Coup de Grace review

You ever look at a M. C. Escher print too long and feel something akin to vertigo when you look away, back to reality? That is what Sofia Ajram’s new book, Coup de Grace did to me.

Vicken has a plan: throw himself into the Saint Lawrence River in Montreal and end it all for good, believing it to be the only way out for him after a lifetime of depression and pain. But, stepping off the subway, he finds himself in an endless, looping station.
Determined to find a way out again, he starts to explore the rooms and corridors ahead of him. But no matter how many claustrophobic hallways or vast cathedral-esque rooms he passes through, the exit is nowhere in sight.
The more he explores his strange new prison, the more he becomes convinced that he hasn’t been trapped there accidentally, and amongst the shadows and concrete, he comes to realise that he almost certainly is not alone.
A terrifying psychological nightmare from a powerful new voice in horror.

Poetic and dark and draining and glorious.

I am a fan of Sofia Ajram’s work since reading Bury Your Gays anthology.
When I saw the book trailer for Coup de Grace, I immediately wanted to read it. Liminal spaces are a favorite trope of mine and this felt like Back Rooms only darker. While it is that, it is so much more. The twists and turns felt like The Worm and His Kings by Hailey Piper but with a far more claustrophobic and unrelenting story line.
Ajram’s poetic language is soporific and lulls the reader into a dream-like state to skim the surface of the main character, Vicken’s own depression and existential terror. There were moments I was worried this story would leave me in a fugue state afterwards and wondered if I should stop reading for my own mental health. I kept going though.
The end, with its choose your own adventure style and fourth-wall breaking point of view was brilliant.
I can tell this book will be sticking with me like cement dust in my pockets for a very long time.

Recommendations

Want more?

Watch Curve. Its a short film, won’t take you long to process but is a metaphor for depression and suicide much like this book.

Need more of Sofia Ajram’s amazing work? Read Bury Your Gays anthology.