Veena’s review of Hold Back the Dark (Bishop SCU, Book 6) by Kay Hooper
Romantic Thriller published by Berkley 03 Apr 18
This dark series featuring the Special Crimes Unit has chilled its way through small towns in and around North Carolina. This time psychics are summoned to Prosperity to stand witness to a horrific crime wave that is sweeping this hithertofore seemingly calm and prosperous town.
It’s no coincidence that Prosperity is at the center of a grid of the SCU’s recent cases. Get ready to come face to face with things that go bump in the night and raise the hair on your arms.
The crimes are horrific and revolting. The town is traumatized. The dead and even some of the seemingly living might as well be dead and the rest of the townsfolk will never be the same again. The disparate band of psychics who come together to Prosperity to fight this new evil are far from a team. It’s up to seasoned SCU Operative Hollis, with her multiple advanced psychic senses, to create a team who will hold down the line and hopefully stop the evil in its tracks.
Ms. Hooper weaves a compelling tale as the team starts investigating, even as the toll of the dead and damaged continues to rise. The crime scenes are far ranging and ghastly, though they feel a bit staged. The entire story reads like an exercise as people come together, learn to operate as a team, and investigate clues to find the answers.
Even though this story lacks the punch delivered by some of the earlier books in the series, Ms. Hooper continues to be one of my favorite authors and on my auto-buy list.
Grade: C
Summary:
A town in the thrall of evil. A summons that can’t be ignored. The SCU returns in a nail-biting novel from New York Times bestselling author Kay Hooper.
The Chosen have been warned. Powerful psychics across the globe have gotten the same eerie and insistent message: Go to Prosperity. Because in this small North Carolina mountain town, madness has taken hold…
Trapped in a nightmare they can’t escape, the residents of Prosperity are killing one another, waking up with no memory of the monstrous acts they’ve committed–or the reasons why. Chief Deputy Katie Cole knows that whatever evil is afoot is beyond her expertise, and beyond the understanding of Sheriff Jackson Archer. They need help.
The Special Crimes Unit is called in for its specific brand of investigation, to aid the Chosen as well as the once-peaceful mountain town. It will take all the agents’ training, all their experience, and every extra sense they can call on to get to the bottom of things in Prosperity. And as a sinister pattern begins to emerge, even the most experienced and hardened SCU agents must brace themselves for a flood of darkness unlike any the world has ever seen…
No excerpt available.
