A Psychologically Haunting Tale
345821
This is a terrifying, yet tantalizing story into the life of a recovering alcoholic father, Jack Torrance, a loving wife and mother, Winifred (Wendy) Torrance, an extremely loving and prophetic little boy, Danny Torrance, and more importantly, the eerie Overlook Hotel.  To those who have only seen the movie, do not expect to know what this is about. For the book portrays an entirely different picture than the movie. Stephen King's The Shining is a terrifying story surrounding a family temporarily tending to a haunted hotel, which will have you horrified at its power to turn a struggling writer and loving family man into a psychotic killer.
In The Shining, Stephen King uses a very idiosyncratic or distinctive mind to compose a tale about a haunted hotel with a sinister and bloody past. The Overlook Hotel, a beautiful resort vacation style getaway during the summer season, is the source behind numerous deaths, including suicide and murder. Watson, the on season caretaker says it best when he states: "Any big hotel has got scandals, just like every big hotel has got a ghost. Why? Hell, people come and go" (King). The hotel's secluded location makes the setting of this story more ominous due to its isolation component. It is set in the Colorado Mountains, miles away from civilization, where the off season inhabitants have to reside in the dead of winter.
King's depiction of the hotel plays on the reader's fear with symbolism and dramatic imagery. The story behind the hotel is used to arouse the anxieties of the reader.  A warning from another character adds to the hotel's malevolence: "This inhuman place makes human monsters" (King).  Inferring the hotel's ability to turn someone into a monster essentially adds to its evil existence.
The story's main character has an unpleasant background as well. Jack Torrance came very close to losing his family after a binge in which he lost his temper and broke his son Danny's arm at the tender age of 3. It's been two years and Jack is no longer drinking. Needing a job to support his family, he becomes this year's off-season caretaker. Having heard what happened to the last caretaker, most people would have walked away for the sheer fear of what may or can happen.  The last ill-fated caretaker, an alcoholic named Delbert Grady, hacked his two daughters up with a hatchet, shot his wife, then himself.
Battling with extreme anger and alcoholism makes Jack a perfect leading character for this story. Who could be better for a haunted hotel to use for its evil purposes than someone who has numerous internal demons of his own? Each character used within the story has a disquieting effect to play on the reader's emotions, be it good or bad. From beginning to end, The Shining leaves an impression on the reader that he or she will not soon forget.
698627
In a soon-to-be-vacant children's hospital, new night nurse Amy Nicholls (played by one of the more fragile-looking actresses of our time, Calista Flockhart) begins the task of readying the patients for their move to another hospital on the same island. The opening scenes with a particularly prescient orphan named Maggie (Yasmin Murphy) set the audience up for the spookiness to follow. Apparently, mysterious broken bones are not the only things to haunt this hospital.

Spanish writer/director Jaume Balaguero wastes no time, presenting the audience with thunder, lightning, vibrating drinking glasses, and messages spelled out with children's blocks by an unseen presence. Nurse Amy is remote, neurotic, and using some type of medication--emotional problems, perhaps? After a terrifying episode in a renegade elevator, she doubles the dose of capsules from a maddeningly anonymous bottle.

Children in the hospital refer to a mechanical girl--Charlotte--who "lives" on the second floor, which was abandoned 40 years ago. Just as the audience begins to question why these children, who seem healthy, are hospitalized, it is revealed that Maggie has cystic fibrosis.

Amy's predecessor left her position at the hospital suddenly, and when Amy visits her home to question her about some suspicious happenings, she learns that the nurse had died in a car accident the previous day. Soon Amy, who is haunted by her own ghosts, begins seeing the manifestations the children have witnessed and that the staff either denies or ignores.

The cast is well able to handle this familiar, yet creepy, tale that examines both emotional and spiritual haunting. Thoughtful performances elevate "Fragile" above the level of so many thrillers and horror films.
It's a worthwhile ghost story that chills to the very end.
3825758
This is a gripping story of a world where aging has been eradicated by a drug, yet the indefinite lifespans of its inhabitants come at the cost of a logistical issue: If one lives forever, how can one store all one's memories? Should some of them be deleted? Which ones? And who gets to decide?
Vividly portraid characters undertake a suspenseful journey of uncovering and fighting a corporate conspiracy. However, the most compelling part of the story - to me - is the protagonist's struggle to reclaim her own lost memories, pieces of her own past she does not remember, but which define her. Her piecemeal recollections of her personal history are part of what make reading this book both haunting and addictive.
127086
A young Bengali-American struggles to find an identity separate from his schizophrenic mother and brokenhearted father.

