A Good Psycho Is Hard to Find By: Will Ludwigsen Star Rating: Sensuality Rating:

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Synopsis

When Chet met and got together with his girlfriend, Misty, they both worked as counselors at a youth summer camp. It was the same summer that the camp was attacked by a chainsaw-wielding psycho, but Chet and Misty bravely fought him off. Ever since, their lives have been too mundane and boring. In an attempt to recapture what they felt that summer, Chet tries different things to get people to attack them, but nothing seems to fuel their adrenalin in the same way until they try out being the psychos themselves.

Review

"A Good Psycho Is Hard to Find" is a short stand-alone horror story. It's told from the first-person perspective of a guy named Chet who volunteered one summer as a youth camp counselor. During his time there, the camp was attacked by a chainsaw-wielding psycho, but he and his girlfriend, Misty, a fellow counselor, successfully fought the guy off. However, ever since then, his life, including his sex life with Misty, seems too bland. They try to spice things up by hiring people to attack them again, but they can't seem to find a good enough "psycho" to play the role. Therefore, it doesn't hold the same adrenalin-infused excitement as the first time, so they turn the tables by becoming the psychos themselves.

This is an extremely short story of only eleven pages, so there isn't a lot to it. However, the writing is good and I was mostly enjoying it right up until the twist ending. I understand adrenalin junkies and wanting more excitement in one's life, but what I didn't quite comprehend was what they got out of switching roles, especially when they hurt people, even if somewhat unintentionally. It just all felt like a sick game that didn't result in sufficient guilt for the bad things they were sometimes doing. So ultimately the story itself was pretty good, but the ending kind of sucked for me. "A Good Psycho Is Hard to Find" can be found in the anthology Blood Lite.

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Will Ludwigsen