was my most anticipated book of 2021. In fact, I actually pre-ordered it around Oct 2020 as soon as I heard about it. And so it absolutely kills me to say that I didn't love this book. In fact, I didn't even particularly like it. I just had no feelings about it at all! It was just very average and not at all what I've come to expect from Hendrix. I've always been a horror movie and horror book fan so I can appreciate the nod this book makes to those classic slasher films of the 80's and 90's but unfortunately it just didn't go as well as I was expecting. It's very rare for me to be of the opinion that a movie was better than the book but this is definitely one that would be far better as a movie in my opinion.
TFGSP follows a group of women who are all final girls from some kind of horrific mass killing and who all attend the same support group. They are sort of getting on with their lives until someone targets them again and they start being killed.
Hendrix is amazing at writing strong female characters and female relationships / friendships and the women in this book are no exception. I loved how Lynette's character had flaws, her trauma affected every aspect of her life which is far more realistic than if she was a final girl who then went on to live happily ever after. She was real and raw and such a great protagonist to get behind. I also loved how all the final girls were affected in different ways by the horrific incidents they had been through. It was very reflective of how different people will react in different ways and how we all process trauma differently.
I genuinely wish that I had loved this book, maybe it's my high expectations and mental build up that have led me to feel so disappointed. I know there's other readers out there that have loved it so I would still recommend it to horror fans.

Since young, I have loved horror movies and my favourite sub-genre has always been slasher: Serial killers, whodunits, people getting bumped off one by one. Franchises like Halloween, Scream, and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre were the ones I watched over and over without tiring of.

So it's no wonder I fell in love with this book.

The Final Girl Support Group is a homage to all my favourite films and I had fun trying to identify which movies were being referenced. It also explores a great premise, something that I'd never asked myself: What happened to all the Final Girls after the credits rolled? Sometimes, they are hunted down again. Hence all the movie sequels.

The story has quite a few twists and turns. I'd been so sure of something but turned out to be wrong! A lot of what makes this book amazing is in the detail: Even the chapter and character names have special meaning behind them.

I loved how the author showed readers what it's like being in the protagonist's head. Some see her as a heroine, some think she's "not even a real Final Girl", but at the end of the day, she's undeniably a survivor who is still struggling with trauma.

Ironically, this book is both tribute and social commentary. It also questions why people (aka me) find entertainment in such horror and violence. How we remember and worship horror movie 'icons' more than the victims. Why our favourite movie monsters have to "chalk up such low body counts" with slow and crude weapons like blades and hooks, when they can simply mow down everyone with guns.

What. A. Book.

“Men die because they make mistakes. Women? We die because we’re female.”

To the casual observer, the group of women would appear to have little in common. They meet monthly in the church basement, arriving one by one and leaving alone. What the observer cannot know is that this is a meeting of one of the most exclusive support groups around.

These women are the girls who heard a mysterious noise in the dark forest and didn’t go to investigate. They’re the girls who didn’t check the basement by themselves. They checked the back seat of the car before they got in. They didn’t look behind and trip when they were running. They didn’t drink or do drugs. They didn’t sneak off for sex. These are the girls who knocked the killer out but didn’t creep nearer to check his pulse. These are the women who shot the slasher and then emptied the gun into him to made damn sure he was dead.

The Final Girl Support Group is for the girls who lived but, this time, one of them is dead, a Final Girl no more. And now the killer is after all of them.

I’m not a massive fan of the slasher genre – it tends to be quite formulaic – but I’ve watched my fair share and thought I’d give this a try. Whilst it’s not the best novel I’ve ever read, it’s more than just a rehash of all the tropes. Hendrix writes from the female perspective well, and the story also raises the issues of media harassment and how victims are taken advantage of, and how dangerous even the normal world can be to women.

Each final girl’s monster is a killer from a series of slasher films, which distracted me as half my attention was spent on trying to match the survivor to the franchise. I don’t know if this is why I struggled so much to remember who each character was, but somehow the characters weren’t distinct enough to register properly. I’ve noticed this before with Hendrix: the premise is generally good, but something gets lost in the telling - maybe the books would be better as screenplays? The chapter titles were cute, though.

If you’ve never watched a slasher film, then this is probably not the book for you. If you love them, you’ll almost certainly get more out of The Final Girl Support Group than I did.

I received an advance reading copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I am a big fan of Grady Hendrix's books, especially after reading The Southern Bookclub's Guide to Slaying Vampires, so it is safe to say that The Final Girls Support Group was one of my most anticipated books of the summer. Unfortunately, this one just wasn't for me.

