Audiobook Review – Evil in Me by Brom, Narrated by Stephanie Nemeth-Parker and Shahjehan Khan (4/5 stars)

Reading Level: Adult
Genre: Dark Fantasy/Horror
Length: 11 hours and 38 minutes
Publisher:‎ Macmillan Audio
Release Date: September 17, 2024
ASIN: B0CWC6F7Z3
Stand Alone or Series: Stand Alone
Source: Borrowed audiobook from library
Rating: 4/5 stars

“Aspiring musician Ruby Tucker has had enough of her small rural town and dysfunctional family. But a falling out with her best friend and bandmate has killed her dreams of escaping and making it big in the Atlanta punk scene.

While helping her eccentric neighbor organize his religious artifacts, an ancient ring clamps down on her finger—possessing her with the spirit of a blood-thirsty demon. There’s no exorcizing it unless hundreds of people chant a spell to set Ruby free. And what’s worse, the ring is a beacon for evil, drawing an unimaginably wicked mob straight to Ruby, hungry for her flesh.

If Ruby can get her band back together, she has a shot at salvation. It’s time for her to face the music and put her whole soul into a song—one powerful enough to raise some Hell.”

Series Info/Source: This is a stand alone book. I got a copy of this on audiobook from NetGalley for review.

Thoughts: I liked this. To be fair, I am a big fan of Brom, and while this was far from his best book, it was still interesting and I am happy I read it. I want to pick this up or at least look at it in paper form at some point because Brom usually has some fantastic illustrations in his books that I am sure I missed because of the audiobook format.

Ruby has been having some mental stability issues and is off her meds again. But she’s okay, she’s doing fine. If she can just get through her community service, she can start over, leave town, and join her friend’s band. Then she gets the evil demon ring stuck on her hand, and suddenly she is in a race to find a way to get this evil thing off her finger before other evil things hunt her down.

I listened to this on audiobook and the narration was well done. I found the constant replaying of Ruby’s song by the band to be annoying; it was jarring. It was okay to hear it once, but I didn’t need to hear it over and over again…Brom could have just said “they replayed the song”. I was annoyed that I had to spend time listening to this simple (and not at all awesome) song over and over. I wanted to fast-forward through those parts but was driving in heavy traffic and couldn’t do that safely.

The premise was intriguing, and I enjoyed the characters. This is kind of between dark paranormal and horror. I thought this was an interesting and creative story. There are fun twists throughout. The story alternates between longer sections with Ruby and shorter parts with a serial killer named Richard. I honestly didn’t think Richard’s parts of the story were necessary, however, they do help add some ironic twists to the ending.

I enjoyed Ruby a lot as a character. She has had a rough life with a lot of sucky things happening to her. I loved her persistent and tough attitude and how she was always trying to make the best of things. There are some very good side characters in here as well. I enjoyed how unpredictable the story was and how crazy some things in here were.

This definitely has a lot of gore and horror in it. Brom is not an author to read if that bothers you. It also has a lot of very dark (but strangely humorous) themes; again, you don’t read Brom for unicorns and rainbows. I always enjoy the darkly humorous themes and unique ideas and characters that Brom brings to the page.

My Summary (4/5): Overall I enjoyed this. While I didn’t think it was Brom’s best book (I still like “The Plucker”, “Slewfoot”, and “The Child Thief” more) I did still enjoy it. It was creative with interesting characters, unexpected twists, and dark humor. I wasn’t a huge fan of the live band parts in the audiobook; I just found them too repetitive and jarring. However, aside from that, the audiobook was well done and I appreciate the effort that went in to trying to make the audiobook a bit more unique. I look forward to what Brom writes next.