This is not an easy book. Both the subject matter and the language can be hard going. There is a wonderful immediacy to Neil Kapoor's tale of life with a mentally ill parent. Even when the surface of a scene is placid, there's a tension, as if something is about to explode and there is no sense warning anyone, because there is no way to escape. So it's business as usual. Home. Class. Home. Class.

Neal is a mysterious character, especially to himself. His sense of otherness and separation is tragic. When he tries to venture out into the world, he ends up tangled in a love triangle...quadrangle???...with three other drama students, each troubled in his or her own way. This crew alternately destroys and saves one another. In a way, they also provide Neal with proof that his family secret isn't so unique. That others have their madness and therefore maybe, just maybe, they can be trusted with Neal's truth.

I will say that I found the author's language quite overwrought in places. The similes and metaphors, though often lovely in themselves, weigh down a narrative that is already quite heavy. The point-of-view is also an issue. Ostensibly, the story is told in the first person with side trips into third person(present)for dreams and Neal's projection of his mother's experiences in the psychiatric hospital. But the first person often slips into an omniscience that blurs reality. In some ways this works well...we wonder if Neal himself is showing signs of schizophrenia. On the other hand, it robs the other characters of their own "reality" as Neal ascribes to them feelings, reactions, and motivations that may or may not be accurate. Combine this with some murky dialog tags, and the reader can end up feeling lost.

Overall, THE ISOLATION DOOR is a well-conceived, often harrowing look at life in the midst of mental illness. Well worth the close reading necessary to get the most out of it.
4550339
Devlin's book is haunting.  A mother's terminal cancer diagnosis puts her three daughters on edge as they try to cope with the illness and their own feelings.  The story takes many unexpected twists and turns, drawing you deeper into the suffering of middle daughter Vanessa, her sisters, and her father too.  It is a very thought-provoking book about parental love and loss, and finding yourself.  The themes are serious and there are references to sex, although it is not key to the story.  I'd recommend for mature teens only.
3187892
This is a fascinating and unsettling tale of a young woman's love/hate relationship with her mental illness.  We share the young woman's pain and grief as her mother and doctor attempt to pull her from her reality where she enjoys complicated and loving (though decidedly strange) friendships into theirs, a gray world where she has only one friend whom she calls "rat boy."

Through medication, she loses the beauty of her existence:  the ability to travel across dimensions, the ability to communicate with nature, and the love of her life.  Refusing medication, her abilities -and her brown-eyed boyfriend- return to continue the adventure to its tearful conclusion.

As I read, while I wanted to believe in the establishment view ("crazy"), a thought kept nudging the back of my mind:  What if her beautiful, bizarre perception is the reality and my mundane and unidimensional "reality" is actually the falsehood?

This is a vivid, haunting portrayal of a troubled young woman's world. Can't wait to read more from this author!  -Catherine
2259345
I knew from the first page that this small, powerful book would break my heart. What begins as the tale of happy, bustling family life, becomes the macabre unraveling of a crime so heinous, that the surviving daughter can barely function years after the event.
Ellen informs the reader from the very beginning that she has escaped from a nightmare, a waking dream that has haunted every action since her 12th birthday. We discover what happened, page by taunting page, until finally glimpsing the enormity of Ellen's alienation. The horrific details are revealed slowly, building a sense of impending doom. What might have been a simple Gothic mystery, is instead a journey toward salvation. Alternating events, present and past, serve as the author's vehicle.
At 12 years of age Ellen experienced a bitter lesson: home, the safest place for a child, is transformed, at the blink of an eye, into the most dangerous place, the site of an unspeakable crime. As one of the two remaining siblings, Ellen has spent her years squandering herself through promiscuity, false bravado and self-hate. Now pregnant with a stranger's child, in the middle of a divorce, Ellen moves into the vacant family home, recently put on the market. Drawn into the familiar rooms, where it all began and ended so tragically, this sojourn is a means to salvation, unconscious or not. Ellen confronts the demons that pollute her waking moments. The reward is in the journey itself, step by step, as Ellen unlocks the chains of the past and finds the way home to her authentic self.
1906214
Dead Works was a short novel of supernatural and and psychological horror.

Eric is a graduate psychology student jumping through the various hoops that such a doctor must, before becoming officially licensed. As such, he has his own clients to see, but he is required to periodically bring some of his cases before a group of other students and a supervisory psychologist. He chooses to bring two very strange cases to the group and discovers a link between them. Himself.