The Final Girls Support Group is a love letter to 80s and 90s slasher flicks. This book has all the gore, the cheese, and over the top plot of films like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Nightmare on Elm Street, Scream, Friday the 13th, and others. In fact, each final girl in the support group is based on one familiar film franchise, but with a twist.

In the book, the final girls' real life stories come first, and the film franchises come later. But what happens to these women who experience very real trauma? Hendrix always infuses his books with social commentary and The Final Girls Support Group is no exception. As Hendrix serves up references to these horror films, he is also eviscerating the sexualised violence against women created for the male gaze, as well as the very real fears that women face. I really loved the intent, but it felt a little clumsy and not very authentic, unlike the messages in his other stories.

In terms of the plot and characters, this book felt more shallow than other Hendrix books I've read. The plot kicks into high gear after little setup, and the breakneck pace doesn't let up. I didn't connect as strongly with the plot as I have with his other books, and I feel like the focus on the plot rather than characters may be a reason. The characters had amazing backstories, but were totally flat. Lynnette, our first person POV character, is a very secretive woman who is running for her life for the majority of the book — this doesn't exactly leave a lot of room for deep introspection. However, I still feel like we could have gotten to know her and the other women in the group. They were pawns to be moved about for the story's sake, much like the film final girls they're based on, and I feel like this could have been a real opportunity to give them so much more.

The Final Girls Support Group is a fast paced horror thriller that I'd recommend to lovers of slasher films and horror movies in general. While it wasn't for me, I'm still eagerly looking forward to his next book.

If you're looking for books that have you hooked from page one and are a little bit funny, a little bit gross and a little bit heartstopping then you need to jump on the Grady Hendrix bandwagon. One minute this had me wincing, the next I was chuckling and then I was reading it from behind a pillow. This is pretty much a blood bath from the beginning, a slasher book and so much more. There's so many references to famous teen murder movies like Scream and Halloween etc. I think it would be particularly enjoyable around Halloween for obvious reasons.

Advice whilst reading: don't let your guard down and watch your back at all times. Unputdownable.

Thank you @netgalley and @titanbooks for the ARC of the Final Girl Support Group which is out on July 13th 2021. I won't sleep tonight.

The Final Girl Support Group Review

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

In horror movies, the final girl is the one who’s left standing when the credits roll. The one who fought back, defeated the killer, and avenged her friends. The one who emerges bloodied but victorious. But after the sirens fade and the audience moves on, what happens to her?
Lynnette Tarkington survived a massacre twenty-two years ago, and it has defined every day of her life since. And she's not alone. For more than a decade she’s been meeting with five other final girls and their therapist in a support group for those who survived the unthinkable, putting their lives back together, piece by piece. That is until one of the women misses a meeting and Lynnette's worst fears are realized―someone knows about the group and is determined to take their lives apart again, piece by piece.
But the thing about these final girls is that they have each other now, and no matter how bad the odds, how dark the night, how sharp the knife, they will never, ever give up.

📚📚📚

This was my first Grady Hendrix and was a gruesome twisted book it was but my god did it hook me! So many twists and turns and i really struggled to put this book down!!

Four stars instead of five because I struggled to remember who all the characters were, probably doesn’t help that it wasn’t the only book I was reading at the same time, but I did smash out 70% of the book in one sitting because I was just so intrigued and needed to know the ending!

It’s definitely not going to be my last Grady Hendrix and it’s another one added to the #Slumpbuster stack!

Buddy read with the lovely @lockdown.reads which ended up a lovely chapter by chapter voice note debrief 😂

Thank you to @netgalley and @titanbooks for the ARC - get this book, out 13th July!

#bookstagramming #booksta #bookstagram #booklover #bookstagrammer #books #book #bookaholic #bookshelf #bookish #booksbooksbooks #bookstack #bookstacks #bookstackchallenge #TheFinalGirlSupportGroup #Netgalley #Review #honestreview #bookreview

The premise of this book sounded right up my street! It's a shame that the book didn't meet my expectations.
This book started strongly, and got me straight into it and intrigued - however the more the book went on, the more it went bonkers! I appreciate some horror films are equally as bonkers, and so this book was just fitting the genre and the style of the films. However, it just didn't work for me.
There were a lot of characters in the book, and I didn't feel that the final girls characters were individual enough for me to follow along. The plot was nuts, and the characters were unlikeable.
I didn't really enjoy this book.

