So Cold the River by Michael Koryta

 

Reviewed by Jeanne

Eric Shaw once had a very promising Hollywood career which fizzled quickly after some “creative differences.”  His marriage is on the rocks.  The only work he can find is filming weddings and birthday parties.  He’s especially good at creating remembrances of people for funerals; in fact, he’s almost scary good. Besides his remarkable skill with a camera, he sometimes has a sort of sixth sense about things.  He’ll include a certain photo or a piece of music and then find out his instincts were right: that these things were extremely meaningful to the person.  He just knew. It’s almost creepy.

Now Eric has been given a new assignment by a woman who was impressed by his psychic insight at her sister’s funeral.   Alyssa Bradford’s very wealthy father in law is dying and she wants Eric to do a documentary on his life, something the family can treasure.  The problem is that Campbell Bradford has always been very reticent about his past.  They know he came from West Baden, IN and he has an old bottle filled with mineral water which he has kept for at least 80 years.  Alyssa hopes that Eric will be able to fill in some gaps.

She’s offering $20,000. 

Maybe that should have been Eric’s first warning.  Or maybe it should have been the bottle with the grinning devil imprinted on it, a bottle that seems to be getting colder and colder for no apparent reason.  Then there are the auditory and visual hallucinations—or are they hallucinations?—and the sense that someone or something else also seems to be making the journey to West Baden.

Michael Koryta has been on my To Be Read list for quite some time as an author of mysteries and thrillers.  Book Bingo had me pick this one up, and I’m glad it did.  This particular title leans toward horror which isn’t my usual genre but I definitely liked it.  It’s more creepy than gory, and Koryta lets the reader unravel the mystery along with Eric.  Koryta does an excellent job of gradually building the dark backstory, teasing the reader with bits of lore and gossip, until we reach the explosive conclusion.

There’s a good supporting cast.  I especially liked Kellen Cage, a young man who is also investigating the area’s history; and Anne McKinney, an 86 year old who knows a lot about the town’s history and who acts as a weather spotter. I like that Eric isn’t perfect but he is a basically decent guy; he’s let his pride and stubbornness wreck relationships but he’s honest enough to take responsibility.

Most of all I was fascinated to learn about the real town of West Baden. The descriptions in the book intrigued me: the mineral springs, once a thriving spa area, and the magnificent hotels which drew the rich and famous to West Baden and nearby French Lick. 

I found it to be an entertaining page-turner of a book.  If you’re a hardcore horror fan, you may find this too tame, but if you just a few dark chills and thrills, this may be a book for you.

And if you want to check out the hotel, try this link:  https://www.frenchlick.com/tour/westbaden  The lobby and the atrium are incredible. The library—well, it was okay.  Not enough books for my taste.

Nevermore: Fabulous Fiction!

Reported by Ambrea

This week, our Nevermore readers picked up a variety of fiction, ranging from a dire, post-apocalyptic future to the trenches of World War I to the glittering and gritty skyline of modern Los Angeles.  We started with Wool by Hugh Howey, which begins with Holston—a citizen of the silo, one of the few remaining safe havens left in a newly inhospitable world—who suddenly finds himself desperate to leave, desperate to go outside.  Like others before him, Holston’s wish is granted and he’s allowed to leave with the caveat that he will clean the windows of the silo with a clump of wool and then disappear forever.  For those who leave the silo are doomed to never return.  Our reader said Wool was surprisingly good.  She enjoyed the story, but she also enjoyed the fact that Howey used an older narrator, a man of average strength and skill, an unassuming hero for an unexpectedly complex novel.

Our readers abruptly switched gears with A Land Remembered by Patrick Smith and dived into the wilderness of antebellum Florida.  The story begins with Tobias MacIvey, who arrives in Florida to start a new life with his wife and son, and ends nearly a century later with Solomon MacIvey.  Considered a “sweeping story…[filled with] rich, rugged Florida history,” A Land Remembered encompasses not just the experience of one family as they seek to tame the land, but the entirety of the region.  Our Nevermore reader had nothing but praise for Smith’s book.  She said the author did an excellent job in fabricating his novel, pulling in extraordinary descriptions of the land, the people, and the time period and interspersing his prose with historical facts that made his writing both believable and enjoyable.

Next, we explored The Dust that Falls from Dreams by Louis de Bernières.  The McCosh girls—Christabel, Ottilie, Rosie, and Sophie—grow up in the countryside, spending their days in carefree camaraderie with the Pendennis brothers—Sidney, Albert, and Ashbridge—and the Pitt boys, Archie and Daniel.  But their lives abruptly change with the start of World War I.  Suddenly, the Pendennis brothers are caught in the trenches, Rosie and Ottilie McCosh are working as nurses along the front lines, Daniel becomes a fighter pilot, while the others are scattered to the far sides of the continent, each telling their stories as the war unfolds and a new world emerges.  For our reader, The Dust that Falls from Dreams was a surprisingly good book.  It had the qualities of an epic, encompassing several characters over a number of years, and it had a way of drawing the reader into the story that was enjoyable.

Our readers also explored Last Words by Michael Koryta.  Markus Novak, an investigator for a defense firm in Florida, has spent the two years since his wife’s murder looking for answers to no avail.  Now, with his job on the line, he’s investigating a cold case in Garrison, Indiana—where, much to his surprise, he discovers that the supposed murderer, a man by the name of Ridley Barnes, has asked to reopen the case.  Left with no choice but to investigation, Novak digs into the case only to discover that nothing is as he expected in the small farm town of Garrison.  Our reader said he really enjoyed Koryta’s latest novel.  Although he was unfamiliar with Koryta’s work, he was pleased with his newest book and highly recommended it to our group.  He also noted (with a laugh) that Last Words featured a sociopath, which harkened back to Nevermore meetings where our members discussed The Psychopath Test and The Sociopath Next Door.

Last, our readers discussed Private L.A. by James Patterson and Mark Sullivan.  Jack Morgan is the founder and director of America’s top investigative firm, known only as Private, and he’s dead set on conquering each and every job his investigators encounter.  Together with Justine Smith, his partner and sometimes girlfriend, Jack Morgan looks into the disappearance of Hollywood’s greatest power-couple only to discover the truth is not what it seems.  Our reader was thrilled with her audiobook choice.  She really enjoyed listening to the story, enjoyed seeing the mystery unfold, but she also loved the fact that Patterson actually incorporated real celebrity personalities.  He digs deep into Hollywood to seamlessly inject his story into the real world, creating a whodunit with a little intrigue and a little suspense and lots of twists.