Intense

Small town hi-jinx, secrets and mystery permeate this atmospheric mystery centered around family, friendship and class. Teen girls acting badly, yet they’re portrayed in a sympathetic way that doesn’t excuse their behavior that only Mindy McGinnis can do. “Yes, I can understand why she knocked out her former friend with a brick” is a phrase I never imagined thinking.

I’m usually someone who can only do audio books an hour at a time, but I couldn’t stop listening to McGinnis’s newest masterpiece. I’m usually a creature of habit when it comes to reading. I like my favorite writers’ books to feel familiar and don’t usually enjoy when they stray too far from the genres I love. McGinnis has a way of writing truly different books, ones I wouldn’t normally pick up after reading the blurb. But she’s Mindy Friggin McGinnis and I’ll can’t not read.

THE INITIAL INSULT is the first of two in a series, which means readers will get to read (or listen to) more of these flawed, yet easy to root for characters.

I enjoyed THE INITIAL INSULT so much I’m going to purchase the book.

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Couldn't press pause

this book was great! definitely recommend. solid writing and character background. story is told from perspective of the main characters and keep you wanting more.

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For the first book from her I've heard, excellent.

A lot of Poe references, most I caught right away. Great modern take on several of his short stories combined. Great narration by all three. I'll be waiting for the second book in this series. 10 out of 10.

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Keeps You On Edge

This is a great thriller. McGinnis did a great job switching between perspectives. It was a very bizarre story, but definitely a page turner.

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Masterful nod to a legend

"The thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as I best could, but when he ventured upon insult I vowed revenge."
The Cask of Amontillado by Edgar Allan Poe

"Nemo me impune lacessit" ("No one provokes me with impunity")
The Cask of Amontillado by Edgar Allan Poe

“ 'For the love of God, Montresor!'
'Yes,' I said, 'for the love of God!' ”
The Cask of Amontillado by Edgar Allan Poe

"as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher. I know not how it was — but, with the first glimpse of the building, a sense of insufferable gloom pervaded my spirit. I say insufferable; for the feeling was unrelieved by any of that half-pleasurable, because poetic, sentiment, with which the mind usually receives even the sternest natural images of the desolate or terrible. I looked upon the scene before me — upon the mere house, and the simple landscape features of the domain — upon the bleak walls — upon the vacant eye-like windows — upon a few rank sedges — and upon a few white trunks of decayed trees — with an utter depression of soul which I can compare to no earthly sensation more properly than to the after-dream of the reveler upon opium — the bitter lapse into every-day life — the hideous dropping off of the veil. There was an iciness, a sinking, a sickening of the heart — an unredeemed dreariness of thought which no goading of the imagination could torture into aught of the sublime. What was it — I paused to think — what was it that so unnerved me in the contemplation of the House of Usher? It was a mystery all insoluble; nor could I grapple with the shadowy fancies that crowded upon me as I pondered."
The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe

"I dread the events of the future, not in themselves, but in their results. I shudder at the thought of any, even the most trivial, incident, which may operate upon this intolerable agitation of soul. I have, indeed, no abhorrence of danger, except in its absolute effect — in terror. In this unnerved — in this pitiable condition — I feel that the period will sooner or later arrive when I must abandon life and reason together, in some struggle with the grim phantasm, Fear.”
The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe

"And thus, as a closer and still closer intimacy admitted me more unreservedly into the recesses of his spirit, the more bitterly did I perceive the futility of all attempt at cheering a mind from which darkness, as if an inherent positive quality, poured forth upon all objects of the moral and physical universe, in one unceasing radiation of gloom."
The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe

"But evil things, in robes of sorrow,
Assailed the monarch’s high estate
(Ah, let us mourn, for never morrow
Shall dawn upon him, desolate!);
And, round about his home, the glory
That blushed and bloomed
Is but a dim-remembered story
Of the old time entombed.
And travelers now within that valley,
Through the red-litten windows, see
Vast forms that move fantastically
To a discordant melody;
While, like a rapid ghastly river,
Through the pale door,
A hideous throng rush out forever,
And laugh — but smile no more"
The Haunted Place verses 5 & 6 contained within The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe

"Our glances, however, rested not long upon the dead — for we could not regard her unawed"
The Fall of the House of Usher

"I struggled to reason off the nervousness which had dominion over me. I endeavored to believe that much, if not all of what I felt, was due to the bewildering influence of the gloomy furniture of the room — of the dark and tattered draperies, which, tortured into motion by the breath of a rising tempest, swayed fitfully to and fro upon the walls, and rustled uneasily about the decorations of the bed. But my efforts were fruitless. An irrepressible tremor gradually pervaded my frame; and, at length, there sat upon my very heart an incubus of utterly causeless alarm."
The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe

"Who entereth herein, a conqueror hath bin;
Who slayeth the dragon, the shield he shall win"
The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe

"See! on yon drear and rigid bier low lies thy love, Lenore!"
Lenore by Edgar Allan Poe

"And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, “Lenore!”

