A Christian-leaning science thriller that stays on the mild side until it produces a sudden sting.
A woman once deliberately inflicted with transplanted memories by a treacherous researcher faces high-tech bodily possession by a dead man.
The Goddards (Living Memories, 2013), husband-and-wife authors, here birth a sequel to their debut borderline-sci-fi novel, with intrigue and nastiness above and beyond the call of science at the University of Mississippi. Heather McHann was once cruelly turned into a human “guinea pig” by her now-dead boyfriend, Gregory “Dex” Poindexter, a college researcher using cutting-edge computer techniques. He unethically manipulated human subjects in treating trauma and PTSD by transferring memories from one person to another. The method led to “infective” mind control and crimes committed by the helpless Heather at Dex’s behest. Three years later, despite her negative past experiences, personal trainer Heather is fascinated with the science and starts working part time in the Sleep and Memory Unit at Ole Miss. She re-encounters previous subjects of Dex’s malice—chiefly troubled teenager Samantha Mathis. But Heather also gets accosted and threatened by a suspiciously tweedy assailant in corporate shakedowns aimed at her and Samantha by big pharma, which is prodding into Dex’s potentially profitable secrets. But there’s more. Heather discovers a data device left by Dex in anticipation of his demise with a video file labeled “entire essence.” Displaying the poor sense exhibited by teens in those slasher movies who go wandering into dark places alone, she views the encoded images, setting the stage for a twist on the theme of spiritual possession. The Ole Miss campus turns out to be an atypical and refreshing locale for genre fiction. The authors infuse their thriller with a discernible Christian worldview, though it is less preachy than readers might expect. Characters argue about evidence for the existence of souls, say grace before meals, and seldom spout anything that goes beyond mild profanity. Sexual suggestiveness stays PG, if even that (no kinky stuff for a premise based on a bad guy reviving in a 29-year-old beauty’s gym-toned body). Samantha keeps having encounters with “Benji,” a sort of holy fool nobody else seems able to perceive, who quotes Bible references and warns against evil in a Yoda/Gollum/Clarence the angel manner. Science and technology speculation might have been served in the heady doses that bestselling novelist Michael Crichton generated in his books, but the authors pull away from that. (And they are notably ahead of Crichton in the characterizations, with the exception of the noncorporeal Dex, who remains a pretty pallid rotter.) Only in the twist finale does the storyline echo such memorable sci-fi short fiction entries on similar themes, like Brian W. Aldiss’ “Let’s Be Frank” and Robert Bloch’s grim “Forever and Amen,” sharply turning away from the virtuous stuff offered before it.
A Christian-leaning science thriller that stays on the mild side until it produces a sudden sting.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 978-1-60489-226-0
Page Count: 201
Publisher: Livingston Press
Review Posted Online: April 11, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
An author to watch, Buehlman is now two for two in delivering eerie, offbeat novels with admirable literary skill.
Cormac McCarthy's The Road meets Chaucer's Canterbury Tales in this frightful medieval epic about an orphan girl with visionary powers in plague-devastated France.
The year is 1348. The conflict between France and England is nothing compared to the all-out war building between good angels and fallen ones for control of heaven (though a scene in which soldiers are massacred by a rainbow of arrows is pretty horrific). Among mortals, only the girl, Delphine, knows of the cataclysm to come. Angels speak to her, issuing warnings—and a command to run. A pack of thieves is about to carry her off and rape her when she is saved by a disgraced knight, Thomas, with whom she teams on a march across the parched landscape. Survivors desperate for food have made donkey a delicacy and don't mind eating human flesh. The few healthy people left lock themselves in, not wanting to risk contact with strangers, no matter how dire the strangers' needs. To venture out at night is suicidal: Horrific forces swirl about, ravaging living forms. Lethal black clouds, tentacled water creatures and assorted monsters are comfortable in the daylight hours as well. The knight and a third fellow journeyer, a priest, have difficulty believing Delphine's visions are real, but with oblivion lurking in every shadow, they don't have any choice but to trust her. The question becomes, can she trust herself? Buehlman, who drew upon his love of Fitzgerald and Hemingway in his acclaimed Southern horror novel, Those Across the River (2011), slips effortlessly into a different kind of literary sensibility, one that doesn't scrimp on earthy humor and lyrical writing in the face of unspeakable horrors. The power of suggestion is the author's strong suit, along with first-rate storytelling talent.
An author to watch, Buehlman is now two for two in delivering eerie, offbeat novels with admirable literary skill.Pub Date: Oct. 2, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-937007-86-7
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Ace/Berkley
Review Posted Online: Sept. 1, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2012
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
