Avalina

BookLife.com Review

Rose (Death on the Railway) offers a proudly provocative thriller of the dark arts complete with witchcraft, revenge, the irresistible setting of Salem, Massachusetts, and a crafted-to-shock eroticism. Avalina Bishop is a fifteen-year-old young woman whose grandmother is a witch. With rumors that Avalina also possesses skills as a mistress of the dark arts, a group of teenagers decide to burn down her house-with Avalina inside. Before Avalina perishes, she calls upon the "Prince of Darkness" to spare her soul so she can reincarnate at a later time and seek revenge on her murderers. Her soul becomes entrapped in a necklace that passes from character to character, while Avalina works to possess her hosts' bodies and complete her mission.

Avalina's gruesome murder of course elicits reader sympathy, though her lack of self-reflection, empathy, and personal growth makes it challenging to connect with her. The opening chapter includes a graphic masturbation scene, featuring the fifteen-year-old hero, that seems to dare readers to set the book aside. Avalina, meanwhile, lacks empathy for the women she imprisons while possessing their bodies and plays a hand in their oppression. In her quest for revenge, Avalina possesses the body of Joan, a 21-year-old woman, proceeding to have sex with Joan's boyfriend despite Joan's internal protests, and crudely dismisses Joan's worries about pregnancy.

Simply put, the material is dark, perhaps pointedly so, as Rose favors shock and outrage over the development of tension. The storyline offers as many twists as it does reasons for sensitive readers to balk. Some welcome human warmth enters the tale in the form of Avalina's mother, who does everything in her power to serve as the voice of reason.

Takeaway: A pointedly dark witchcraft thriller in which a young woman invokes the dark arts to seek revenge.

Great for fans of: Richard Laymon, Russ Martin.

Production grades

Cover: A

Design and typography: A

Illustrations: N/A

Editing: B

Marketing copy: A