Review: Electrifying and Blood-Tingling
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 05 3, 2013
"It was stupid, childish even, but she couldn't help but feel that there was something in the blackness, waiting for her."Such is the writhing, riveting feeling of suspense that consistently plagues not only the characters of this thrilling horror story, but also serves to brilliantly and fluently infect its readers.David Jester's Evergreen is an electrifying, blood-tingling, and macabre mix of literary skill and strategy and the meticulously depicted range of human emotion and experience. This truly effective combination serves to not only keep readers constantly questioning and guessing, but also allows readers to connect more intimately with the experiences and reactions of the members of a small, close-knit community savagely torn apart by the vicious, murderous, and sadistic actions of one of their own.Jester introduces readers to the small gypsy community of Evergreen, where neighbors are more like family, and friends can be found wherever you look. That is, until the mangled, lifeless body of Sheila Haynes's daughter found displayed in her own front yard serves as the shocking and sickening introduction to a string of truly demented and sadistic murders in Evergreen. What's worse? The killer is one of the community's own. But who could it be?The nave choices made by the heads of the community, Patrick Ryan and his bull-headed drunk of a mentor and friend, Aidan McCleary, allow them to become blinded by their own pride and ignorance, leading the community down misguided paths to unfounded accusations, heartless executions, and senseless brutality. All the while, their actions bring them no closer to uncovering the truth, or unmasking the true killer, and with their numbers dwindling due to the constant killings as well as families packing up and leaving the community out of fear for their lives and the lives of their children, the anger and desperation of Patrick and Aidan, as well as that of the community as a whole, only grow. Such desperation, anger, and fear eventually lead the community to the precipice of its own demise as suspicions, anxieties, and a collective need for resolution boil and bubble over, spilling forth long-hidden community secrets, shocking personal betrayals, and an extraordinarily well-written and surprising discovery of the true killer's identity.Jester has written a wonderfully entertaining story that is sure to feed your paranoia, spark your intrigue, initiate unease, and masterfully elicit and evoke real emotion. Can you figure out who the killer is?