Life After Dane

I just wrapped up this audiobook and after a cringe fest (in a good way) of awful things I absolutely loved it! It played all the right keys of a brutal haunting/possession/nightmare story with a spotlight on what damage can happen to young minds when mistreated. This book pulled my heartstrings out of pity, all the while seeking retribution for later actions.
The teeth though. That makes me uneasy every time. Well done!

Poor Ella Peters. A mother should never have to mourn the loss of her child. It's a nightmare that no parent on Earth wants to live through. For Ella though, it's so much worse than that. Not only is her child gone, he died a monster. A killer. Dane Peters, the Rest Stop Dentist. A criminal who has been laid to rest. Or has he?

What is most heartbreaking about this story is that Dane wasn't born this way, he was made. Edward Lorn weaves a tale around the violent abuse of a young child, and the mother who stood by and let it happen. It's a testament to Lorn's writing that I felt empathy for Ella. As much as I hated her sometimes, as much as I wanted to reach into the book and shake her violently with both hands, I saw deep enough to understand. It wasn't the choices she made, it was the choices that were made for her in this brutal relationship. She was just trying to survive.

In fact, the writing throughout Life After Dane is gorgeous. Although I wasn't always on board with supernatural/horror aspect of this book, it never ceased to amaze me how deeply ingrained it was in my psyche. I'd find myself thinking about this book while I wasn't reading it. Wondering what might be going on in Ella's mind as a mother looking back on her broken past. It wasn't so much that I wanted to delve further into the horrors surrounding her, but more that I had to. I needed to know what happened next.

So why the three star rating you ask? There was a lot I enjoyed about Life After Dane, but I just couldn't wrap my head around the overall storyline. When Ella first started seeing things, I thought I knew what was coming. I was wrong. I was so, so very wrong. It confused the hell out of me. This is all on me, as a reader. It just wasn't my kind of read.

However, and this is a big however, I still highly recommend this book. Hold on, I'll explain. Edward Lorn's writing never fails to be brilliant, and that's glaringly obvious in Life After Dane. If I can be confused, but still care for the characters and be totally enamored with the writing? That's one hell of a book. And yes, Life After Dane is one hell of a book.

I discovered this author completely by accident when I participated in a very short but very detailed conversation about the demonic properties of cold pop tarts, then following a recommendation by a beard (the beard?) I decided to buy this book and I am so glad I took the plunge. This is as good as any horror book I've read. There's two things going on here, on one hand you got the very real human horror of abuse and then there is the paranormal element (a nod to The Dark Half?) It all works and its written brilliantly. The ending was just about as perfect as you can get. Just one thing, there does seem be a recurring thing about wrap around walkways, what was the significance or was I looking at something that wasn't there?