The Only Good Indians (2020), Stephen Graham Jones’s latest novel, often feels weighed down by a distant, but strong, tradition. For horror fans, there is a lot to like in its pages: haunted houses, breaching of cultural taboos, spectacular but rarely overdone gore, hybrid monsters, and an ever-present deniability of the supernatural. Many reviewers celebrate Jones’ style, citing his creation of likeable and realistically flawed characters as the novel’s main strength, with its horror coming in a close second. While these elements are certainly strong in The Only Good Indians, I found that the change in the novel’s structure after the first section to be the real strength of the novel. Presenting readers with a horror novel turned into hopeful allegory, Jones creates characters that battle with or ignore their indigenous traditions and identities only to have them caught, destroyed, and changed by those same traditions. By its conclusion, The Only Good Indians becomes less a tale of horror, grief, and trauma, and more one focused on acceptance and reconciliation of one’s sense of identity.