The story follows Lynnette, a real-life final girl who survived a massacre twenty-two years ago which has defined her life ever since. Lynette is not alone, for over a decade she has been meeting five other final girls at a group therapy session. When one of the women misses a meeting, Lynnette’s worst fears are realized, someone knows about the group and is determined to take their lives apart again. But these final girls have each other, and they will never give up.

I love the concept of this thrilling horror story. I am a big fan of Grady Hendix, horror films and the ‘final girl’ trope – so I was very excited when this became available on Netgalley. It was fast paced, full of twists and turns and I think it would make a brilliant film.

Admittedly, it wasn’t my favourite. I found the first few chapters confusing and it took me a while to get into, the second half was much better. I also didn’t particularly like Lynnette which is probably why I couldn’t rate the book higher. I wish I cared for her more because it would have made me desperately hooked to find out if she made it.
I recommend this if you fancy a completely unique thriller. The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires is still one of my favourite books so this one was worth a read, because Hendrix is such a creative author.

Firstly a huge thanks to Titan Books and NetGalley for my e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Okay I admit that I have only watched one or is it two horror movies because I am exactly what people call a chicken *smiley face emoji* I went into this with the excitement of a newbie. Final Girls are those that girls that survive a horrible massacre or event (yep they are the survivors) so in Grady Hendrix’s Final Girl Support Group we follow Lynnette Tarkington who survives a horrible massacre and has been attending a support group with five more actual girls who have been through similar experiences. The book begins mostly at a final girl’s support meeting where one of the girl at the meeting doesn’t show up and we end up finding out how. It turns out someone wants the final girls dead and it’s up to Lynette who everyone didn’t regard as a true final girl to find out how and why. This book is hauntingly good and the characters held their own as each and every character brought something to the book

First off, thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for the copy they provided in return for an honest review.

If you're new to Grady Hendrix - and that has to be a short list by now! - then you may not know that there's some things you can rely on when you're opening one of his books. In no particular order:

- Meta-references, from a man who truly knows and loves his genre. Designed to make the reader feel like a member of the coolest club in town, you won't feel excluded if you miss one, but there's more than enough to guarantee that you'll pick up on at least a few.

- Strong, capable female characters without the need to establish them as "not like the other girls"; being feminine AND kicking ass is something this author chooses to celebrate.

- Horror moments that will prove this is not an author who has to rely on jump-scares to make you nervous; Grady Hendrix writes some excellently tense horror.

Of course, if you're already familiar with this author you know this all already. Does The Final Girl Support Group live up to his best work? It absolutely does. The concept of the final girl is not original to Hendrix, but he's the first to bring them together - and he allows them to be damaged, to be paranoid, to be unlikeable in some cases; and doesn't let any of those factors deny them their right to happiness, life, and joy.

I did knock off a star though, despite all my gushing above. That's a subjective ding though (hopefully what we're all about here on Goodreads) - I wanted just a tad more from our main character. For someone as paranoid, as obsessed with preparation as she was, it wasn't until the second half that we really got to see her really shine and take agency over her story. I'm not too mad about it though; there's valid reasons for her not to react perfectly right from the jump - it's just not how I wanted it to go.

Overall though, I wouldn't hesitate to recommend this to anyone who knows what a final girl is. And to the rest? Come on in and find out!

Thank you to Net Galley and the publishers for sending me a copy of the book in exchange for a review.

What. A. Book.

I’m a massive fan of 90s slasher movies and this was just fantastic. I loved the Final Girls, the plot, the twists and the subtle hints of what the women had gone through before.

I actually had my jaw open and held my breathe for the last third of the book which doesn’t usually happen!

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an eArc in exchange for an honest review.

I found The Final Girl Support Group a very enjoyable read. It took me a while to get into the story but once I was in, I was completely gripped and I couldn't put it down. I don't read that many thriller books occasionally so I don't have much to compare it to but it felt like a very original story.

My only issue is that I couldn't tell if Lynette, the main character, was meant to be a parody of herself or simply a bit... dense. I did enjoy her as a MC and being in her head definitely made me feel as anxious as she was at times!

This was my first Grady Henrix book and it will most definitely won't be the last!

Grady Hendrix has kind of become one of my favorite writers. I’ve read and liked (and loved, at times) every one of his books. From vampires to haunted teenagers and creepy furniture stores, Grady Hendrix always manages to scare and delight me.

And just as I knew it would be, Final Girls stays true to my prediction and entertained the heck out of me.

