HAIR-TRIGGER SMILE

James’ latest genre-defying novel in his Hourglass series fuses paranormal fantasy, existential horror, and eschatological thriller.

After 2022’s The Ferryman’s Toll, James continues the grand-scale narrative chronicling the conflict between opposing paranormal organizations. As Hourglass operatives battle the forces of the Cairnwood Society—“a cabal of wealthy and infernal sorts, human and non-human”—on Earth and in various alternate realities between Boschian dream realms and the undead vistas of the afterlife, humankind has a much more pressing problem. The mythical hereafter has been long destroyed; now the future of humanity is left with only sprawling nightmarish wastelands ruled by monstrous overlords. The only hope is to find an artifact that can allegedly stitch together a new paradisical afterlife: the coveted Firmament Needle. If the majority of storylines can be compared to narrative consommé, then this novel is the thickest of stews. Tasty morsels abound—the worldbuilding and backstory are extraordinary, with mind-blowing dreamscapes throughout. The ensemble cast of characters is deeply and insightfully developed, even otherworldly characters like Calkarion, a mulelike humanoid strapped to a mechanical spider who befriends Konstantin Kozlov, a Russian necromancer, in his search for the Needle. But it’s the diversity of the multiple intertwining plot threads that makes this such a page-turner. Hourglass operatives like Clyde Williams, whose soul has been tainted by a Babylonian dream demon, battle their adversaries—and themselves—in jaw-dropping fight sequences. Kozlov and company embark on a phantasmagorical quest through post-apocalyptic landscapes inhabited with nightmare-inducing predators, which include a living circus filled with killer clowns and carnies. Through it all, the author succeeds in delivering an overarching message about the pitfalls of misplaced faith: “Perhaps we all do need a little faith. Not in any of this…but in ourselves to do what’s right.”

A virtuosic work that should please fans of genre-bending sagas.