3 out of 4 stars
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Raven's Peak is a dark fantastical, adventure inhabited by supernatural beings, agencies, and forces, but set in a present-day dystopia-world where realistic, ordinary people have found themselves swept into the inexorable. It features a serpentine plot with lots of tactile, visceral sensationalism, monster battles, arch drama and confrontations between the good and the evil and the bold and the bad.
At the outset, we encounter a strange amorphous and contradictory character by the name of "The Reverend" or Arthur. He has been brought back from imprisonment by the head of the "Chaldean Council" to fight an unbeatable adversary taking the form of his erstwhile daughter Abigail and to save three young girls who have been abducted. He does not last very long though as he soon meets his end. In a small town church he combats and defeats the demon who has possessed his daughter, but in the process full of remorse at his own actions, he takes his own life.
The two main protagonists through the rest of the book are a reconstituted Abigail and an out-of-work Theology student and blog writer by the name of Haatim. Haatim is out-of-sorts with his East Indian family, grieving the death of his sister and adrift without a definite idea of what he would like to do with his life. He is caught in a crisis of faith and is in the process of shifting the subject matter of his blog from Theology to true crime. While researching at the library he meets up with a strange, shabby man by the name of George Wertman who, as a desperate favor, asks Haatim to follow and photo a suspected stalker. The stalker turns out to be none other than Abigail who has been assigned by the Council to "take George out". Abigail is a now a "Hunter", charged by the council with taking out or killing demons and the demon-possessed. It turns out George had been in the employ of a group of psychopaths and demon worshippers going by the name the "Ninth Circle".
When Abigail and Haatim find themselves ambushed, Haatim is given a "poison" to knock him out and at the same time protect him from the Ninth Circle's intention of "claiming" him. Haatim is captured by members of the Circle who are disguised as medical staff. Abigail, in turn, ambushes this group and with an antidote, brings Haatim out of the influence of the drug. There is much well-described action through these scenes which include violence and physical fighting. A demon named Delaphene escapes and a whole chapter is dedicated to the pursuit and altercation between these two. Abigail interrogates Delaphene and finds out a possible method of finding out where Arthur has gone, somewhere not even the Ninth Circle are normally familiar with. The demons leave cut scars on their victims which, when unhealed leave a "link" open. Normally they would heal after a few days and thus the connection would be closed, but it is not the case.
I will not recite the entire plot, will leave it to the reader to experience the rest of what happens, but I think one can get a sense of an incredible sequence of events. On the surface it all sounds very interesting if not exciting, but though I myself like the phantasmagorical, usually in the form of touches of surrealism, magic realism or unusual, innovative techniques I can't find "Raven's Peak" my type of thing. On the surface, it might seem to have a kinship with avant-garde technique, but I think the fundamental difference is that this genre is not so much about what one can do with the imagination as escapism. As do many novels of this type (bestsellers I read when I was a teenager and, I find, the plots of many current TV serials) the story alternates between mundane coziness and chaotic dimensions with not much room for the characters to collect themselves and reflect on or even register what they have just been through. In this way, the fantasy bestseller relies on the reader's imagination to fill in the gaps or to ignore them, as it were. Ironically I imagine most of the readers of this kind of thing would find themselves in much the same quandary as myself with writing that employs any kind of interiority. I think even noir-realism would escape these readers as they would probably regard that genre as empty and lacking. Nevertherless reading this book was an interesting trip through through past loves for me.
There is a great deal of detail to this story. I suspect that this very much the type of thing that many people, especially young, read these days, perhaps always the way it has been with bestsellers, the plot meanders along almost like, if the author can forgive me, it is made up of going along. Indeed I think it is a form of confabulation, a type of "fubu" (for-us-by-us) thing, like in rock and pop, very appealing because it is like something the reader, very much could have written themselves. I can see on the OnlineBookClub website that the reviews are almost unanimously high rating and positive, so one can safely assume that this writer, whether or not he has been snapped up by a major publisher, is a very popular indie writer.
There was a time when I would have enjoyed this type of thing. When I was young I thrilled to Edgar Rice Burroughs, Robert Silverberg, Isaac Asimov and Robert E. Howard (the at-times perverted originator of the "fantastic" genre). As it is there are a minimum of technical mistakes. The book is a finished product and, even if not focusing on too much outside of the eternal “good versus evil”, it is neither rushed nor disjointed. There are no glaring contradictions in character or events, so one might say if you're going to go for the sub-genre you are not going to be in for any unpleasant surprises. I also like the fact that the author does not throw in profane or soft pornographic material. Considering that it has been spell and grammar corrected and there are no plot inconsistencies I would give it a 3 out of 4. I would recommend it for teenage readers and older lovers of the imaginary fiction that does not in actual fact push the boundaries too much..
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Raven's Peak
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Thanks for the well-written review.
