Review of The Dead Letters (Mass Market Paperback)

Piccirilli writes dark. His novels are full of dread, sadness, and his characters often have little hope. They are all misfits of some kind and all of them have lost something. It could be their limbs, their lifestyle, their freedom, their sanity, normalcy, or a loved one. In this book it's the loss of a child that haunts the protagonist.

The plot concerns a man who has dedicated his life to finding the serial killer who murdered his daughter, and then other children. The killer smothered his daughter in her bed while she slept with her own pillow. After several more killings, a twist comes into the case. The killer starts kidnapping children from abusive homes and then brings them to the families of the children he killed.

This novel has all of the characteristics you come to expect from a Piccirrilli novel. A main character filled with tremendous loss of some kind, guilt, and a need for closure or acceptance. It has some really strange people in it in the form of a wacky cult who's involved with their own serial killings whose members who are as odd and deadly as they come. The story has supernatural elements with both the wacky cult and the main character himself to keep horror readers adequately enthused. And it has an ending that defines a Piccirrilli novel.

I enjoyed this novel much more than Headstone City. Its plot was straightforward without a lot of sub plots or distractions. Its mood was sullen and depressing giving punch to the chills and very thrilling portions of the story. And the story itself was disturbing enough to make me come back to it in my mind after I finished the last page.

When an author writes a book as great as November Mourns, (or even Choir of Ill Children) there is a tendency to compare all other books he writes after it to that masterpiece. This is unfair to the author (look at King's work after "It") and it's tempting to do so. But I'm gonna do it anyway...this book is not as good as the two mentioned above, but it is certainly a great read and I would place it at number 3 of my all time favorite Piccirilli novels. I would recommend this book to Piccirilli fans and to those who have not read the author before.

T.T.Zuma



Product Description
Five years ago, Eddie Whitt's daughter Sarah became the victim of a serial killer known as Killjoy, and Whitt vowed to hunt him down-no matter what the cost. But the police have given up. And Killjoy has stopped killing...and in some bizarre act of repentance has begun kidnapping abused infants and leaving them with the parents of his original victims.

The only clues to Killjoy's identity lie in a trail of taunting letters. And even as they lead Whitt to a deadly cult-and closer to his prey-he begins to suspect that, like his wife, he's losing his grip on reality: Sarah's dollhouse is filled with eerie activity, as if her murder never occurred.As dark forces rise around him, Whitt must choose-between believing that evil can repent...and stepping into a trap set by a killer who may know the only way to save Whitt's soul.

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