{"id":1973,"date":"2018-05-30T19:44:41","date_gmt":"2018-05-30T23:44:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/?p=1973"},"modified":"2018-05-30T19:44:57","modified_gmt":"2018-05-30T23:44:57","slug":"locke-key-vol-2-head-games","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/locke-key-vol-2-head-games\/","title":{"rendered":"Locke & Key Vol. 2: Head Games"},"content":{"rendered":"

Head Games<\/em><\/a>, the second volume in Joe Hill\u2019s\u00a0Locke & Key<\/a><\/em>\u00a0graphic novel series, focuses on the Locke siblings as they cope with life after their father\u2019s death and unwittingly fall more under the influence of the escaped demon Dodge, who is posing as the cousin of the high school\u2019s track coach, Ellie. Bode Locke find\u00a0the Head Key, which\u00a0allows the possessor to open up another person\u2019s mind and remove or add memories, fears or knowledge. Much of the narrative of\u00a0Head Games<\/em>\u00a0focuses on Dodge using the key to alter the minds of people who remember his earlier incarnation, Lucas Caravaggio.<\/p>\n

One of the interesting\u00a0things that Hill does in the narrative is to use the reader\u2019s own assumptions about the characters to provide interesting misdirection, keep the story surprising, and offer a mystery right at the end of the novel that makes the reader eager to go to the third volume. It\u2019s that element of surprise, particularly toward the end of the book when we think we have things figured out, that really helps keep the reader engaged with a story that could otherwise seem off-puttingly grim to some readers.<\/p>\n

Most of the misdirections relate to Ellie and her mentally handicapped son Rufus. Dodge has forced Ellie to help him and he\u2019s living in her house; in the first volume of the series, the reader learns that Dodge\u2019s main leverage is that he murdered Ellie\u2019s abusive mother, which she clearly has complicated feelings about (a mix of feeling she owes Dodge, and fear of him because she knows what he\u2019s capable of, and guilt), and that\u2019s reinforced early on in\u00a0Head Games<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Because the flashbacks indicated that Ellie first knew Dodge when she dated Lucas in high school, we readers naturally assume that Ellie was a teenager when Dodge murdered her mother, much as the older two Locke siblings were teens when Dodge engineered their father\u2019s murder. But the first scene of the \u201cArmy of One\u201d epilog portrays Ellie as a middle-aged woman and Rufus a teenager \u2026 and Ellie\u2019s elderly, abusive mother is still alive, chain-smoking and pressuring Ellie to send Rufus away to a group home. Things are clearly not as they seemed, and engaging the reader\u2019s curiosity about what\u00a0else<\/em>\u00a0is going on (coupled with the reader\u2019s\u00a0desire to see Ellie\u2019s thoroughly horrible mother get some kind of comeuppance) drives interest in the narrative.<\/p>\n

Another interesting misdirection centers on Rufus, who is in his mid-teens but behaves much younger. Throughout the novel, he\u2019s mostly playing with his toy soldiers and talking to them as though they\u2019re real. His grandmother declares he\u2019s retarded and Dodge is likewise dismissive of him. Dodge is so crafty and so dangerous that we figure Rufus will be nothing more than a tragic victim when Dodge goes to Rufus\u2019 room with the Head Key to \u201cfix\u201d him. But Dodge can\u2019t find the expected keyhole on the back of Rufus\u2019 neck, and reasons that \u201cProbably heads with nothing in them can\u2019t open.\u201d<\/p>\n

