Synopses & Reviews
A masterful psychological thriller, from the author of The Church of Dead Girls.
Another bucolic fall in northern New Hampshire, and the semester is under way at Bishop's Hill Academy. But this year the start of school has been less than tranquil. The new headmaster, Jim Hawthorne, has liberal ideas that the staff find far from welcome. He's also determined to do something about the long "tradition" of permanent loans to faculty of shovels, saws, even cars, from the school's supplies. Eloquent as he is on the subject of honor, rumor has it he's only taken this job to escape his past. And Hawthorne isn't the only uneasy newcomer. There's Jessica, a former stripper at fifteen, and Frank LeBrun, a replacement cook who's a bit too quick with a dirty joke. All three have secrets to conceal, memories to suppress.
Serene on the surface, the ivy-clad, tree-lined campus gives few clues to the school's history of special privileges, petty corruptions, and hidden allegiances. But as autumn advances, the affable smiles and pretenses of virtue wear thin. And as winter closes in, students, teachers, and staff get an education in savagery and murder. With his customary uncanny awareness of the intricacies of human nature, the acclaimed author of The Church of Dead Girls once again probes the daily life of an ordinary community to reveal the depths of good and evil.
Review
"[A]bsolutely compelling....Like the best thriller writers, Dobyns not only scares us with what is out there but also with what we find (or don't find) within ourselves." Bill Ott, Booklist
Review
"An enjoyably overstuffed thriller....[I]t's not [the] subtle characterization that will most please readers. More likely, they'll simply lean back and luxuriate in this clever tale's outrageously entertaining melodramatics." Kirkus Reviews
Review
"Prepare for plenty of flickering lights, gothic gore, fake hauntings and prep school horror....Dobyns, a poet and literary critic, writes stylishly and creates an atmosphere both claustrophobic and catastrophic." Ann Prichard, USA Today
Review
"[Dobyns's] prose is fluent and the plot races along like clockwork." Erik Burns, The New York Times Book Review
Review
"Dobyns's new novel succeeds, though it still does not top The Church of Dead Girls. As usual, Dobyns fleshes out mundane, real-world characters." Library Journal
About the Author
Stephen Dobyns has written nineteen novels, including the highly acclaimed
The Church of the Dead Girls and the bestselling Saratoga mystery series. He has also written nine works of poetry, a book of essays, and many short stories, for which he was won several awards, including the Pushcart Prize. Formerly a reporter for the
Detroit News and a teacher at the University of New Hampshire, Boston University, Brandeis, and the University of Iowa, he lives in the Boston area with his wife and three children.