'Universal Harvester' Suspenseful Without the Scare

When customers start to come into Video Hut, Jeremy Heldt’s place of occupation, Jeremy does not know what to expect. Small-town Nevada, Iowa in the 1970s or ‘80s is mundane. So when customers come in with complaints that there is something on the VHS tapes that interrupts the movies, he does not think much of it. But, when Jeremy watches the movies “Targets” and “She’s All That,” he realizes he may have stumbled upon something sinister. The movies cut at some point to homemade video recordings of hooded figures, a barn, and unclear actions. As Jeremy and Stephanie, a customer at Video Hut, work together to uncover the truth behind the videos, we learn it may be much more complicated than initially thought. “Universal Harvester” brilliantly weaves a path through time and characters. Author John Darnielle successfully creates suspense through his use of syntax and multiple narrators, revealing little until the very end.

The setting of the novel moves through time by splitting the story into four parts. Darnielle offers clues about the time periods through technology. The first part takes place in the mid-seventies or early eighties, which is communicated through the VHS tapes that are circulated at Video Hut (and later confirmed by Abby, a character in the fourth part, as she watches the tapes from the future). The second part takes place even further into the past, when Barbies and color TV were expensive novelties. The third part returns to the ‘70s or ‘80s. The final part takes place roughly in the present, the age of cellphones, laptops, and the Internet, when a missing person could be found more easily today than they could in the ‘70s or ‘80s.

“Universal Harvester” is written primarily in the third person, allowing the narration to follow many characters throughout the novel. Jeremy serves as the protagonist for most of the story, yet there are parts from the perspectives of his father, Video Hut’s owner Sarah Jane, and a customer named Stephanie. Throughout almost the entire second part, the new protagonist Irene Sample reveals her story without explaining outright her reasons for leaving her family. Irene’s husband Peter’s thoughts also trickle into the storyline. The multiple perspectives, none of which are fully illuminating, allow Darnielle to keep up the suspense until the very end. The story moves in and out of the characters’ arcs to allow for a mystery in motive and knowledge. Sarah Jane does not make obvious what she does and does not know.

The varied syntax adds to the creepiness of the storyline: “The one thing you can never plan for, Mom used to say. Unexpected guests.” Many examples of disjointed ideas or sentences emphasize words or hints that seem ominous or curious. This further allows Darnielle to successfully keep the main points of the novel discreet. Another example of this—“It was the outbuilding. The door was open. When the camera jumped, Jeremy saw, clearly, because he was looking for it, the worktable”—displays the exact timing of when Jeremy notices a certain aspect of the video. The description scene, therefore, creates a tension that the character himself is feeling.

Furthermore, by emphasizing the role technology plays in “Universal Harvester,” Darnielle makes a broader criticism about globalization: The world has gotten so much smaller and more connected through technology. “In most lives, in most places, people go missing. This isn’t true as it was in a less connected age; people see more of their high school classmates on Facebook every day than they previously would have in their entire lives after graduation. Lonely husbands or wives form secondary accounts to keep track of lost lives and secret prospects; short of catastrophe, these points of contact never wholly erode.”

Although the book is suspenseful and eerie, to call it a horror novel would be misleading. The mystery behind the videos offers a thriller aura without the initial idea of what a horror novel should be—scary scenes, murders, and masked figures. But someone does go missing. Though Darnielle does not horrify in an expected way, he does leave you questioning the reality he presents.

—Staff writer Kamila Czachorowski can be reached at kamila.czachorowski@thecrimson.com.