Synopses & Reviews
When Lucy Cartaret dies, her journalist son Dan returns to her hometown, Fort Jude, Florida, in search of his real father and claiming to be investigating the mysterious deaths of three elderly women. Spontaneous human combustion, experts say. But why? Surely it's more than coincidence - and what links these deaths to Dan's mother? It soon becomes clear that something terrible happened during his mother's last year in town, thirty years before. But the social elite of Fort Jude remain tight-lipped. The families who run the town will do anything to protect their own - anything.
Review
When his mother dies, Dan Carteret has only two leads to the identity of his father: a photograph of four young men, and a newspaper cutting showing the remains of a victim of spontaneous human combustion. Carteret travels to his mother's hometown of Fort Jude and discovers that three cases of spontaneous combustion have occurred there in the recent past. In the search for his father, he confronts an affluent, insular society that closes ranks and refuses to give up the secret of what happened to Carteret's mother at a fateful beach party in her youth. A fragmented narrative, using half a dozen different viewpoints, tells the story of the "thin line between an organised society and raw nature", and presents a compelling account of people torn by clan loyalty and made desperate by love, hate and loneliness. Eric Brown, The Guardian
Review
Dan Carteret travels to Fort Jude, Florida, where his late mother grew up. As a journalist, Dan is intrigued by the number of spontaneous human combustion cases the town has seen, but, in reality, he is searching for his biological father, a man his mother has told him nothing about and has forbidden him from meeting. Dans intrusion into Wasp-ish Florida society stirs up old secrets concerning a terrible night many years ago when a girl was assaulted by a group of drunken jocks. He also discovers that some legacies are transferred through the generations by blood rather than nurture. Reeds writing is pithy, poignant and never less than gripping. No one escapes her eye for mercilessly dissecting human failings. Son of Destruction is about the toxicity of buried truths. It is also about psychic powers, although to the very last line the reader is kept guessing as to whether these actually exist in the world of this novel - or are merely the product of coincidence. James Lovegrove, Financial Times
Review
"This contemporary gothic mystery will keep readers guessing" The Guardian
Review
"A fragmented narrative, using half a dozen different viewpoints, tells the story of the "thin line between an organised society and raw nature", and presents a compelling account of people torn by clan loyalty and made desperate by love, hate and loneliness" Eric Brown
Review
"Reed's writing is pithy, poignant and never less than gripping. No one escapes her eye for mercilessly dissecting human failings. Son of Destruction is about the toxicity of buried truths. It is also about psychic powers, although to the very last line the reader is kept guessing as to whether these actually exist in the world of this novel - or are merely the product of coincidence" Booklist
Review
"Fascinating paranormal detective novel" James Lovegrove - Financial Times
Synopsis
A spellbinding American Southern Gothic thriller with a supernatural twist. On his mother’s death, LA Times reporter Dan Carteret returns to her hometown, Fort Jude in Florida, determined to discover the truth about his birth father. It becomes clear that something terrible happened during his mother’s last year at high school, and in the last thirty years three elderly women in the town have fallen victim to spontaneous human combustion. Is this coincidence? Dan questions the town’s residents, who are all tight-lipped. It seems that the families who run Fort Jude will do anything to protect each other . . .
About the Author
Award-winning science fiction writer Kit Reed is the author of more than twenty novels and over a hundred short stories. She serves as Resident Writer at Wesleyan University, Connecticut.