The Possession of Jessica Young By Russ Martin

The Possession of Jessica Young
By Russ Martin
1982 Tor Books
Paperback, 316 pages

                Russ Martin is back with another Satanic mind-control saga, the first one for Tor Books. Tor picked up the slack from Playboy Press who had just been sold. This one is another male wish-fulfillment fantasy if the male happens to be a total misogynistic asshole weakling.

 

                The book opens with Jessica Young, a whip-smart and beautiful woman, who has broken free from her captors. Among her credentials, she has psychic abilities. The story is told in chapters from “Then” and “Now”, unraveling a sordid tale of sexual abuse, degradation, betrayal, slavery and greed. Jessica’s captor is one Stephen Abbott, a rich, good-looking man who holds a prominent position in The Organization. His boss? It seems to be Old Scratch himself.

 

                Jessica’s escape from Abbott’s clutches are but a bump in the road for The Organization who are looking to steal her powers for the great good of mankind and Satan. Read that as MAN-kind. Abbott and his male cronies own their women. Maids, slaves and sex toys. In order to find the missing Jessica, Abbott seduces her 17-year-old sister Heather to help find her in Los Angeles. Jessica has a cop friend that she has been seeing so she seems safe. But is she?

 

                Jessica is a good character; a smart woman who can easily take care of herself. It is therefore very uncomfortable to watch her be reduced to a family-murdering trophy by Abbott in the “Then” chapters. Admittedly, I cringed quite a lot watching her, and later her sister with her teenage “boyfriend”, getting used and abused. I’m not comfortable with rapey scenes and this book has many.

 

                That said, Martin (whoever he really is) weaves a compelling story throughout, with the flashbacks and current scenes keeping the pages turning, hoping to see Jessica decimate her adversaries. This is a much more uncomfortable narrative than some of his other books with a similar subject matter. The cringe-factor is high, unless you really are a weakling man who needs to see women “put in their place”. It makes you wonder what kind of person Martin was (is?). This appears to be the first in a kind of trilogy that use some of these same characters. On deck is The Obsession of Sally Wing.

The Desecration of Susan Browning By Russell Martin

The Desecration of Susan Browning
By Russell Martin
1981 Playboy Press
Paperback, 254 pages

 

                This is Martin’s second foray into the world of Satan and his loyal followers, hot on the heels of 1980’s Rhea. His writing is crisp and fluid and I even had to look up a few words! Educational! While this isn’t an entirely satisfying read, it is quite good, and it moves by quickly.

 

                Marty and Susan Browning are two Hollywood up-and-comers who have a wonderful marriage. On the way to their car after a movie date, they witness a woman being assaulted in the parking lot and Marty comes to her rescue. Three days later, the Browning’s get a visit from the victim, Wanda Carmichael, with an invitation to a swank party at her mansion. From there on, the desecration begins.

 

                Wanda takes over Marty, makes him (willingly?) divorce Susan and grinds Mrs. Browning’s life to dust. Just what does Wanda have that enthralls Marty so much? Susan’s friend Max tries to comfort her but soon his constant presence starts to be annoying… until she becomes his willing sex slave. Yeah, things are in a weird slide for poor Susan! Why is all of this happening? Perhaps the sleazy private dick will find answers, or perhaps the cute, young Father Crabbe can help her sort things out.

 

                Yes, this is like an X-rated soap opera and that’s exactly why it is so much fun. None of the characters are particularly likeable; Susan herself has many flaws, so we just sit back and watch the shitshow. While God and faith do come into play, it is never heavy handed. My only real complaint story-wise would be that I wanted more Satan!! Rituals are fine but gimme some Ol’ Scratch!

 

                Being that one of the main characters is transsexual and this book was written in 1981, there is a lot of dated transphobia that will make the modern reader cringe a bit, but that’s the way things were (or are for some of the shit slices out there). It’s all part of 80s Hollywood where life is cheap, property is expensive, and Satan brings good things to evil people.

 

                I found this in the children’s books section at a thrift store!

Michelle Remembers By Michelle Smith and Lawrence Pazder, M.D.

Michelle Remembers
By Michelle Smith and Lawrence Pazder, M.D.
1981 Pocket Books
Paperback, 334 pages

    This is a tough book to review now, over 40 years after it was first published as a true memoir. The book inevitably caused a lot of problems for a lot of people as it was the launching pad for the widespread “Satanic Panic.” Back in the early Eighties, my wife at the time read it and bought it hook line and sinker and urged me to read it. I did and even the wide-eyed and stupid, more gullible me only believed it to a point. Now that the whole thing has been thoroughly debunked, I can only go into it reading it as a horror fiction novel. Which is essentially what it is.

    Michelle Smith has been having bad dreams following a miscarriage and seeks help from her psychiatrist whom she had been seeing for four years. Her doctor, Lawrence Pazder, M.D., helps her go back 22 years to when she was 5 years old to uncover her terrifying past that she had hidden away from her consciousness. Her mother had offered her up to a group of satanists as a catalyst to raise Satan himself for the Feast of the Beast. She was beaten, caged, defiled, burned, poked and prodded for 81 days straight, all in the name of Satan. The horrors she witnessed would drive anyone insane, but being just a child, she could rely on her goodness and innocence to help her survive.
    
    There is some pretty heavy stuff going on for sure. Kitten slaughter, fetuses cut up and rubbed on Michelle, possessed people, horrid rites, shit, piss and blood. It really is some horrifying stuff. I could tell exactly where it was back in the early Eighties where I stopped buying it… when they actually summon Satan. Yeah, right. But up until then, sure, why not? Child abuse is a very real a terrifying thing and I can certainly see a bunch of losers torturing a kid in the name of a fantasy that they believe in. I might not have even finished the book back in the day; the last hundred pages are a chore, with Satan and his annoying rhyme-talk and other fictional religious characters making appearances.

    Whether or not I believed it, a lot of people did, and the age of Satanic Panic was ushered in. Most of you will remember it from heavy metal records being thrown under the bus. Thank Smith and Pazder. Much like the Salem Witch Trials, people were being arrested with no evidence and being turned in to the police on the accusation of kids being coached by money hungry psychiatrists. Eventually, it all died out and Michelle Remembers was discounted as fiction, though Pazder (who died in 2004) and Smith (who divorced their spouses and married each other shortly after the book’s publication) have never admitted that it was a hoax. But it made a lot of money for them, and they gave a lot of money to the Church to play along.

    I recommend Steve J. Adams and Sean Horlor’s 2023 film Satan Wants You for an in-depth look at the book and its repercussions.