Written from the point of view of a down-on-her-luck former guitarist who got kicked out of a heavy metal band on the verge of breaking, We Sold Our Souls follows our protagonist, Kris Pulaski, as she attempts to come to grips with the success of her band’s former lead singer. Compounding the normal issues of self-pity, misogyny and imposter syndrome is a nagging feeling about lost time on the night that they signed their intellectual property contract, removing her, the drummer and the other guitarist from the band. Now on the cusp of starting a set of career retrospective shows in his new band, singer Terry Hunt may be up to some nefarious deeds to keep Kris and her former bandmates out of the spotlight…PERMANENTLY.
I enjoyed this fun horror novel but it still presents some interesting problems. It does a good job of describing the feelings, situations, and techniques involved in being 1) a guitarist, 2) famous, 3) creative, and 4) seemingly cursed, which is where the plot leads the reader. Just the same, when the author starts reeling out pages of lyrics from the band’s lost masterpiece, using both metaphor and actual guitar playing techniques to describe for the reader what they should be hearing, I still feel like I really didn’t get the full picture. Hendrix did a good job, but like they say, “Writing about music is like dancing about architecture.”
I got through this book really quickly. I thought it was well-written and fun to read. The characters were interesting and there were a few twists along the way that kept the story going in ways that I didn’t expect. There is a nice coda at the end to describe how everybody WHO DIDN’T DIE BWAH HAH HAH HAH!!! ended up. I recommend.