Tamara Thorne
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Review of
Bad Things
When Rick Piper decides it's time to take his kids out of Vegas and face the demons of his childhood at the old family home, he doesn't realize that the demons are still there-both within him and within the home, a rambling stone mansion complete with a built-in maze of secret passages courtesy of a jocular ancestor. The widowed Piper, a Dave Barry-ish columnist, had settled in gambler's paradise not for the action, but for the day and night lights. Seriously afraid of the dark, Vegas seemed a haven from a bizarre childhood that included Robin, his legless twin brother, the murder of their parents and-as if those weren't enough-the ability to see greenjacks, tiny elf-like creatures whose nightly cavorting is said to curse selected Pipers through the length of the family tree. On Halloween, evil greenjacks are said to build Big Jack out of branches and twigs and vines, and with his help may well be able to take over a human body, imprisoning the human's soul inside a formless greenjack. Rick Piper thinks Robin was possessed by a greenjack one Halloween. After all, Robin had suddenly become a jealous and calculating little demon determined to make Rick's life miserable. For example Robin's nightly, maliciously slimy refrigerator raids culminating in contamination of the family's food. But Rick has convinced himself that all this is simply too ridiculous to be true, chalking it up to insanity. Rick has blocked out most of the events surrounding his parents' death, as well as the home he and his brother were forced to share with evil guardians Aunt Jade and Uncle Howard. Without Carmen, the faithful housekeeper, Rick could never have survived the escalating evil in which the "new" Robin engaged. As the memories resurface, Rick is forced to face the past bit by tormenting bit, until he must either deal with it or allow himself to sink into madness. And he will have to face the family history, the greenjack myth, once and for all. Tamara Thorne (Candle Bay, Eternity, Moonfall) lets the characters carry the story through skillful time jumps. Making Rick fear the dark is particularly effective, touching a nerve because so many of us share that supposedly irrational fear. Great secondary characters Carmen and Dakota round out the cast. Aunt Jade and her stuffed poodles add a creepy note, and Robin's flashback antics deteriorate rapidly from harmless to murderous. Watch those tunnels! Based on various Green Man myths and laced with just enough humor to offset the strangeness, Bad Things is a gripping, eccentric adventure. That so many disparate elements can come together so convincingly is tribute to Thorne's ability to imbue the plot with inner logic. This novel will make you look twice at those formless shadows in the trees, and Halloween may never seem quite as harmless as it was. But that's the point, isn't it? Return to Bad Things by Tamara Thorne |
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