While the suspense and mystery wasn’t exactly shocking, Final Girls had me hooked because of the fast pace, the musings of Lynette (our intrepid protagonist), and the proselytizing for victims’ stories over the Monsters.

Great book. 4/5

Thank you, Netgalley and Titan Books for the ARC.

Fast paced with twists and turns, I couldn’t put this book down.

If you enjoy a thriller with action, suspense and an unconventional hero, then this is the book for you.

Overall Rating: 4/5
‘The Final Girl Support Group’ by Grady Hendrix is a fun, fast paced and different read - much like the authors other successful past releases.

The book itself is about ‘the last girls standing’ in horror stories, you know the ones? Covered in blood and surrounded by the wreckage of all that she ever knew, but still breathing. That standard trope. Well in this world there a whole bunch of them who have managed to crawl out of the fires, outsmart axe wielding murderers at camps and escape crazy ghost mask wearing boyfriends and SURVIVE. However, this form of surviving is by attending a monthly support group with all the other final girls.

Lynette, one of the final girls is barley hanging on, she goes to the support meetings, but her life consists over obsessing over how a killer might get her next and planning her escape plans. When suddenly the group falls apart and it looks like someone is out to put an end FINALLY to the girls everyone is a suspect and Lynette does not know who to trust.

This was such a clever book and I really enjoyed it. I am a massive horror movie fan so really appreciated all the nods to the cult classics we all know and love but with a Hendrix spin on it. The characters were all wonderful, not all likeable (like really not likeable!!!) but loved all the same as each final girl added something different.

Much like with any Grady Hendrix book I have read it is written perfectly, some authors you just really gel with writing styles and this is one of them for me.

Overall a wonderful read and one that I fully recommend!

Thanks to NetGallery and the publishers at Titan Books for the advance copy of the book.

Publication Date: 13 Jul 2021

Have you ever wondered what happens to the Final Girl, the one who is left standing when the credits roll? For more than a decade, 6 Final Girls have been meeting with their therapist in a support group. When one of the Final Girls go missing - who has discovered their group and is out to pull apart their lives once again?

Thank you to NetGalley UK and Titan Books for the ARC of this, it was my very first ARC and I was absolutely buzzing it was The Final Girl Support Group! This one is out July 13th although it seems you can get your hands on copies from certain places now!

The Final Girl is one of my favourite tropes in horror so when I saw that one of my favourite authors was releasing a book all about it, I was SO excited! It’s such a brilliant idea.

However, this ended up not being what I expected and was more of a mystery/thriller rather than a horror. Which was a little disappointing for me as jump scares are imperative in slasher and their sub-genres however I wasn’t frightened at all reading this one.

I did like all the horror movie references (lots of obscure ones that make you feel really chuffed when you notice) and how can I not appreciate nods to my favourite film, Scream. Fellow horror buffs will notice as-well that the characters are Hendrix’s own creations but are named after the actors who portrayed their movie counterparts.

Overall, I would still recommend and would love to see a movie adaptation of this. The final act for the Final Girl’s was one of my favourite parts and I can picture it so clearly. 3.5 stars!

I liked Grady Hendrix’s books ‘My Last Friend’s Exorcism’ and ‘We Sold Our Souls’ so much that I gifted copies of them to my sister and her wife. Sis loves 80s teen movies and Mrs sis loves heavy metal so it felt like a match made in heaven. So it proved, as they both really enjoyed their respective book, despite not behind horror fans. When I saw Hendrix has written a book that might appeal especially to people who like slasher movies I was naturally delighted. Problematic as it sometimes is, I’m a big fan of it and was very interested to see what he’d do.
And then I started reading it. Honestly, there are a lot of problems with this book, some of which surprised me and some of which I might have anticipated if I’d given it a bit of thought. The biggest one is the central concept. Other reviewers seem to have liked it but it seemed really weird and not that successfully handled to me. Essentially the idea is that all slasher movies franchises are based on real events, with real victims. I think Hendrix is trying to critique the glamorisation and commercialisation of violence against women. It’s a worthwhile subject for horror writers to consider, but his approach is ham-fisted and boringly obvious.
The final girls from each massacre come together in a support group and the plot revolves around a threat to one of them, the narrator Lynette. Things quickly escalate into what is basically an extended chase scene with lots of running around and shouting. It feels lazy and formulaic, like so many other thrillers out there. I was almost surprised not to see the words “James Patterson and” on the cover.
There’s no doubting that Hendrix has an encyclopaedic knowledge of the horror genre, and it’s occasionally fun to pick out the references to movies that litter the book. What struck me though, was the fact that the reason I liked the other books of his I have was because they playfully combine horror with other genres. ‘Final Girl Support Group’ is just straight up horror and fails as a result. It’s not scary or particularly thrilling and the characters and situations completely failed to interest me. Frankly, this is one slasher story I hope stops with the first instalment.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for giving me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Ok this book was so GOOD! Honestly, anything by Grady Hendrix is great. Every time I thought I knew what was going on well, I was wrong. The twists were coming and that was so great. I read this in almost one sitting but I wanted to enjoy it for longer cause the characters were all very well-written. However, i wish the book was 100 pages longer so we could get a bit more time to know our characters before all the action HITS. Because yeah, it hits pretty fast.

