A bizarre, memorable, and messy occult tale.
Years after escaping a cult, a woman rejoins the diabolical organization to take it down in this conclusion to a supernatural trilogy.
Psychologist Alina Masters and her family have led blissfully uneventful lives on the Greek island of Corfu. But when her construction worker husband takes a nasty fall, his hospital transfer sends them back to Chicago, Alina’s home. Alina may know who’s responsible for this reputed accident—her former lover Galen Drake, who belongs to the cult Ascension. She was once part of it, too, but fled the cult when pregnant with her and Galen’s child, Destin, who is now 6 years old. Craving some form of revenge against Galen, Alina squeezes her way back into Ascension. Surprisingly, Galen proposes an alliance to knock Ascension’s higher-ups, including his own mother, out of their seats of power. Alina is all for ending the cult that’s been a perpetual threat to her family. She maintains the pretense that she and Galen have reunited while struggling to ensure that Destin stays safe. But despite her previous involvement with the cult, Alina has much to learn, including that her mom has an unexpected link to Ascension as well. Bacon’s hazy plot reveals few details on the cult; even Alina doesn’t seem to know what Ascension is or its three rules (for example, “Respect the hierarchy”). But things get clearer in the latter half, and the organization’s evil, with a supernatural bend, is unmistakable throughout. The author delivers intriguing set pieces, like a potential terrorist strike and a political fundraiser for Galen, a United States senator with vice presidential aspirations, where Alina makes headlines. The book often displays a vibrant prose: Speaking with a pastor about Destin, Alina chokes out “an ugly sob, reliving the image of his tiny hands covered in blood.” Unfortunately, long-winded and occasionally repetitive sentences as well as grammatical flubs and abundant misspellings (“fain” instead of feign; “segway” instead of segue; “flea” instead of flee) permeate the narrative.
A bizarre, memorable, and messy occult tale.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 445
Publisher: Manuscript
Review Posted Online: Dec. 3, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
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
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