The plot may be a slow burn, but the horror is immersive and the fear paralyzing, as readers experience mortal danger, freezing cold, and debilitating vertigo along with the characters.
Opening with a masterfully terrifying scene, the stage is set for a high anxiety, cinematic tale, and Olde Heuvelt delivers with an intimate and disorienting storytelling style, told by alternating Sam’s notes as he grapples with demons from his past and present with Nick’s diary entries and a confession, parsed out in five sections. From the moment Nick is rescued, it is clear that he has brought something dark back with him, a force whose power is spilling out of his wrecked face and infecting others, with deadly consequences. Nick and Sam are young, handsome men, blissfully in love, until Nick is horribly disfigured in a climbing accident on Le Maudit, an Alpine mountain that even the locals won’t climb. ĭutch Horror master Olde Heuvelt returns with an epic tale of madness that, while less focused than Hex, is just as frightening.
