DARK SUMMER

by Mark Upton ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 1, 1978

A Chinese box of clichÉs. Widowed Diane Cheney and her father, Colonel Benjamin Coulter, arrive in Penlow Park and begin astounding all their martini-swilling new friends with magic tricks--and with Diane's superb composure and the Colonel's endless barrel of money. Two couples are ripe for this devilish duo's plucking: Paul and Laura Fayette, and Clint and Margaret Stahl. Clint, for instance, is an impotent lush, covering his lacks with a brave front as a seducer; during a boozy lunch, Diane gets him to crawl about the floor and crawl up his ""Auntie's"" (hers) skirt--just the treatment he's always needed. Next she's playing virgin-in-the-closet with Paul, allowing him to ""rape"" her--just what he's needed. Then it's time to bring out the lesbian potential in Margaret and Laura. And so go the evil doings, till the Cheney house burns down, immolating Diane and Clint. Paul and Laura now find themselves at each other's throats, readying for divorce. Both remember Diane's lost flesh, and each is somehow bringing her ectoplasm back for raging sex with the dead. But when Paul discovers that they both are cavorting with the same ghost, his jealousy explodes, and Laura goes bananas with a carving knife. A bad imitation demon novel to follow up Upton's bad imitation Hollywood novel, last year's The Dream Lover.

Pub Date: Feb. 1, 1978

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Coward, McCann & Geoghegan

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1978

Categories: FICTION