Make Sure You Die Screaming by Zee Carlstrom

Make Sure You Die Screaming is a road trip novel in which a genderqueer ex-advertising creative sets off to kidnap their estranged father at the request of their mother. The unnamed narrator is at rock bottom with no job and their best friend Jenny recently dead, so when their mother calls to say that their conspiracy theory-loving father has gone missing, they steal their ex-boyfriend’s car and head off towards Arkansas, with new friend Yivi in the passenger seat. Fuelled by alcohol and pills, the journey hits many bumps along the way.

This book sounded very much up my street from the blurb and I like the energy it brings: it is fast-paced, often feeling like a chaotic film rather than a novel and, as I’ve seen other people point out, it does have some Chuck Palahniuk vibes too. The narrator is unreliable, often deeply annoying, and works well to reflect the messiness of modern America (this isn’t the sort of book for people who can’t handle characters who are annoying, because everyone in this book is annoying). I do wish that the book actually gave a bit more time to the narrator being genderqueer, as there were a few moments that delved into what it meant for them, but mostly it was a very surface-level ‘don’t call me a man’ and ‘I don’t know what name I use’ situation that could’ve been more deeply explored as part of the defences they were putting up around every part of their life.

The road trip narrative is simple and has some great moments of dark comedy. The stakes seem high and then seem to easily lower, which isn’t unusual for the genre, but I do think that describing the book as a ‘thriller’ (as I’ve seen some places do) is a bit misleading. This is a book that feels like it is aiming towards being a cult classic for the current state of the USA, throwing in a lot of things in a breakneck journey akin to the characters’ driving, but in a nihilistic way that doesn’t offer the characters any real salvation. I had a fun time on the journey, but I do wish it did more with the queerness and gender stuff it brings up (especially around the narrator’s relationship with Jennym). And finally, as someone who was an annoying teenage Mad Men fan, I liked the advertising agency flashbacks and creative duo thing.