Once I got past the slightly clumsy read-these- newspaper-articles-to-get-the-backstory start and on to the first chapter, this was a hell of a ride.

A supernatural thriller that felt fresh and kept turning up the tension until the final sentence.

An evil at its heart that was original, gruesome and fully realised.

A hero so broken he barely functions.

A series of races against time that were more than a puzzle because the emotions attached to the outcomes were so intense.

Most of the action was set in the husk of a once prosperous town in Upstate New York where the smell of desperation and failure is as pervasive as the reek of the tanning vats that once made the city wealthy.

A plot filled with discoveries that almost always lead to either disappointment or fear or doubt but which propel the reader forward with a growing need to know and a strengthening desire for the fractured hero finally to succeed.

The icing on the cake was pretty much perfect narration from Joshua Jackson.

And all that good stuff came to me free as part of my Audible membership.

What more could I ask for?