The End of the World as We Know It

Author Jason Pargin spins apocalyptic tales full of impending doom, social commentary and soy sauce.

Let’s face it: we live in a crazy world.

Maybe it’s always been so. Or maybe it’s getting crazier by the day. Either way, bestselling author Jason Pargin wants you to know it could still be worse.

You could be a video store clerk turned soldier on the front lines of a war to repel an alien invasion, as is the main character of Pargin’s first novel, John Dies at the End (2007).

Or you could be trapped into transporting a large container that may or may not contain a bomb, like the protagonist of Pargin’s most recent book, I’m Starting to Worry About This Black Box of Doom (2024).

Though the two novels have lots in common – including atypical heroes, abundant pop culture  references and heavy doses of very dark humor – it’s readily apparent that Pargin, 50, has grown as a writer in the 17 years separating the books.

In the interim he wrote a half-dozen other novels, including three sequels to John Dies and a completely different series starring a woman named Zoey Ashe.

The latter features what may be one of the all-time ballsiest book titles: Zoey Punches the Future in the Dick.

But I digress. The setup for John Dies at the End could have been pulled from Marvel Comics: David Wong, a 23-year-old slacker with a history of behavioral issues, stumbles into an alien invasion and must, with the help of his BFF John, save his Red State hometown (referred to throughout as Undisclosed) and, by extension, all of humanity.

“I remember thinking, that’s what the end of the world will look like,” David’s sometime girlfriend Jennifer Lopez – no, not that Jennifer Lopez – wryly observes. “It won’t be wars or a meteor. It’ll be something we never could have thought of…”

That unthought-of thing turns out to be aliens with the ability to possess humans through an icky black goo nicknamed “soy sauce.” Also, they can cause humans to lose time, effectively fast-forwarding lives without prior consent. And did I mention they can animate slabs of frozen meat and armies of roaches to menace those who might thwart their plans?

Ostensibly David recounting his misadventures to an investigative journalist, John Dies often reads like the transcription of a first-person shooter video game. As the reader, you’re right there with David as he makes his way down dark hallways and through deserted malls, always expecting something creepy to jump out at him (and you). Spoiler alert: It almost always does.

John Dies was originally self-published by the author but gained a cult following over time, so much so that it spawned a movie adaptation (starring Paul Giamatti, no less!) in 2012.

Be forewarned: there are some word choices and “jokes” along the way that Pargin has said he now regrets. If you look past those, however, and accept John Dies at the End as B-movie comedy / horror, you won’t be disappointed.

In comparison, I’m Starting to Worry About This Black Box of Doom reads as the work of a more experienced, more self-assured writer.

The protagonist is one Abbott Coburn, a young man who, we are told in the opening sentence, “had spent much of his twenty-six years dreading the wrong things, in the wrong amounts, for the wrong reasons.”

A Lyft driver in Los Angeles, Abbott arrives at a pickup spot and finds a woman wearing a faded trucker cap that reads “Welcome to the Shitshow.” She goes by the name of Ether, and she’s sitting on a large black box, the kind musicians use to haul equipment. Ether offers to pay Abbott a large sum of cash to transport said box – contents undisclosed – across the country to Washington, D.C., in time for the July 4 holiday.

Understandably, the timing of the mission and the secrecy surrounding the box set off all sorts of warning bells for Abbott. But he needs the dough, and there’s no book unless he goes along, so thankfully he does.

What follows is a high speed chase involving, among others, Abbott’s judgmental father, a retired FBI agent looking to secure her legacy, and a 275-pound, tattoo-covered guy named Malort.

For me, one of the most interesting aspects of the book is what it has to say about personal decision-making in the era of social media. Online chats helped advance the plot in John Dies, but here, the prevalence of platforms (Twitch, Reddit, etc.) – and the ways in which people willingly or unwittingly makes decisions based on those platforms – are a recurring theme.

The variety of theories spouted online about what’s in the box as it barrels toward D.C. holds up a pretty clear mirror to the things that scare us most. There’s also a lot in there about the things that motivate us, for good or for ill, and it often has a lot less to do with money than you might think.

For that reason, Black Box of Doom feels like a more “important” story than John Dies, but, of course, importance is always relative to the reader, so I encourage you to make your own judgments.

To purchase copies of John Dies at the End or I’m Starting to Worry About This Black Box of Doom, visit bookshop.org, the indie bookstore alternative to Amazon.

###