Book Review-Newer Books 2

Review—In the Dark of the Night by John Saul

Phantom Lake is an ideal place to spend the summer with your family and friends. The Brewster’s decide to join some of their closest friends and rent a house on the same lake. This house has not been rented in years and no one knows why. The previous owner was a doctor who specialized in treating the criminally insane, many who were serial killers. He disappeared one night and no one knows the why of that issue either.

The house is beautiful and even has its own carriage house. Merrill Brewster is the mother of two children and her husband Dan will be at the house only on weekends. She has a history of being known as overly cautious and unnaturally afraid of all of the things that could happen in life. Eric is her teenage son, who with is friends investigates the carriage house. After that, strange things begin to happen. His sister’s cat shows up at the sheriff’s office mutilated in a box. Each boy has recently had a nightmare that leads him to feel responsible. In the carriage house, after tearing down a bricked wall, they find the treasure the doctor had hidden. All sorts of items have been taken apart, pieces are missing, and the boys start to find them and put them back together. The room has its own energy and what seems like minutes turns out to be hours. In addition, the history of these items turns out to be an ominous warning. The boys continue to have nightmares after every time they put something back together, and time is lost with each visit. They have learned to feel apprehensive about returning to the room, but they are drawn there and cannot seem to help themselves.

There is one other suspect to the strange and dire happenings in Phantom Lake. He knew the doctor and has had nightmares of his own since the place was rented. Waiting for the Fourth of July, the drama unfolds.

John Saul has written numerous novels of bone-chilling intensity. This one is slow moving but ends with a bang. The characters are likeable and mostly understandable. Are you paranoid if they are after you? His other books usually move at a faster pace, but this one picks up and moves along nicely. If you like this book, try his others.