FRIDAY THE THIRTEENTH:
CHURCH OF THE DIVINE PSYCHOPATH
A Review By Patrick Green

The folks at Black Flame Press have secured literary rights to New Line Cinema’s Terror Trio; Jason, Freddy and Leatherface. Not content to simply novelize the recent films, Black Flame has commissioned original works featuring our favorite madmen. One of the first, Church of The Divine Psychopath, offers a new adventure for ol’ Hockeyhead in a familiar
setting.

Kelly, a troubled and very hot twenty year old, seeks solace in a chintzy strip mall church, but instead finds a new target for her nubile lust: the Minister himself, Reverend Long. Though the church members are more than a little creepy, as in “Guyana cult/drink-the-koolaid” creepy, Kelly ignores her reservations in favor of her nymphomaniacal
yearnings. She finds a friend in seventeen-year-old Meredith, who also happens to
have a secret crush on Kelly. Before this syrupy subplot can reach its logical conclusion, Long and his skuzzy henchmen reveal the one element of their
denomination that separates them from the rest of the Bible-thumper crowd: Jason himself, stiff, rotting, and hanging on a cross; The Irredeemable as Redeemer. Long proclaims that he has purchased property at the abandoned Camp Crystal Lake where the church members can isolate themselves from a sinful and corrupt world, with Mrs. Voorhees’ baby boy acting as their protector, as well as the ultimate test of their faith.

Yep, the ol’ Rev is nuttier than a barrell of trail mix, and it’s apparently contagious. Meanwhile, Hobb, an operator with a secret branch of law enforcement, finds
himself walking on eggshells after a botched drug bust. He is offered a shot at redemption however, in the form of a special assignment: joining a team of black ops-types in a heavily armored sweep of Camp Crystal lake to find and eliminate Jason Voorhees.

Not only does this not work out nearly as well as either the parishioners
or the operators hope, it goes way, way south, with Jason revived in a tried-and true (for a Frankenstein movie) manner and doing what he does best. Er, only.
In tackling a character that is near-mythical in the minds and hearts of modern horror fans, author Scott Phillips approaches the hockey masked horror with a loving touch that fans will appreciate. In terms of continuity, Jason’s initial appearance seems to allude to a connection with Part 6, but strays far from that by book’s end.

There is a long Jason-less stretch in the first third, but when the Big J
turns up, he makes a real mess, the kind that would have the MPAA uivering with feverish antipathy. Gorehounds will find their sick hunger sated, and then some.

Perhaps realizing that Jason’s fan base now consists of more that just giggly high schoolers, Phillips has populated his novel with characters of varying ages and backgrounds. Better still, many of these characters are far more empathetic than almost anyone who has ever appeared in a Friday film. For example, our heroine Kelly is far from the sweet choir girls
who’ve managed to best Jason in the past, therefore the suspense is ratcheted up a few notches. The Meredith character is also well-drawn, lost in the guilt and confusion of being a gay teenager. Phillips could have taken the easy road with this character, but chose a more meaningful route. You can’t be sure who’s going to meet a splattery end, nor can you predict exactly how. For these thoughtful touches, Phillips deserves a hearty tip
of the machete.

As for Jason himself, well, he’s become like Godzilla in a sense. We know about Jason’s past and there’s been plenty of speculation about his thought processes, motivations, etc. Phillips doesn’t spend much time on this, letting the narrative flow from character to character until all the pins are set and the ball starts rolling. Then it’s one action/kill
sequence after another, presented at a breathless pace. This places the focus on how
the characters are affected by the force that is Jason, and what it brings out of them. It’s a well thought-out strategy for a novel whose source material is frankly limited in the characterization department. During those many pages with no Jason action, it’s easy enough to care about what’s happening to the characters, and to wish them well. If only the films had this kind of depth.

Phillips’ prose style is not a perfect fit for a Jason book, but more than workable. Often sounding like a gritty detective novel, the book is not so much suspenseful as action-packed. POVs shift within a single chapter at times, a technique that makes the book a bit longer than it needs to be. We get inside the heads of some characters (like Reverend Long for instance) a little too much, considering there’s no real reason we should have empathy for his cause. Much character development is handled via endless stream-of-consciousness exposition that slows the pace considerably. It’s great to have all that established for the reasons mentioned above, but perhaps more external rather than internal dialogue would have made it a little more interesting.

Also, there’s a bit of chicanery involving the anti-Jason squad that piques our interest before pretty much disappearing, but perhaps that’s for another book.

“Church Of The Divine Psychopath” is highly recommended for FT13 fans, as well as for lovers of raw action yarns. If you’re needing a Jason fix while awaiting the fate of New Line’s “re-imagining”, this is it. Let’s hope the other novels, including the sequel Hell Lake, are equally well-done.

Read all of Patrick Green’s articles and reviews at Grave Misgivings