A wild, if occasionally slow, brew of sorcery, Satan, and rural America.
Debut author Toothman’s character-driven horror novel unfolds in West Virginia.
It’s 1970 in Clockmaker, West Virginia, a small coal-mining town, and teenagers Joseph Smith and Priscilla Carpenter feel trapped. Joseph will one day escape to follow the Grateful Dead, but Priscilla has no such out. She lives in constant fear of her abusive father, Everett. Life improves when Priscilla finds a book about witchcraft, but the dark arts aren’t easy to master. She must work with disgusting ingredients, and she must also learn discipline. To become a real witch, she patiently climbs the ladder, like a “kung fu master.” But her sacrifices will be worth it if she can, for example, make urine rain on those who deserve it. Of course, satisfying petty grievances is merely the beginning; when it seems Priscilla’s ready to set aside her witch’s cauldron, there’s much more to come. An older Priscilla revisits her powers to address a health issue and, in so doing, draws unholy attention to herself. Enter the devil himself. Toothman’s novel ably builds the inner life of his lead (as with Priscilla’s taste in literature) and includes occasional black-and-white drawings from illustrator Wotton. The result contains many tropes of the horror genre, but the story isn’t so easy to classify. It references historic events, including the Buffalo Creek flood, and riffs on subjects like telekinesis. It all makes for a novel packed with the unexpected, like a cannabis-smoking devil. As Priscilla gets deeper into witchcraft, it becomes clear she’ll be stirring up chaos, which fuels the novel. But the story’s momentum can be uneven. Joseph’s character is ho-hum; his musical leanings and his conflicted feelings about the devil (“Sure, sure, he seemed nice”) don’t add much. Not when there are circles of hell to learn about and other devilish details that reveal a complex, fascinating world.
A wild, if occasionally slow, brew of sorcery, Satan, and rural America.Pub Date: Dec. 21, 2023
ISBN: 9798987763216
Page Count: 570
Publisher: Millions of Colors
Review Posted Online: Dec. 27, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Gleefully sadistic, gloriously gratifying revenge fiction.
A frustrated advice columnist takes matters into her own hands.
Before dropping out of MIT during the second semester of her sophomore year, Debbie Mullen had designs on becoming the next Bill Gates. Now, almost 30 years later, the stay-at-home wife and mother of two uses her considerable genius to keep the Mullens’ Hingham, Massachusetts, household functioning “like a well-oiled machine.” In her spare time, Debbie also gardens and shares “the fruits of [her] wisdom” with neighbors via the weekly advice column she writes for Hingham Household, a local “family-oriented” newspaper. Though Debbie is proud of her husband and teen daughters’ accomplishments, her own life sometimes feels a bit empty. As such, she’s both honored and excited when Home Gardening magazine selects her backyard to feature in their next issue. Then, at the last minute, the publication decides to go in a different direction and instead spotlights the roses of her arch rival. Later that day, the editor-in-chief of Hingham Household axes her column because she’d counseled a reader to get a divorce. That evening, Debbie learns that her hard-working husband’s miserly boss refused his promotion request, her brilliant older daughter’s sketchy boyfriend broke her heart, and her athletically gifted younger daughter’s chauvinistic coach cut her from the soccer team for being “chubby.” Enough is enough. Debbie has always given great advice—everybody says so. If certain individuals don’t know what’s best for themselves, maybe it’s her obligation to help them see the light. Increasingly unhinged entries from a “Dear Debbie” drafts folder pepper the briskly paced, meticulously crafted tale, which unfolds courtesy of a pinwheeling first-person narrative. Some of the plot’s myriad twists are more impressive than others, but plucky, puckish Debbie is a nontraditional antihero for the ages.
Gleefully sadistic, gloriously gratifying revenge fiction.Pub Date: Jan. 27, 2026
ISBN: 9781464249624
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Dec. 10, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2026
A dark and twisty look at just how far one woman is willing to go to find inspiration.
A struggling writer finds an unexpected muse when a mysterious man shows up at her cabin.
Petra Rose used to pump out a bestselling book every six months, but then the adaptation happened—that is, the disastrous film adaptation of her most famous book. The movie changed the book’s storyline so egregiously that fans couldn’t forgive her, and the ensuing harassment sent Petra into hiding and gave her a serious case of writer’s block. Petra’s one hope is her solo writing retreat at a remote cabin, where she can escape the distractions of real life and focus on her next book, a story about a woman having an affair with a cop. When officer Nathaniel Saint shows up at her cabin door, inspiration comes flooding back. Much like the character from Petra’s book, Saint is married, and he’s willing to be Petra’s muse, helping her get into her characters’ heads. Petra’s book is practically writing itself, but is the game she’s playing a little too dangerous? Does she know when to stop—and, more importantly, is Saint willing to stop? Hoover is no stranger to controversial movie adaptations and internet backlash, but she clarifies in a note to readers that she’s “just a writer writing about a writer” and that no further connections to her own life are contained in these pages—which is a good thing, because the book takes some horrifying twists and turns. Petra finds herself inexplicably attracted to Saint, even as she describes him as “such an asshole,” and her feelings for him veer between love and hate. The novel serves as a meta commentary on the dark romance genre—as Petra puts it, “Even though, as readers, we wouldn’t want to live out some of the fantasies we read about, it doesn’t mean we don’t enjoy reading those things.”
A dark and twisty look at just how far one woman is willing to go to find inspiration.Pub Date: Jan. 13, 2026
ISBN: 9781662539374
Page Count: -
Publisher: Montlake
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2025
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