Synopses & Reviews
In the end it is people, not places, that are haunted.
Tommy Keeday is a talented student at a boarding school for gifted Navajo teens, located in the vast high desert of western New Mexico. When he is suddenly seized by an illness with bizarre and frightening symptoms, his family believes he is possessed by a chindi, the hostile spirit of a dead ancestor. But Julieta McCarty, the principal of Oak Springs School, is unwilling to accept either a traditional Navajo explanation or a conventional medical diagnosis. In desperation, she calls on Seattle-based parapsychologist Cree Black.
Nothing in Cree's training as a clinical psychologist or her experience as a paranormal investigator has prepared her for the dangerous task of helping this brilliant boy in whom two spirits seem to battle. Is Tommy Keeday just a sensitive but troubled teenager, or is he suffering from an exotic brain disorder? Or is there truth in the terrifying Navajo legends of witches, skinwalkers, and malevolent ghosts? As Cree and her associates struggle to find the answer, it becomes apparent that there are secrets in the pasts of Tommy and the people around him, and that his fate can only be decided by exposing these unresolved longings and regrets.
Drawing on in-depth research and personal experience, Daniel Hecht's latest novel, the second in the Cree Black series, is a thrillingly plausible supernatural mystery, a passionate love story, and a thoughtful exploration of Navajo culture and identity in modern America.
Review
"A psychological thriller in its most literary sense...The writing is poetic in a way that is sure to raise gooseflesh.
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"Hecht is so good at making his ghosts and demons believable...Well balanced and beautifully written." Chicago Tribune
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"Daniel Hecht scores again in a series that is absorbing, lyrical, and altogether frightening...This is one series you won't want to miss."-- New Mystery Reader
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"Hecht evokes the setting and the Navajo culture with skill and sensitivity." Cleveland Plain Dealer
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"As with the first Cree Black novel, Hecht balances paranormal phenomena with everyday concerns...Creepy and convincing." Booklist
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"Shocking and heartbreaking...Read it!" Arizona Tribune
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"Hecht writes fluidly and draws convincing portraits." Kirkus Reviews
Synopsis
Parapsychologist Cree Black is called to a New Mexico school for gifted Navajo teens to investigate the mysterious symptoms of a student. Sixteen-year-old Tommy Keeday is wracked nightly with violent convulsions. Is the boy possessed by the spirit of an ancestor, as his family believes? Or is something even more sinister going on?
About the Author
Daniel Hecht was a professional guitarist for twenty years. He took up writing in 1989 and received his M.F.A. from the Iowa Writers' Workshop in 1992; his first novel,
Skull Session, was a bestseller in 1997. Since then he has published two other novels, including the first of the Cree Black series,
City of Masks, a BookSense 76 pick.