Book Review of Episode Thirteen by Craig DiLouie
Name of Book: Episode ThirteenAuthor: Craig DiLouie
ISBN: 978-0-316-44310-4
Publisher: Redhook
Type of book: supernatural, ghosts, entity, spirits, haunting, phenomena, science, debunking, haunted house, maze, labyrinth, desires, life or death, epistolary format
Year it was published: 2023
Summary:
A ghost-hunting reality TV crew gain unprecedented access to an abandoned and supposedly haunted mansion, which promises a groundbreaking thirteenth episode, but as they uncover the secret history of the house, they learn that “reality” TV might be all too real — in Bram Stoker Award nominated author Craig DiLouie's latest heart pounding novel of horror and psychological suspense.
Fade to Black is the newest hit ghost hunting reality TV show. It’s led by husband and wife team Matt and Claire Kirklin and features a dedicated crew of ghost-hunting experts.
Episode Thirteen takes them to Matt's holy grail: the Paranormal Research Foundation. This crumbling, derelict mansion holds secrets and clues about the bizarre experiments that took place there in the 1970s. It's also, undoubtedly, haunted, and Matt hopes to use their scientific techniques and high tech gear to prove it.
But, as the house begins to slowly reveal itself to them, proof of an afterlife might not be everything Matt dreamed of.
A story told in broken pieces, in tapes, journals, correspondence, and research files, this is the story of Episode Thirteen — and how everything went horribly wrong.
The primary characters include the husband and wife team, Matt and Claire Kirklin. Matt Kirklin is the one that believes in ghosts and supernatural and is looking for his big break. He is also completely devoted to Claire, willing to do whatever he can to make her happy. He is both naïve and blind though and is thought of as the boss by others. Claire is seen as the scientist of the group, trying to disprove the supernatural phenomena. She desires to leave the show and go back to her scientific roots but often feel as if she owes to her husband to stick it out. The secondary characters would be Kevin Linscott, Jessica Valenza (Rasheeda Brewer) and Jake Wolffson. Kevin used to be a police officer and strongly believes in supernatural, often claiming to have met a devil in disguise. Jessica (Rasheeda) is a single mother who desires to become an actress and will do what she can to achieve that dream. Jake is the cameraman who only cares more for action.
Theme:
How far will one go to attain desires? How many licks to eat a tootsie pop?
Plot:
The story is in third person narrative but its written in epistolary style of letters, journal entries, webcam footage, text messages. The tale begins with an editor writing a note about the Foundation House and the ultimate message. and then the reader jumps into character introductions of the players who will participate in unraveling the mystery of Foundation House and the novel begins. Until I read this novel I had no idea that ghost hunting used so many tools to assess whether or not ghosts are real. While the novel is advertised as horror, and yes it does horror aspects to it, to me it seemed a lot more philosophical than horror, and here is a question I have for the "editor" how and why should we trust you?
Author Information:
(From goodreads)
Craig DiLouie is an author of popular thriller, apocalyptic/horror, and sci-fi/fantasy fiction.
In hundreds of reviews, Craig’s novels have been praised for their strong characters, action, and gritty realism. Each book promises an exciting experience with people you’ll care about in a world that feels real.
These works have been nominated for major literary awards such as the Bram Stoker Award and Audie Award, translated into multiple languages, and optioned for film. He is a member of the HWA, International Thriller Writers, and IFWA.
This was actually a pretty excellent read, although it struck me as more philosophical than horror (but then my idea of horror is to read science fiction with robots and AI that is all too human.) it had the style and potential of Christopher Pike novel, but as I mentioned, for me it was very philosophical and asked a lot of questions that I perhaps hadn't considered nor thought of such as: when will we hit the limits before the destruction? And what happens when evidence is before our eyes? Will we doubt or become believers? And whom is manipulating whom? I highly enjoyed the psychology and the questions the story brought up, along with learning about ghost hunting and the tools that were used to accomplish it.
This was given for review
4 out of 5
(0: Stay away unless a masochist 1: Good for insomnia 2: Horrible but readable; 3: Readable and quickly forgettable, 4: Good, enjoyable 5: Buy it, keep it and never let it go.)
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