I liked how this story was told even though it was a little confusing at first. As the mysteries began to unfold, the reader learned more about Eric and two of his clients, Will and Greg. The beginning of this tale was slow, but my interest picked up as Eric himself began to be a larger part of the narrative. From there, the pace increased and moved quickly towards the finale. This is where the author began to shine because the denouement was both fascinating and heartbreaking.

Overall, this book was satisfying. The pacing issues at the beginning could very well be just me and might not bother another reader at all. I'm glad that I stuck with it, because the author masterfully weaved the ending. Even though this story didn't quite knock my socks off, (because I guessed correctly where it was going to go, but not the how), I will read more from this author in the future, because I feel like he is still honing his skills. Who knows what he might come up with next?

Recommend for fans of a mix of heavy psychological horror and the supernatural!
4244626
Fragile Dreams encompasses the spiritual and psychological journey of a man named Matthew, who becomes trapped beneath rubble in the brutal aftermath of an earthquake. The story revolves around his journey in the darkness, clinging on to life and reliving several aspects of his past while also experiencing vivid and terrifying hallucinations in the process.

In the less-than-one-hundred pages of this chronicle, readers are stricken with lucid and eloquently-written sensations of claustrophobia and isolation. Where most authors would be challenged in writing a storyline that, at its epicenter, is small in scale and concise, Fracassi finds a way to transform the blackness and lack of discernible environment with haunting execution. Matthew's past and present share equal attention, grasping the readers and allowing them to care for the protagonist as more than just a man buried beneath rubble, but as a father, a husband, and a man with real-life trauma and authentically-crafted behavior.

Readers will find themselves gripping the spine of this book, white-knuckled and turning page after page with increasing speed, not even realizing they have reached the climax once that final page presents itself. With parallels to the visceral eyewitness accounts from survivors of 9/11, the fierce and unforgiving qualities of mortality are put on display. The eventual psychosis of Matthew is terrifying and filled with morbidity, his nightmares exhuming dread and mournful aspects of the main character's life.

Though an intentionally closed-in and isolated work of fiction, the relationships displayed, most notably with his best friend Robbie and the other survivor Dee, are spotlighted with realistic interactions and often heartwarming moments. Fracassi crafts an often poetic verse, combining realism with disturbing detail and frighteningly cosmic moments of horror.

The only minute flaw that this novella holds, is in pace and structure, though these are easily overlooked and hardly noticeable amidst the graphic storytelling and engaging plot. These small flaws could also be attributed to length constraints, but for most readers they will be too lost in the beautiful language that Fracassi illustrates to notice.

In Fragile Dreams, readers are offered the fragility of the human psyche and the vulnerability of the human body; both are explored and investigated with stunning prose and visceral description, offering a tale that is as endearing as it is evocative.

We recommend this novella to lovers of horror, especially fans of the more psychological aspects of the genre. If this piece is any foreshadowing on the rest of Philip Fracassi's works, we are delighted to traverse further into his meticulous and creative mind.
4302864
When Nevada Barr's latest novel arrived, I expected iconic Anna Pigeon but received instead a strange bird, indeed. Stand-alone 13 is a disturbing psychological thriller that establishes Barr as a versatile writer and will have Stephen King biting fingernails on a sleepless, nightmarish night.

New Orleans is a magnet that attracts "trailer trash" Polly from Prentiss, Mississippi, and brothers Dylan and Rich Raines from Minnesota, both with abominable secrets. Like murky bayou backwater, not all is what it appears to be. Twins Danny and Marshall Marchand like to think they've been in Louisiana for more than a hundred years and are inseparable, until Marshall marries Polly--now a respected literature professor--and wants to adopt her two daughters.

In 1968, Dylan was convicted of pulling a Lizzie Borden with an axe and too many whacks to count, whacks that cut his baby sister in half, nearly takes off brother Richard's leg and kill his parents--even a defenseless kitty cat. (Not one of Barr's "four magical cats.") Dubbed "Butcher Boy" and sentenced to juvenile incarceration in a psych ward, 11-year-old Dylan is drugged with LSD, to make him try to remember what happened. Strings pulled, Dylan is freed after seven years and becomes a pseudo puppet. Set in post-Katrina New Orleans, the plot becomes as unpredictable as a downed high-tension power line, with more psychological twists and turns than newfangled light bulbs.

