The Dark Door
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4.3 • 3 Ratings
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- $5.99
Publisher Description
Something is causing an outbreak of madness and death in the vicinity of abandoned hotels around the country, and someone is torching abandoned hotels. Charlie and Constance are hired to find and stop the arsonist, but as they are drawn deeper and deeper into the mystery they become aware that government agencies are also probing, not for the arsonist, but for the source of whatever it is that brings about murderous madness, that causes bodies to rise and walk, and makes people vanish. What kind of power is at work, who developed it, and most importantly, who or what can control it? Charlie and Constance are determined not to control it, but to destroy it, and it costs them dearly.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Typical of Wilhelm's recent work ( Huysman's Pets ), this SF story takes the form of a mystery novel whose solution is, in human terms, unknowable. A malfunctioning alien space probe flickers in and out of existence from another dimension. All that Earthly eyes can see is a bizarre patterns: random outbreaks of madness and murder that occur in old, closed-up, wood-frame hotels. The loss of his wife and son compels Carson Danvers to go a monomaniacal crusade, burning down each of these host buildings, in hopes of ending the local manifestations. Alarmed insurance companies bring in retired arson investigator Charlie Meiklejohn to catch the criminal, but the sleuth soon teams up with his quarry to deal with the larger, deeper problem. Wilhelm is in top form as the thriller plot races along while characters teeter over an abyss of insanity and loss.
