Diviner's Tale

[A] splendidly written mystery . . . a compelling story. Grade: A Cleveland Plain Dealer . Subtle distinctive and well-wrought. Washington Post . Hired by a developer to dowse a lonely forested valley in upstate New York Cassandra Brooks comes upon a girl hanged from a tree. When she returns with authorities however the body has vanished calling into question her sanityat least until a dazed mute girl emerges from the woods alive and eerily reminiscent of Cassandras vision of the hanged girl. Increasingly bizarre divinations ensue leading Cassandra back to a past she thought long behind her locking her in a mortal chess match with a killer who has returned from the past to haunt her once more. . Sublime . . . creates a seamless breathing breathtaking unity of the literary and the suspense novel detonating the very notion of genre. Riveting insightful sentence-by-sentence charged with feeling it bears us helpless with it on its downward journey to illumination. Peter Straub .