Don't try to decipher the title of this noir novel. Patience and reading through squinty eyes of fictional horrors and those of real life reveals all, as does a tarot card interpreter in the French Quarter. Polly must choose who is the crazy one in a pot/kettle-calling standoff, when the lives of her daughters teeter on a psycho precipice.

Despite gruesome descriptions like "blood and its bright, comic book color," 13 is really a love story, depicted by Polly, when she ponders the depth of her love. "Had I been twenty or even thirty, I might have been able to love blindly, unconditionally. I cannot even apologize for not believing in you utterly and without question; that kind of love---faith---must be learned young."

This is Nevada Barr at her best. With text as rich as Donald Trump, Barr has the reader holding on to this cliffhanger with fingertips as strong and manicured as her poetic prose. Barr leaves subtle clues, then like freezing water in a shower, shocks the reader with how obvious were circumstances that lead to an unpredictable conclusion.

  ---Reviewed by L. Dean Murphy
4048996
"The Last Ghost" is a horror story narrated by a man setting his mother's estate to order. This is a tale that slowly builds with each paragraph, intent on creating a chilling atmosphere

Since, as the title might suggest, "The Last Ghost" is a ghost story, the narrative adopts a Victorian tone to emulate the golden age of ghost stories. This voice is well-executed for the most part and helps immerse the reader into the narrator's tale. There were some evocative descriptions, such as the narrator describing "my mother, but not as a young girl, but older, in the winter of her middle age" and "in that sound I saw rot, not the fetid diseased rot of plague, but the dry, gnawing rot of inevitable decay, the dust of a million men reduced to nothing."

While there were multiple ghosts introduced throughout the course of the story, Liggio did well balancing their presence with one another so it did not feel like one was overly dominating or, conversely, was not described enough. The narrator's terror grows with the appearance of each new ghost, and the tension builds as the horror elements continue to slowly creep in. The ticking of the clock, "I'm sorry," the drip of blood: all of it ties together into an intense atmosphere.

The ending is where "The Last Ghost" struggles. As I found myself drawn into the atmosphere Liggio built in the home, I wanted to know what the ghosts meant by their silent reproach, their counting, and their pointing. And Liggio delivers, spelling out exactly what each ghost's actions and words signify. But though this ending answers all of the reader's questions, it is unsatisfying. The true power of horror is what is left up to the imagination, and Liggio leaves little questions unanswered, thus stripping away the terrors the reader might have imagined. Finally, some additional editing might have served the story well to eliminate a few redundancies and tighten up the writing, but overall, the story seemed to have been well-edited and I only found one typographical error.

Though the ending falls a little flat, "The Last Ghost" is still an enjoyable read, and one which I would recommend.
4819453
Anyone who enjoys a well-crafted paranormal tale that is more psychological than violent and gory knows how difficult it is to actually find such a thing. Though there is a section in which copious amounts of blood are introduced (but not in an unnecessary and distracting manner, in my view), this book falls into that category. It contains the most familiar of paranormal tropes - a seance, possession, and exorcisms, to name a few - but they are presented in such clever ways that they serve to make the reader think while also upping the creepiness factor exponentially. It's a story rife with suspense and compelling events, and  that it initially approaches everything from the standpoint from a staunch skepticism makes the ensuing twists that much more effective and disturbing.

In fact, I'd go so far as to say that not only is this an exceedingly compelling tale, but it's actually creepy enough that it makes readers become quite leery of darkened rooms and unexplained noises in their houses. That's not an easy feat, so it's a testament to the author's skill that the story is truly that unsettling.

At the center of it all, of course, is the character about whom much has been said in myriad other reviews. It's an unusual, creative, risky, and ultimately brilliant move to make one's main character - and most unreliable of narrators - deeply egocentric and more than a little unlikable. In this case, though, it works. Jack Sparks is supremely selfish and self-centered, antagonistic, prone to belligerence and manipulation, and tends to think he's far smarter and more astute than pretty much anyone else he encounters. He's also extraordinarily snarky, which makes him fairly entertaining, and he does not entirely lack self-awareness; in fact, he's aware of his flaws to a surprising degree. That being the case, the reader frequently goes back and forth between not liking (and even loathing) him, finding him to be humorous, and at certain points, perhaps even feeling sorry for him (though I won't delve into why that may be the case for fear of spoiling any of the story's twists and turns).

It winds up being an inspired choice to include some of Sparks' notes (pardon the unintentional pun) in the story, as reading his thoughts, ideas, and brief commentaries about individuals and situations, serves to remind readers of Sparks' humanity, and brings home the notion that this was a "real" person (though, of course, entirely fictional) and that his thoughts were added to the manuscript not long before his demise. It adds another dimension to the story and allows the readers to have another glimpse into the inner workings of Sparks' mind.

