History Literature / Horrorstor

* ReasonableAuthorityFigure: Basil. He may be an irritant to Amy with his frequent pestering and parroting of the Orsk employee handbook, he's genuinely trying to do a good job as manager and when the ghosts come out, he makes his employees' safety his top priority.

* ReasonableAuthorityFigure: Despite having a bit of a stick up his ass, Basil proves to be a pretty good manager, as shown in the employee evaluations. He cuts Trinity slack on her ghost obsession because she's good at her job and gets great results, he doesn't crack down on Matt for having a crazy beard because it's not worth haranguing an otherwise good employee, he recommends Ruth Anne for a promotion and raise due to her dedicated service to the company, and he thinks that Amy has management potential despite her lousy attitude and wants to personally coach her so she can pass the exam necessary to be promoted.

* ShoutOut: There is an Orsk location in the [[Literature/TheShadowOverInnsmouth town of Innsmouth]].

* UnwittingInstigatorofDoom: [[spoiler:Carl, who comments that they ought to have a seance in the story, and Trinity, who goes through with it and accidentally summons Josiah Worth's ghost.]]

* AlternateCompanyEquivalent: Orsk is Ikea with the serial numbers filed off.

* BeingTorturedMakesYouEvil: The various pennant ghosts, long after their deaths, are still slaves to the Warden's cruel, repetitive tortures. [[spoiler:Even after Amy convinces them that the Warden has no sway over them, prompting a DraggedOffToHell, they still continue to act out their ghostly damnation and inflict their horrors onto the Orsk employees regardless.]]

* BunnyEarsLawyer: Trinity. Despite her constant pestering of employees and customers alike about her belief in ghosts. Basil praises her in an employee evaluation for her creative staging solutions.

* EldritchLocation: Orsk. There's a PocketDimension and, when Amy calls the police, they can't find the address.

* FauxAffablyEvil: While Warden Worth goes on about how he wants to cure the inmates of their sickness, it is made abundantly clear that he takes more pleasure in the horrifying things he does to the penants and the Orsk employees than he should, possibly using their "sickness" as an excuse to exercise cruel and outdated practices.
* {{Fingore}}: [[spoiler: Ruth Anne digs through the wall of the store's break room to try and hide from the ghosts, shredding her fingertips down to the bone.]]
* FireForgedFriends: Amy and Basil. He comes back for her when she's being torture by the Warden and vice versa.

* HereWeGoAgain: In the epilogue, [[spoiler:Orsk closes down the Cuyahoga branch due to the bad publicity surrounding the events of the story, but a baby-needs store moves in, and the ghosts are still there. Amy and Basil both get jobs at the new store in the hopes of finding their friends.]]

* UnholyGround: [[spoiler:Orsk was built over the remains of a prison where Warden Worth tortured his penants in a twisted sense of "curing them of their sins." Because of this, the Warden and his tenants haunt the store. When the store is destroyed in Amy and Basil's escape and is replaced with a baby-needs store, that store becomes the new haunting ground.]]
* UnwittingInstigatorofDoom: [[spoiler:Trinity]]

* WhenAllYouHaveIsAHammer: Even after the ghosts are running rampant, Basil sticks to his management training, treating them as though they were merely unruly customers.

Horrorstor is a 243-page horror/comedy novel written by Creator/GradyHendrix and published in September 2014 by Quirk Books. The novel is a modern revamp of the HauntedHouse story, moving the location to a big-box furniture store based on IKEA. The story follows Amy Porter, a directionless college dropout working at the Cuyahoga branch of Orsk, an American furniture chain pretending to be Swedish to compete with IKEA. Strange things are happening at the Cuyahoga branch: products are being vandalized, strange graffiti is popping up everywhere, store electronics are going haywire, and no matter how many times the staff counts, inventory never matches up. To get to the bottom of this, store manager Basil Washington recruits Amy and coworker Ruth Anne [=DeSoto=] to work with him on a late-night shift, promising Amy a pay raise and a transfer to the Youngstown branch. That night, they are joined by Trinity Park and Matt [=McGrath,=] two other employees who broke into the store because they think the store is haunted and want to capture video evidence of ghosts to get on TV. They soon find out just how right they are...the store was built on the site of the Cuyahoga Panopticon, a 19th-century prison where prisoners were brutally tortured and driven to madness by Josiah Worth, a crazed warden who thought mindless, repetitive tasks promoted mental health, and their ghosts have been waiting for Amy and her friends to arrive.