After Dodge leaves, though, Rufus rises in his bed, clearly having just feigned sleep, and remarks \u201cThat was close, too close \u2026 his capacity for cruelty is immeasurable.\u201d These are not the words of a mentally-challenged\u00a0teenager, and further, when he addresses his toys \u2026 they respond. Has Rufus been faking mental disability to protect his mother? Does he have supernatural power over his toys, or vice versa? These questions cleverly drive the reader on to the next volume in the series.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Head Games, the second volume in Joe Hill\u2019s\u00a0Locke & Key\u00a0graphic novel series, focuses on the Locke siblings as they cope with life after their father\u2019s […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1976,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[31],"tags":[127,9,134],"class_list":["post-1973","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-book-review","tag-graphic-novel","tag-horror","tag-joe-hill"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/locke2-e1527723812982.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8qT6f-vP","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1912,"url":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/welcome-to-lovecraft\/","url_meta":{"origin":1973,"position":0},"title":"Welcome to Lovecraft","author":"Lucy A. Snyder","date":"April 18, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Welcome to Lovecraft, the first volume in Joe Hill\u2019s\u00a0Locke & Key\u00a0graphic novel series, focuses on siblings Bode, Tyler, and Kinsey Locke relocating from California to the Keyhouse on the fictional island of Lovecraft, Massachusetts after Tyler\u2019s classmate Sam Lesser murders their father. The murdered Mr. Locke was a high school\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "book review"","block_context":{"text":"book review","link":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/category\/book-review\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/locke-key-1-FI.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/locke-key-1-FI.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/locke-key-1-FI.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/locke-key-1-FI.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":645,"url":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/book-review-devils-tower-by-mark-sumner\/","url_meta":{"origin":1973,"position":1},"title":"Book Review: Devil’s Tower by Mark Sumner","author":"Lucy A. Snyder","date":"August 3, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"A Review of Mark Sumner's novel Devil's Tower (Del Rey, 1996) Devil's Tower is a sprawling, entertaining novel that blurs the boundaries between fantasy, western and horror. Set in an alternate Wild West ruled by hexes and conjurations, it tells the tale of Jake Bird, a reluctant hero who begins\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "book review"","block_context":{"text":"book review","link":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/category\/book-review\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1838,"url":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/the-drawing-of-the-three\/","url_meta":{"origin":1973,"position":2},"title":"The Drawing of the Three","author":"Lucy A. Snyder","date":"March 27, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"The Drawing of the Three\u00a0by Stephen King is the second volume in\u00a0The Dark Tower, his epic, cross-genre novel series. I enjoyed the first novel,\u00a0The Gunslinger, but for me, this is where\u00a0The Dark Tower\u00a0really starts to get interesting. One of the aspects of\u00a0the novel\u00a0that I found particularly interesting\u00a0was King\u2019s narrative technique\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "book review"","block_context":{"text":"book review","link":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/category\/book-review\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/the-dark-tower-ii-the-drawing-of-the-three-2-e1522196624333.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/the-dark-tower-ii-the-drawing-of-the-three-2-e1522196624333.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/the-dark-tower-ii-the-drawing-of-the-three-2-e1522196624333.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/the-dark-tower-ii-the-drawing-of-the-three-2-e1522196624333.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/the-dark-tower-ii-the-drawing-of-the-three-2-e1522196624333.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":1594,"url":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/the-drowning-girl\/","url_meta":{"origin":1973,"position":3},"title":"The Drowning Girl: A Memoir","author":"Lucy A. Snyder","date":"September 24, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"The Drowning Girl: A Memoir is a fictional memoir of madness, haunting and loss written by Caitl\u00edn R. Kiernan. The novel was published in 2012 by Roc Books (an imprint of Penguin). It was nominated\u00a0for\u00a0the Nebula Award, the Locus Award, the Shirley Jackson Award, the Mythopoeic Fantasy Award, the British\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "book review"","block_context":{"text":"book review","link":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/category\/book-review\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/drowninggirl.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/drowninggirl.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/drowninggirl.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/drowninggirl.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":2612,"url":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/garden-of-eldritch-delights-nominated-for-stoker-award\/","url_meta":{"origin":1973,"position":4},"title":"Garden of Eldritch Delights Nominated for Stoker Award","author":"Lucy A. 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Snyder","date":"July 19, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"How does a horror novel become a classic? First of all, it has to be good, or at least unusually compelling. But quality alone doesn\u2019t ensure that a book will become a classic: it also has to be read, admired, and spread widely enough to inspire other creators. There are\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "gender"","block_context":{"text":"gender","link":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/category\/gender\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/shelley-1.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/shelley-1.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/shelley-1.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/shelley-1.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/shelley-1.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lucysnyder.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/shelley-1.jpg?resize=1400%2C800&ssl=1 4x"},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1973","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1973"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1973\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1974,"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1973\/revisions\/1974"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1976"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1973"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1973"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lucysnyder.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1973"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}