"This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, 'Lenore!' "
The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe

"That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.
But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we—
Of many far wiser than we—
And neither the angels in Heaven above
Nor the demons down under the sea
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride,
In her sepulchre there by the sea—
In her tomb by the sounding sea."
Annabelle Lee by Edgar Allan Poe

"For the most wild, yet most homely narrative which I am about to pen, I neither expect nor solicit belief. Mad indeed would I be to expect it, in a case where my very senses reject their own evidence. Yet, mad am I not — and very surely do I not dream. But to-morrow I die and to-day I would unburden my soul."
The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe

"Hereafter, perhaps, some intellect may be found which will reduce my phantasm to the common-place — some intellect more calm, more logical, and far less excitable than my own, which will perceive, in the circumstances I detail with awe, nothing more than an ordinary succession of very natural causes and effects."
The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe

"From my infancy I was noted for the docility and humanity of my disposition. My tenderness of heart was even so conspicuous as to make me the jest of my companions. I was especially fond of animals, and was indulged by my parents with a great variety of pets. With these I spent most of my time, and never was so happy as when feeding and caressing them. This peculiarity of character grew with my growth, and, in my manhood, I derived from it one of my principal sources of pleasure."
The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe

"In speaking of his intelligence, my wife, who at heart was not a little tinctured with superstition, made frequent allusion to the ancient popular notion, which regarded all black cats as witches in disguise."
The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe

"he inflicted a slight wound upon my hand"
The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe

"The fury of a demon instantly possessed me. I knew myself no longer. My original soul seemed, at once, to take its flight from my body; and a more than fiendish malevolence, gin-nurtured, thrilled every fibre of my frame."
The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe

"The socket of the lost eye presented, it is true, a frightful appearance"
The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe

"But this feeling soon gave place to irritation. And then came, as if to my final and irrevocable overthrow, the spirit of Perverseness. Of this spirit philosophy takes no account. Yet I am not more sure that my soul lives, than I am that perverseness is one of the primitive impulses of the human heart — one of the indivisible primary faculties, or sentiments, which give direction to the character of man. Who has not, a hundred times, found himself committing a vile or a silly action, for no other reason than because he knows he should not? Have we not a perpetual inclination, in the teeth of our best judgment, to violate that which is Law, merely because we understand it to be such? This spirit of perverseness, I say, came to my final overthrow. It was this unfathomable longing of the soul to vex itself — to offer violence to its own nature — to do wrong for the wrong’s sake only — that urged me to continue"
The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe

"I am above the weakness of seeking to establish a sequence of cause and effect between the disaster and the atrocity."
The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe

"when I prepared to go home, the animal evinced a disposition to accompany me. I permitted it to do so"
The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe

"I came to look upon it with unutterable loathing, and to flee silently from its odious presence, as from the breath of a pestilence."
The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe

"I started, hourly, from dreams of unutterable fear, to find the hot breath of the thing upon my face, and its vast weight — an incarnate Night-Mare that I had no power to shake off — incumbent eternally upon my heart!Beneath the pressure of torments such as these, the feeble remnant of the good within me succumbed. Evil thoughts became my sole intimates"
The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe

"Finally I hit upon what I considered a far better expedient than either of these. I determined to wall it up in the cellar — as the monks of the middle ages recorded to have walled up their victims."
The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe

""Even a search had been instituted — but of course nothing was to be discovered. I looked upon my future felicity as secured."
The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe

"No sooner had the reverberation of my blows sunk into silence, than I was answered by a voice from within the tomb! — by a cry, at first muffled and broken, like the sobbing of a child, and then quickly swelling into one long, loud, and continuous scream, utterly anomalous and inhuman — a howl — a wailing shriek, half of horror and half of triumph, such as might have arisen only out of hell, conjointly from the throats of the damned in their agony and of the demons that exult in the damnation."
The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe


