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A group of six unlikely but doughty children encounter the way of a colossal and dreadful supernatural darkness that has entered our realm from the deepest abyss of shadow. They have no choice but to spend their lifetimes battling it, experiencing terror upon terror in the ordeal.

A Familiar Premise with a Distinctive Spin

This outlines the narrative, roughly, of Stephen King’s seminal work It (his best; undeniable). It similarly frames of the celebrated author’s heir Joe Hill’s new chilling tome, in which six friends invoke the primordial, deeply sinister serpent King Sorrow from the Long Dark to help them defeat some baddies. As one might expect, their supernatural ritual backfires.

Acknowledging a Authorial Lineage

Joe Hill launched his profession making great efforts to remain separate from his famous father, adopting the nom de plume he maintains to this day and eschewing in-person meetings with his agent (he bears a striking resemblance to his father). But in this latest novel, he embraces it. Several quotes that consciously reflect some of King’s most famous (that classic opening line); a moment that brings to mind a recurring theme in King’s works (a riddling contest). Throughout this massive book, Joe Hill takes pleasure in his heritage, and the audience revels alongside.

The Cast of the Protagonists

Focusing on the companions: the majority are scholars at the imagined the esteemed institution in Maine. There’s Arthur, studious and brilliant, deciphering historical enigmas in his free moments; Colin, wealthy, sharp, and inclined to bulldoze anyone who stands in his way; the twin siblings; the beautiful Allie herself. Then we have Gwen, who doesn’t study with them, but emerges as crucial of their circle as they toy, partly convinced, partly skeptical, in the occult.

The Critical Summoning

The protagonist finds himself, due to circumstances beyond his control, obliged to take valuable volumes from his treasured institution’s archives by a group of neighborhood thugs. This devastates his scholarly soul, particularly as he’s compelled to seize the institution’s prized and chilling publication: the logbook of occultist the historical figure (condemned “for trafficking with the devyll in 1703”; the cover is crafted from his flesh). These young investigators read the journal, realize they are able to call forth what the author references as a “arrogant beast to aid our hero with his blackmail problem – and spend the rest of the novel enduring the repercussions. King Sorrow will indeed rid them of those problematic neighborhood criminals, but they are required to pick a different victim every twelve months or succumb to the dragon’s wrath. As Arthur later puts it: “You invoke terrible forces, all you get is additional horrors.”

Stylistic Fluidity and Inventive Range

Spanning forty years, Hill also moves with natural fluency through various literary forms: as the friends endeavor to address the situation they find themselves in by, in different ways, choosing undeniably wicked targets to sacrifice, or seeking means to slay the beast themselves, we go from suspense to shadowy tale, black-ops torture to love story to terror. One particularly memorable shift was to a quest story, within the subterranean depths beneath this UK region, a section tinged by the Lord of the Rings author that was magnificently horrifying.

An Expansive Canvas of Horror and Courage

We encounter trolls – those living under bridges and digital trolls, properly scary and superbly depicted. The story includes mystic weapons and deceptions, pulse-pounding sequences of courage and scenes of appalling malevolence, both human and otherworldly. It’s a tour de force: a horror novel that is chiefly a tribute to the imagination, and to devotion and companionship. “We longed for a tale to embrace and {now we’ve got one|presently we possess it|currently we hold it,” says Colin as the friends assemble around a surface, making preparations to call forth their serpent into being with the power of their thoughts.

According to Joe Hill in his introductory quote: “Here be dragons”. Don’t miss them.