As the reader becomes privy to all that Sparks experiences in his last days and becomes sufficiently spooked, the author also skillfully weaves in salient commentary about such things as the downsides of social media and some people's constant quest for ever more likes and followers, and the perils of both extreme egotism and a closed mind, so that the book is as smart and timely as it is suspenseful.

Perhaps one of the most impressive aspects of the story is that it initially presents events and information that seem as though they simply serve to move the tale along, yet there isn't a single loose end or wasted moment - everything winds up having great significance and implications, and they do so in such a way that even more seasoned readers cannot predict.

Ultimately, this is a massively entertaining, absorbing book. It's smart, creative, evocative, and genuinely disturbing. Upon reading it, I became an instant fan of Jason Arnopp's writing, and I don't have the slightest doubt that that will be the case for everyone who picks up this book that I very highly recommend.
2198706
The fabrics from which dreams are woven can be horrendous, and more catastrophic still when the visions return to the fertile grounds of your mind night after chaotic night. This point is made even more pronouncedly when the dreams happen to be about things that are occurring or are going to happen, especially when they teeter on the edge of insanity, or, as is the case with Claire, on areas that hit close to home. For several nights now she has been seeing visions of an apple orchard and a figure leading a little girl through it, leading her to believe that the child in her mind might well be a little girl that has gone missing. So, with an outstretched mentality, her mind goes searching, looking for something which she can clamp onto. Unfortunately for her, the mirror sometimes has a darker side, one that can peer into the mind that dreams visions, and that hands that can effectively whittle away many of the pieces that lead a person toward happiness, security, and the warmth that we like to call home.
In dreams had some beautiful depictions within it, capturing the aura of a town floating beneath waters unleashed by river diversion, showing a person in the first few minutes that it had a surreal feeling to it and that there was the ability to seem frightfully eerie running laps through its veins. This was further accented by the visions that were seen throughout the film, those of children and a past foretold in the shadows of a nursery rhyme wearing a shroud of insane speech and garble imagery, keeping its viewer enmeshed in the tale that was being portrayed upon the screen. It also seemed to have a storyline going for it that was interesting until the final chase that is inevitable begins to ensue, dragging on for a time before leading toward a vindictive ending that leaves everyone shattered as sprawling in the dust and that makes up for the duration of the run. This was an interesting ride, too, because getting a handle on what exactly is going to happen is a bit hard until alter in the movie, and then its all apples from there.
Combine this with the acting, which was done beautifully, the fact that the movie was something containing portions that entranced me within their bleakness, and the madness in the eyes of a Downey seems somewhat believable int he role, and you have something that is worth watching and that does the book its based on, Doll Eyes, a fair amount of justice. It'll make you question all the delightful dreams that manifest within your mind!
693338
It is a haunting image that Porteau evokes to explain why houses become haunted: the shadow of a man seared into a wall by the hell-fire blast in Hiroshima.

This is not a book that fits neatly into any one genre. It holds a creepy, haunted feel from the beginning as it uses supernatural-tale tropes to reveal the toll that abuse and neglect imposes on childhood development and later life. Near-future science-fiction comes into the narrative, too, if only to underline how technology does not change the basic human experience. We will not be rescued from our nature by innovative science.

It certainly is not a YA novel, even though Porteau expertly presents both the inner and outer lives of Elizabeth and her father David in his youthful past.

The genre it fits into most comfortably is psychological thrillerbut even then, Porteau has deftly skewed the presentation of the various characters' histories so that we are kept guessing to the end. Is Old Susie's house truly haunted? Is David unavoidably destined to have the same flawed relationship with his daughter Elizabeth as his own father had with him? And will the escaped killer wreak a side-wise vengeance on this haunted family?

The same complex character development we saw from Porteau in his Gettysburg stories, "Tales of B-Company", shines strongly in his debut novel. Because of his skillful weave of genres, the novel's final denouement feels fresh and unexpected, and satisfies the desire for closure.

Best not to expect anything, but just throw yourself open to experience the story. You won't be disappointed.
2141035
I found this a fascinating tale, a psychological horror story, horrifying in such an understated and believable voice. Written well before its time, in my opinion. I have recommended it to numerous friends. Purchasers should read the description carefully--this is a short story, not a novel.
460678
Michael Koryta's novel `The Ridge' is a beguiling mixture of literary types; it combines the macabre elements of a modern-day gothic horror tale with the archetypes of the hard boiled police thriller, managing, for the most part, to appease the requirements of both. A well-researched narrative that contains sufficient shocks and twists that ensures the reader is fairly well engaged throughout.

