Hello there, Readers! Welcome to November’s Spotlight.
So, I did a nice little Spooky Spotlight for you last month being as it was October. But here’s the thing; as I’m writing this? It’s still October. I’m still in a mood to be scared and I found myself chuckling more than cringing at Eleanor’s adventures in The Bus on Thursday. You can find that one Here . So what’s a guy to do?
Grab another scary tale from the shelf, that’s what!
As this Spotlight goes up, Halloween will have been done for a week so please forgive me for bringing up the past, but much like the events in this month’s book… I just can’t let the past alone.
This month’s offering isn’t an Indie title but is instead from an author who I’ve been meaning to check out for a while; Adam Nevill. His 2011 novel The Ritual has been on my To Read list for a long time, but I decided to opt for the more recent The Reddening instead.
So, grab yourself a cup of tea and prepare for a tale of superstition and conspiracy literally thousands of years in the making.
Book Stats
- Author: Adam Nevill
Formats: Kindle, Paperback, and Audiobook.
Price: $4.99 for Kindle or Free with Kindle Unlimited, $17.99 for Paperback, $16.99 for the Audiobook, or one Credit on Audible.
Length: 346 pages or 12 hours 19 minutes in audio format.
Narrator: Connor Goff
Number of books in the series: It’s a standalone work.
Basic Premise
An enthusiastic paraglider is taking a leisurely glide around a remote sea coast made of sheer cliffs in Devon, England.
His heart skips a beat when he sees that a recent storm has pulled some of the coast away to reveal a cavern. He’s even more engrossed when that cavern turns out to be filled with bones.
Such begins the excavation of the Brickburgh caves.
The bones, both animal and human, stretch back centuries, millennium, all the way back to neanderthal populations that lived in the area. One thing remains constant, however; toothmarks and signs of the tools used to pry flesh from bone. Cannibalism. It appears no-one was spared as some of these bones are those of infants, some are of old people. The young, the old, the sick, the well, the strong, the injured, human, neanderthal. There’s no discernible pattern beyond the fact that these people were eaten. Along with these remains are found works of ancient art depicting hyena-headed women and huge, anthropomorphic beasts. Some kind of flesh-devouring deities? Who knows?
Of course, no-one does. Yet. But there are people who are bound and determined to find out.
During a press conference on the discoveries found at the Brickburgh excavation site, we meet Katrine. She’s a lifestyle journalist, an alcoholic in a terrible relationship and none of this talk of cannibalism and ancient horror does anything to improve her mood. (She also has a run in her stocking. So. There’s that.) She needs a change. Maybe a move out to the seaside will improve her prospects? Get out of London to where things are quieter, easier.
We also meet Helene. Her brother Lincoln was immersed in recording sounds made deep in the earth. This is actually a really interesting field – I did a little research on it before writing this spotlight. The earth actually makes sounds as layers of dirt, water and rock shift underneath us almost imperceptibly. If you record with the right equipment far enough down, there’s a lot of crazy stuff to hear. Lincoln was deeply involved in these ideas and concepts and left his sister Helene all the CDs with his recordings.
The last one he made, right before his apparent suicide (The body was never found.) featured nightmarish whoops and yells, sounds like animals and children screaming as well as the shifting of the earth. That was 6 years ago and oh, by the way, it was in Brickburgh.
These two unlikely heroines meet and share information about these happenings because, here’s the best part, Lincoln wasn’t the only person to disappear mysteriously in the area.
What they uncover is the stuff of nightmares. Ancient cults and old gods meet new money, power and the drug trade. Who’s in on it? Who can they trust? And what can they do to save themselves and stop others from disappearing?
Read it to find out.
My Take
The Reddening is a fantastic story that contains just the right amount of supernatural terror pitched against the idea that humans are the real monsters. Growing up on English TV I could perfectly imagine the characters and the landscapes that Mr. Nevill describes in such haunting detail. The atmosphere he creates is one of high tension and mistrust with just enough twists and turns to keep it all fresh and not too oppressive.
There are some pretty graphic depictions of mutilation and body horror in this book, just as a bit of a warning to those of us who, like me, have a weak stomach when it comes to that kind of stuff. But hey, if a passage can make me feel utterly nauseous, it’s probably one that’s very well written. And that was probably to be expected in a book about actual ritual cannibalism, right? Right. (I have no-one to blame but myself.)
If I have one minor complaint, it’s that the narrator for the audible version, while he does a fantastic job generally, does mispronounce some of the English vernacular. Lino, short for linoleum, is pronounced Lin-No in his reading but would actually be pronounced Lie-No. Row, when referring to an argument is pronounced almost like Rao, not Row as in Row, Row, Row your boat. Again, very minor complaint when set against the generally great job he does but an editor should have caught that. His voice is low and has an almost conspiratorial tone to it a lot of the time. An excellent storyteller.
All in all, this was the spooky spine-tingler I was looking for in a chilly October read. I highly recommend it to anyone who wants a grisly tale of murder in the name of ancient Gods.
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