The River Through the Trees — David Peak

Decades ago, Dan and Grace Robertson encountered a childhood legend: Bicycle Bob. Some say he's an insane drifter with a taste for blood. Others call him evil made flesh and claim his touch will poison your soul. Some say he's just another country ghost story. Now, Dan is a cemetery caretaker who prefers the solace of his work to the complexities of living people. Grace persists as a strung-out addict living on the fringes. Grace has set a desperate plan in motion, and Dan is the only one who knows the root of her madness. He alone can uncover the unholy monstrosity hungering beneath the surface of a dying town.

David Peak's The River Through the Trees is a grotesque of impoverished rural life, a life of quiet acceptance broken only by drugs, death metal, desecration, and the teachings of an ancient book. Combining the compelling pacing of Lehane, the cosmic terror of Lovecraft, and the defunct modernity of Ligotti, it is a taut, disturbing story whose haunting images bring to mind the dark places we do our best to ignore.

DAVID PEAK is the author of Surface Tension and Glowing in the Dark.