num_pages: 214
description: Life in a small town takes a dark turn when mysterious footage begins appearing on VHS cassettes at the local Video HutJeremy works at the counter of Video Hut in Nevada Iowa. Its a small townthe first a in the name is pronounced aysmack in the center of the state. This is the late 1990s pre-DVD and the Hollywood Video in Ames poses an existential threat to Video Hut. But there are regular customers a predictable rush in the late afternoon. Its good enough for Jeremy: Its a job; its quiet and regular; he gets to watch movies; he likes the owner Sarah Jane; it gets him out of the house where he and his dad try to avoid missing Mom who died six years ago in a car wreck.But when Stephanie Parsons a local schoolteacher comes in to return her copy of Targets starring Boris Karloffan old movie one Jeremy himself had ordered for the storeshe has an odd complaint: Theres something on it she says but doesnt elaborate. Two days later Lindsey Redinius brings back Shes All That a new release and complains that theres something wrong with it: Theres another movie on this tape.So Jeremy takes a look. And indeed in the middle of the movie the screen blinks dark for a moment and Shes All That is replaced by a black-and-white scene shot in a barn with only the faint sounds of someone breathing. Four minutes later Shes All That is back. But there is something profoundly disturbing about that scene; Jeremys compelled to watch it three or four times. The scenes recorded onto Targets are similar undoubtedly created by the same hand. Creepy. And the barn looks a lot like a barn just outside of town.Jeremy doesnt want to be curious. In truth it freaks him out deeply. This has gone far enough maybe too far already. But Stephanie is pushing and once Sarah Jane takes a look and becomes obsessed theres no more ignoring the disturbing scenes on the videos. And all of a sudden what had once been the placid regular old Iowa fields and farmhouses now feels haunted and threatening imbued with loss and instability and profound foreboding. For Jeremy and all those around him life will never be the same . . .
language: English
title: Universal Harvester
publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux