An often exciting beginning to a new paranormal series.
Wordsworth offers a debut supernatural novel of abduction and lies that features a mysterious Japanese artifact at the center of its story.
Hanna is an 18-year-old enjoying her life at Surgite University in New Jersey. She has friends she can count on and a wealthy boyfriend she’s had since high school. But all is not well; there’s a series of odd abductions plaguing the state, and they’re the talk of Hanna’s social group. The victims are mostly young women who eventually reappear after a short absence; none can identify their kidnapper, and they all show signs of weariness and exhaustion but no indications of sexual assault. In a parallel plotline, Hanna has noticed that she doesn’t seem to be remembering details of her recent outings with her boyfriend, Theo; she isn’t forgetful about other aspects of her life, but this selective amnesia worries her, as she doesn’t want to forget Theo, whom she adores. However, it turns out that he’s responsible for her selective amnesia; he somehow makes her unable to recall memories of their encounters, lies to her about their time together, and schemes to make her believe she’s done things she hasn’t. He's also constantly talking about the concept of falsehood and pressing her to tell her whether she’s lying to him. Later, it’s revealed how the kidnapper carries out his abductions in detail; the process involves a magical knife with mysterious Japanese characters engraved on the blade. Many readers will find this thriller gripping from beginning to end; the slow revelations will keep them connected to the story, and the author’s facility at creating suspense will make them invested in what happens next. One drawback, though, is the fact that the way that the magical knife works is somewhat confusing and not clearly explained: “Violet light leaped out, encircling his victim with snaking black lines. In merely a second, she was gone.” However, the characters, whether they’re heroes or villains, are consistently engaging and effectively demand readers’ attention.
An often exciting beginning to a new paranormal series.Pub Date: Dec. 21, 2022
ISBN: 9798986771007
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Soapy, suspenseful fun.
A remembered horror plunges a pregnant woman into a waking nightmare.
Tegan Werner, 23, barely recalls her one-night stand with married real estate developer Simon Lamar; she only learns Simon’s name after seeing him on the local news five months later. Simon wants nothing to do with the resulting child Tegan now carries and tells his lawyer to negotiate a nondisclosure agreement. A destitute Tegan is all too happy to trade her silence for cash—until a whiff of Simon’s cologne triggers a memory of him drugging and raping her. Distraught and eight months pregnant, Tegan flees her Lewiston, Maine, apartment and drives north in a blizzard, intending to seek comfort and counsel from her older brother, Dennis; instead, she gets lost and crashes, badly injuring her ankle. Tegan is terrified when hulking stranger Hank Thompson stops and extricates her from the wreck, and becomes even more so when he takes her to his cabin rather than the hospital, citing hazardous road conditions. Her anxiety eases somewhat upon meeting Hank’s wife, Polly—a former nurse who settles Tegan in a basement hospital room originally built for Polly’s now-deceased mother. Polly vows to call 911 as soon as the phones and power return, but when that doesn’t happen, Tegan becomes convinced that Hank is forcing Polly to hold her prisoner. Tegan doesn’t know the half of it. McFadden unspools her twisty tale via a first-person-present narration that alternates between Tegan and Polly, grounding character while elevating tension. Coincidence and frustratingly foolish assumptions fuel the plot, but readers able to suspend disbelief are in for a wild ride. A purposefully ambiguous, forward-flashing prologue hints at future homicide, establishing stakes from the jump.
Soapy, suspenseful fun.Pub Date: Jan. 28, 2025
ISBN: 9781464227325
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
A superior entry in the night-on-the-nightmare-ward genre.
A medical student is assigned an overnight shift to observe a Long Island hospital’s psychiatric ward and help with emergencies. You’d never guess what happens next.
Amy Brenner isn’t even interested in psychiatry, the one medical specialty she’s never considered for her own career. Nor is she interested any more in Cameron Berger, the classmate who ended their relationship so that he could spend more time studying, and she’s not pleased to learn that he’s switched his rotation with another student so he can spend some of the next 13 hours persuading Amy to rekindle their romance. Predictably, Cam will be the least of Amy’s troubles. Apart from Dr. Richard Beck and nurse Ramona Dutton, everyone else on Ward D is much more dangerous, from elderly Mary Cummings, whose knitting needles aren’t plastic but sharpened steel, to William Schoenfeld, who’s stopped taking the medications that were supposed to silence the voices telling him to kill people, to Damon Sawyer, who’s confined in Seclusion One and can’t possibly escape, unless a power outage neutralizes the locks. Most threatening of all is Jade Carpenter, whose close friendship with Amy ended eight years ago when Amy turned her in for what ended up being only one of a whole series of thrill crimes. McFadden measures out the complications, revelations, and betrayals with such an expert hand that readers anxiously trying to figure out whom Amy can trust as her goal shifts from ticking off a toilsome requirement to surviving the night may well end up wondering whom they can trust themselves. And isn’t provoking that kind of paranoia what medical thrillers are all about?
A superior entry in the night-on-the-nightmare-ward genre.Pub Date: March 4, 2025
ISBN: 9781464227271
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2025 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.