Overall, another 4 star book from Grady Hendrix!!

“Someone always wants to kill us. It’s never over.”

Dr Carol Elliott has been conducting regular group sessions with final girls for sixteen years. Our final girls are:

* Marilyn Torres, who won’t let leather touch her skin
* Adrienne Butler, who was a counsellor at Camp Red Lake
* Dani Shipman, whose babysitting job didn’t quite go to plan
* Heather DeLuca, who faced off against the Dream King
* Julia Campbell, whose experiences were turned into the Stab movies
* Lynnette Tarkington, who tells the story.

These women have watched friends and family members being butchered by “monsters” but they survived the unsurvivable. Many have even survived sequels. Their stories have been made into successful movie franchises, some have attended conventions and then there are the superfans to contend with.

No one except another final girl can truly understand what it’s like to live with the impacts of this type of trauma. Their scars are both physical and psychological. And it’s really hard to try to move on because there’s never any certainty that the past will stay in the past. These monsters have a habit of not staying dead, after all.

“We get subjected to sequels. That’s what makes our guys different, that’s what makes them monsters - they keep coming back.”

The final girl support group has been the one constant in the lives of many of these survivors but it’s no longer safe. Someone has been planning their deaths and it’s time for them to fight for their lives. Again.

“This is the sequel or a crossover, or I don’t know what.”

This book was so much fun! I was delighted to discover that the atrocities these women have survived were based on some of my favourite horror movie franchises. Between them, these women have survived Freddy Krueger, Michael Myers, Leatherface, Jason and Mrs Voorhees, Ghostface, and Billy and Ricky Chapman. I have never seen the Silent Night, Deadly Night movies but I’ve binged all of the others many times. Some details have changed but the basic plots remain the same.

I loved picking up on the similarities and differences between the backstories of these women and the movies I know so well. The chapter titles are spot on: The Final Girl Support Group’s New Nightmare, Season of the Final Girls, The Final Chapter, The Final Chapter II.

Even the names of the characters are perfect. For example, the woman whose story represents the Scream movies is called Julie Campbell. Neve Campbell, Scream’s final girl, played a character called Julia in Party of Five. Details like that really stood out to me.

After the trauma they have all experienced, it’s not surprising that the final girls live with a variety of long term impacts. I particularly appreciated that there was no ‘one size fits all’ approach in this book. While they all experienced living nightmares, these women cope with their trauma in individual ways. Their different personalities, their support systems (or lack thereof) and their individual strengths and weaknesses all play a part in what their lives look like now.

““Are those guys really that scary?” he asks.
“Scarier than you can ever imagine,” I answer.”

In between the blood spatter I started thinking about serial killers. The names of those who commit heinous crimes are usually burned into our brains but how well do we remember the names of the people they murdered? I know the names and predilections of so many infamous serial killers. I often know in detail what they did to their victims but I’d be hard pressed to tell you the names of their victims. I think it’s time for me to rectify this.

Because I’m me, I tested out the address that a character in the book receives emails from. As usual, I was disappointed to get an automatic response saying my email was undeliverable. One of these days an author or marketing person is going to set up the email address that’s included in a book and I’ll finally get a real response. I’m hoping for an exclusive short story, a personal message from the character that I’ve emailed or even a treasure hunt or details of a competition where I can win a signed copy of the book. One day…

I own every single one of Grady Hendrix’s books. I knew I’d love them but somehow they made it into my Kindle’s black hole of good intentions so this is my first Grady Hendrix read. Believe me when I say it will not be my last!

Content warnings include addiction, alcoholism, mental health and suicidal ideation.

Thank you so much to NetGalley and Titan Books for the opportunity to read this book.

The concept for this was very interesting but poorly executed. The plot was all over the place & the MC was hard to like or understand. Huge suspension of belief required but even doing that didn't help much.