* FauxAffablyEvil: While Warden Worth goes on about how he wants to cure the inmates of their sickness, it is made abundantly clear that he takes more pleasure in the horrifying things he does to the penants and the Orsk employees than he should, possibly using their "sickness" as an excuse to exercise cruel and out-dated practices.

* CreatorProvensialism: When all of the lights go out, including the emergency lights, one character notes that those are supposed to stay on even through an earthquake. This is out of place in tectonically unexcitable Ohio, where a severe storm like a tornado would be a much more common event than an earthquake. Hendrix is from South Carolina, where earthquakes are a much bigger concern.

* BittersweetEnding: [[spoiler: Josiah Worth is defeated, Basil and Amy survive, and the Orsk branch is shut down. However, their friends are still trapped among the spirits and they're left traumatized by the events. They ultimately decide to return to the new baby needs store in the hopes of saving anyone that may have survived. [[TheStinger And the final page reveals that the store is planning on having a 24 hour sale in the future.]]

* NotSoDifferent: Orsk's methods of psychologically manipulating customers and employees are disturbingly similar to Warden Worth's psychological torture of his inmates.

Horrorstor is a 243-page horror/comedy novel written by Creator/GradyHendrix and published in September 2014 by Quirk Books. The novel is a modern revamp of the HauntedHouse story, moving the location to a big-box furniture store based on IKEA. The story follows Amy Porter, a directionless college dropout working at the Cuyahoga branch of Orsk, an American furniture chain pretending to be Swedish to compete with IKEA. Strange things are happening at the Cuyahoga branch: products are being vandalized, strange graffiti is popping up everywhere, store electronics are going haywire, and no matter how many times the staff counts, inventory never matches up. To get to the bottom of this, store manager Basil Washington recruits Amy and coworker Ruth Anne [=DeSoto=] to work with him on a late-night shift, promising Amy a pay raise and a transfer to the Youngstown branch. That night, they are joined by Trinity Park and Matt [=McGrath,=] two other employees who broke into the store because they think the store is haunted and want to capture video evidence to ghosts to get on TV. They soon find out just how right they are...the store was built on the site of the Cuyahoga Panopticon, a 19th-century prison where prisoners were brutally tortured and driven to madness by Josiah Worth, a crazed warden who thought mindless, repetitive tasks promoted mental health, and their ghosts have been waiting for Amy and her friends to arrive.

* ExtremelyShortTimeSpan: The whole book takes place in a single 24 hour period, with the majority of the action happening overnight.

* FireForgedFriends: Amy and Basil. He comes back for her when she's being torture by the Warden.]]

* KillTheCutie: [[spoiler:Ruth Anne.]]

* HeroicBSOD: In the epilogue, Amy is a shell of herself because [[spoiler:she wasn't able to save Ruth Anne, Trinity or Mark.]]

* BeingTorturedMakesYouEvil: The various pennant ghosts long after their deaths are still slaves to the Warden's cruel, repetitive tortures even after their deaths. [[spoiler:Even after Amy convinces them that the Warden has no sway over them, prompting a DraggedOffToHell, they still continue to act out their ghostly damnation and inflict their horrors onto the Orsk employees regardless.]]

* HereWeGoAgain: In the epilogue, [[spoiler:Orsk closes down the Cuyahoga branch due to the bad publicity surrounding the events of the story, but a baby-needs store moves in, and the ghosts are still there. Amy and Basil both get jobs at he new store in the hopes of finding their friends.]]