"The sign out by the road reads 'Amontillado Animal Attractions,' but last week somebody spray-painted 'White Trash Zoo' over it.”
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"he put the truck in reverse, ready to head back to the Usher house, down the road."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"I’ve borne it all with patience, the years of small cuts that heal over, my heart a pulpy mass of scars. But it was still beating, at least I could say that, right up until she took Goldie from me. Now it’s a dead thing, still in my chest. And if I can’t feel the good things anymore, then doing a few bad ones shouldn’t hurt a bit.
And they are long overdue."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"I’m not like Cecil, wondering who would go and do a thing like that.
I know who.
It was Felicity Turnado."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"Hugh’s calf tattoo flashes in front of my eyes as he walks, our school mascot—a raven—flicking with every other step."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"Nobody ever tells me no. Not Dad. Not Huge. Not whoever carried me away from Tress Montor’s parents so many years ago."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"Deeper is her last meal still in her blood,
death mixing with her life, quiet as it fades."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"The Usher house looms behind us, built by Ribbit’s ancestor to show the world what he could do. What the world did in return was eat his fortune, and now the rocks he took from the ground are working their way back to it, tumbling down in a stiff wind."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"Right now Lenore—Ribbit’s mother—fills the chair, her maiden name a strong enough pull to count. Nobody had blinked when she gave Ribbit her name, his dad—an easily swayable Troyer—bending to her will."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"I’ve put my hands on the walls, plaster coming loose, even at the lightest touch, and wondered if I might feel something. A deeper call, or a beating heart."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"She’d refused to marry, saying she’d rather see the Usher blood die than have it walk around in a body that didn’t carry the name."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"They gave out flu shots for free at the clinic last week, urging the very young and very old to get vaccinated. I guess that’s how death works, clipping us off at both ends."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"I need manacles.
Everything else came together pretty quickly and is already tucked into the back of Cecil’s truck. The drill and bit, some masonry tools and Quikrete from back when Cecil tried to make a little patio to put the grill on."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"Although Ribbit did score one successful pickup that night—Gretchen’s thanks had come in the form of more than just words. And good for him; Gretchen hands it out like candy at Halloween and there’s no reason he shouldn’t be in on it with the other trick-or-treaters."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"I’m going to lose it. Break open right here in the middle of the hallway, leaving a puddle of insecurities and guilt for everyone to slip in."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

“ 'The clock,' I tell her, my eyes following the smaller hand as it slides upward from the large, embossed number three. 'It’s running backward.' It goes on like that for a full minute, then seems to change its mind and run forward again."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"I agree, rolling my eyes, and we both laugh.
It’s a sound I know well, and have missed. My higher giggle mixing with her low tones, the music of my childhood, now accentuated by the rattle of chains"
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"We are kids, I remind myself. But like my therapist says, sometimes kids don’t get to stay kids for very long."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"The box comes open as it falls, and they float downstream, refusing to sink, bobbing brightly against the dark brown of the water. They’re packaged in different colors, the foil flashing pink and neon green, the sun reflecting off them as they go with the current, for everyone to see.
Something that doesn’t belong.
Tossed away.
Trash.
Just like me."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"David Evans comes in and informs the librarian his summer reading report is due tomorrow so she should give him the shortest thing on the required reading list. She hands him T. S. Eliot’s The Waste Land with a small smile.
“Good luck,” she says, keeping her face professional. But inside, I’m sure she’s laughing"
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"He’ll come to our rescue every time, a white knight who rides away before he has to take more responsibility than just saving you."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

“ 'It’s like your porcelain doll,' she says, pointing to the dresser. 'If she had a tiny crack would you say she was broken?'
'No,' I say.
'And she wouldn’t be.' Mom nods. 'But a crack makes her just a little bit weaker, and the next time she falls . . .'
'She’ll break,' I say.
'Right. But you’re not made of porcelain, are you? You can heal. And we’re taking you to see Dr. Gabriella so that the little crack you’ve got can close up, nice and tight.'
'So I’m ready for the next time I fall,' I add."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"The jolt of panic I felt at the sight of the velvety paws has settled into a line of reasoning, each fact easing out the high peaks of adrenaline in my bloodstream."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"I thought I was empty; I thought I had nothing left inside me.
But I do. More tears."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"Everyone reacts differently, some with screams, a few mutters of disbelief, and more than a little nervous laughter, gasping noises meant to convey hilarity, but really they’re saying, I don’t know what to do.
It’s been that way for a while now, the truly amused laughter at Ribbit’s admission of wanting to screw the principal devolving into something more primitive, a confused sound that admits the person making it thinks they are supposed to be laughing but doesn’t know if something funny is happening or not. Like maybe what used to be funny is now something else. Something darker."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"If I am still and quiet
I can see
other lifetimes, slipping past us,
in a place, where they ended.
The girl does not know
there is a boy above her
swinging
from the rafters,
his toes brushing her forehead.
She does not see the woman,
sobbing
at the dresser.
Does not hear the baby
screaming
in the corner.
She sees and hears and feels and knows
only now,
in this place.
And I marvel at the limits
of humans."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"You don’t get to spill old blood in Amontillado."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"And the girl lifts her head,
the salt smell of pain in her eyes,
and reaches for me"
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"There are three slashes on my arm, dark and black, like three mouths opening into a part of me not meant to see light."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"But in all my lives,
humans cry the same.
She leaves, arm curled to her,
metal / salt / sad / smell stays behind.
The door closes, but it is a light thing.
And I am dark and heavy."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"What’s the situation? I asked her once why wasn’t she like other moms, the ones who said, What’s wrong?
“Because they assume something is,” Mom said, rolling back the hem of my jeans.
“There is,” I argued, wiping my nose. “A bee stung me.”
“That’s what bees do.” Mom pinched the stinger between her fingernails and pulled it out. “So really, everything is perfectly right.”
A cat had mauled me. That’s what cats do. Nothing was wrong. I just had a situation. And situations have solutions."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis

"The other half of my heart is on sale for a quarter."
The Initial Insult by Mindy McGinnis