Read By: Simon Vance

Set early in the 19th century, Powers's ( On Stranger Tides ) seventh
novel is a horror story that wonderfully evokes the period. On the stormy
night before his wedding, Dr. Michael Crawford, in an ill-advised moment
while drinking and carousing with two of his friends, slips his intended's
ring on the finger of a statue of a woman in the inn's courtyard. The
next morning the statue has disappeared. Disturbed, Crawford purchases
a new ring and goes to his wedding. The night's celebrations are followed
by a morning infinitely more horrifying than the previous one--Crawford
awakens to find his bride murdered. Doubting his own sanity, he flees
England, becoming aware that he is pursued by a lamia --a malignant
female spirit. He seeks help from his friends, the poets Byron and Shelley,
who, it turns out, have experience with such a monster. Strewn with
literary personages and allusions, the book is entertaining on several
levels, but most particularly as a chilling horror-adventure.

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