* BeingTorturedMakesYouEvil: The various pennant ghosts long after their deaths are still slaves to the Warden's cruel, repetitive tortures even after their deaths. [[spoiler:Even after Amy convinces them that the Warden has no sway over them, prompting a DraggedOffToHell, they still continue to go out their ghostly damnation and inflicts their horrors onto the Orsk employees regardless.]]

* DraggedOffToHell: While it is left ambiguous as to whether this is the case or not, [[spoiler:Amy managing to get through to the ghostly tenants that they do not have to listen to the Warden anymore and he is quickly delt with... but they still continue their torturous purgatory, only now in a disorderly manner without their leader.]]

* BeingTorturedMakesYouEvil: The various pennant ghosts long after their deaths are still slaves to the Warden's cruel, repedative tortures even after their deaths. [[spoiler:Even after Amy convinces them that the Warden has no sway over them, prompting a DraggedOffToHell, they still continue to go out their ghostly damnation and inflicts their horrors onto the Orsk employees regardless.]]

Horrorstor is a 243-page horror/comedy novel written by Grady Hendrix and published in September 2014 by Quirk Books. The novel is a modern revamp of the HauntedHouse story, moving the location to a big-box furniture store based on IKEA. The story follows Amy Porter, a directionless college dropout working at the Cuyahoga branch of Orsk, an American furniture chain pretending to be Swedish to compete with IKEA. Strange things are happening at the Cuyahoga branch: products are being vandalized, strange graffiti is popping up everywhere, store electronics are going haywire, and no matter how many times the staff counts, inventory never matches up. To get to the bottom of this, store manager Basil Washington recruits Amy and coworker Ruth Anne [=DeSoto=] to work with him on a late-night shift, promising Amy a pay raise and a transfer to the Youngstown branch. That night, they are joined by Trinity Park and Matt [=McGrath,=] two other employees who broke into the store because they think the store is haunted and want to capture video evidence to ghosts to get on TV. They soon find out just how right they are...the store was built on the site of the Cuyahoga Panopticon, a 19th-century prison where prisoners were brutally tortured and driven to madness by Josiah Worth, a crazed warden who thought mindless, repetitive tasks promoted mental health, and their ghosts have been waiting for Amy and her friends to arrive.

* UnholyGrounds: [[spoiler:Orsk was built over the remains of a prison where Warden Worth tortured his penants in a twisted sense of "curing them of their sins." Because of this, the Warden and his tenants haunt the store. When the store is destroyed in Amy and Basil's escape and is replaced with a baby-needs store, that store becomes the new haunting ground.]]

'''Tropes in this book include:'''

Horrorstor is a 243-page horror/comedy novel written by Grady Hendrix and published in September 2014 by Quirk Books. The novel is a modern revamp of the HauntedHouse story, moving the location to a big-box furniture store based on IKEA. The story follows Amy Porter, a directionless college dropout working at the Cuyahoga branch of Orsk, an American furniture chain pretending to be Swedish to compete with IKEA. Strange things are happening at the Cuyahoga branch: products are being vandalized, strange graffiti is popping up everywhere, store electronics are going haywire, and no matter how many times the staff counts, inventory never matches up. To get to the bottom of this, store manager Basil Washington recruits Amy and coworker Ruth Anne [=DeSoto=] to work with him on a late-night shift, promising Amy a pay raise and a transfer to the Youngstown branch. That night, they are joined by Trinity Park and Matt [=McGrath,=] two other employees who broke into the store because they think the store is haunted and want to capture video evidence to ghosts to get on TV. They soon find out just how right they are...the store was built on the site of the Cuyahoga Panopticon, an 18th-century prison where prisoners were brutally tortured and driven to madness by Josiah Worth, a crazed warden who thought mindless, repetitive tasks promoted mental health, and their ghosts have been waiting for Amy and her friends to arrive.

* PocketDimension: When the ghosts come out, a previously fake door in the showroon now leads into the Beehive.

* RedHerring: The strange events happening at Orsk are thought to be explained first by rats, then by [[spoiler:Carl, a homeless employee.]]

* IntentionalEngrishForFunny: Orsk is an American store pretending to be Swedish, and the advertising reflects this, with pharses like "The Better Home for the Everyone!"