It's commendable that Koryta is evidently not at all timid when it comes to setting up his overall premise; the area of Blade Ridge -the novel's primary location- "as isolated a pocket of the world as you'll find east of the Mississippi" is home to a wooden lighthouse built in the middle of the woods by a once "gifted carpenter" and a nearby newly-installed enclosure for exotic felines implemented by a widower who recently lost her husband in an accident to the nearby Marshall River. It's an odd and original setting that confounds the reader's expectations regarding the typical `ghost story' milieu-no graveyards nor century-old mansions inhabit this particular landscape.

The author's chief protagonist in `The Ridge' is the recognizable character motif of police deputy Kevin Kimble, a middle-aged, career-driven companionless figure, seemingly content with being "one of those boys who inexplicably becomes identified by his last name". `Kimble',  from the outset is evidently a tormented individual as the opening chapter quickly establishes with a twin-pronged dilemma for his principal character. On his pre-dawn journey to a Women's Prison Kimble receives a disturbing call on his cell phone from the elderly, locally-shunned social pariah, Wyatt French; French talks of suicide and questions Kimble as to how rigorous his likely investigation of such an event would be.  His subsequent meeting with an inmate at the prison, Jaqueline Mathis, proves to be equally unsettling and the reader begins to realize that there is a rich and ominous back-story to the tale that the author is embarking upon.

Koryta has fashioned an involving and bracing narrative here, complete with interestingly drawn characters, sharp description and an ending to his novel that is well-rounded and pleasantly rewarding. At its heart, `The Ridge' is an effectively realized modern-day ghost story. Koryta is adept at utilising a by-now standard set of ideas and craftily exploiting those to define his own version of the preternatural. Where the author arguably becomes unstuck are those instances in the text that while they are structurally sound are unfortunately hollow and artificial in terms of plausibility where characters motivations are concerned. There is a moment  that occurs at roughly the mid-point of the novel that this reviewer would contend seriously undermines the intention of the author and the credibility of the plot; however, if you are willing to forgive this curiously incongruent lapse the book proves to be a  tense, bloody and overall engaging affair.

Written by James Keen from Horror Novel Reviews. Horror Novel Reviews does not receive payment for reviews. All books are promotional copies.
2134485
Mahbod Seraji's haunting "Rooftops of Tehran" is set in 1973 Tehran, in an exotic world where families gather on carpeted rooftops to escape the heat and humidity of the day, weaving stories and poems late into the starry nights. Seventeen-year-old Pasha Shahed is a bookworm who harbors a secret crush on his beautiful neighbor Zari. At first, he keeps this forbidden desire locked firmly away since Zari is engaged to Doctor, a university student with dangerously Marxist political leanings. But when Doctor is forced to go on the run after catching the eye of SAVAK, the Shah's secret police, Pasha finds himself drawn to Zari like a moth to a flame.

Despite the fact that the novel unfolds several years before the Revolution, the political atmosphere is charged, with thousands imprisoned, tortured and killed for suspected subversive political activities and affiliations. The SAVAK are everywhere. Pasha and Zari are caught up in this tempest with devastating effects for all involved; during the Shah's birthday motorcade, a single defiant statement by Zari shatters Pasha's world.

Pasha must recover from both the physical and psychological scars in the aftermath, and his only hope of escape is studying in the United States. He and his parents struggle to make sense of the violence and palpable fear that has crept into their lives, of nighttime raids and friends that disappear forever. Pasha's friendship with Ahmed becomes a lifeline as Pasha struggles with depression and suicidal thoughts in the wake of his many personal losses.

Seraji's Tehran is beautifully described, and threads of Iranian culture are woven throughout; Iranian poets, celebrations (No Ruz), and traditions  create a rich cultural tapestry that provides vibrant color to Pasha's tale. Pasha makes an engaging narrator, and touches of humor lighten otherwise dark moments ( Pasha's mother's  disgusting herbal "tonics" that are supposed to cure him of his introverted nature,  "Professor" Ahmed's "scholarly" treatise on the dangers of self-pleasure). This is a must-read by a fresh new voice, and particularly insightful given the current political situation in Iran thirty years after the Revolution.  A short interview with the author and a reader's guide are also included.