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Six oddball but doughty youngsters encounter the way of a vast and fearsome supernatural darkness that has infiltrated our world from the farthest reaches of darkness. They must wage a lifelong battle fighting it, experiencing one nightmare after another in the struggle.

An Echoing Premise with a New Approach

This outlines the narrative, in essence, of the master of horror’s seminal work It (arguably his finest; no arguments). It is also the plot of King’s son Joseph Hillstrom King’s recent horror doorstopper, in which six friends invoke the age-old, utterly malevolent dragon the Dragon King from the Abyssal Void to assist them in vanquishing some antagonists. As one might expect, their arcane ceremony goes awry.

Celebrating a Family Lineage

Joe Hill launched his profession striving diligently to distance himself from his well-known dad, adopting the nom de plume he continues to employ and steering clear of encounters with his agent (he possesses a striking resemblance to his parent). Yet with this recent release, he leans into it. There are lines that deliberately echo some of the senior author’s well-known (that classic opening line); a incident that evokes a signature King element (a battle of wits). In this epic story, Hill is delighting in his heritage, and we delight along with him.

Meet the Central Figures

Returning to the group: five of them are pupils at the imagined Rackham College in this northeastern locale. First is Arthur, bookish and gifted, cracking ancient puzzles in his spare time; the character Colin, wealthy, sharp, and inclined to bulldoze anyone who stands in his way; Donna and Donovan; the attractive the lovely Allie. And there’s Gwen, who doesn’t study with them, but assumes a vital role of their group as they toy, somewhat credulous, partly skeptical, in arcane arts.

The Pivotal Ritual

The protagonist finds himself, for reasons we don’t need to go into, compelled to pilfer valuable volumes from his cherished academic collection by a bunch of local criminals. This tears at his bookish heart, notably because he’s made to take the collection’s foremost and chilling title: the diary of practitioner Enoch Crane (condemned “for dealing with infernal entities in 1703”; the book’s jacket is made from his skin). Our Scooby gang read the journal, discover they could summon what the author references as a armoured devil” to aid our hero with his extortion dilemma – and occupy the subsequent narrative facing the fallout. This ancient entity will indeed rid them of those troublesome local drug dealers, but they’ll have to choose a new sacrifice annually or fall prey to the beast. As Arthur later puts it: “You invoke terrible forces, all you get is further monstrosities.”

Narrative Fluidity and Inventive Range

Covering a generation, the author shifts with natural fluency across narrative styles: as the companions strive to manage the predicament they find themselves in by, in different ways, choosing undeniably wicked targets to immolate, or hunting down ways to destroy the entity themselves, we move between suspense to shadowy tale, clandestine torment to love story to fright. A standout transition was to a adventure narrative, within the subterranean depths below Cornwall, a part tinged by the Lord of the Rings author that was gloriously terrifying.

A Rich Tapestry of Fear and Hope

We encounter trolls – those living under bridges and internet antagonists, properly scary and perfectly brought to life. We see enchanted blades and deceptions, breath-taking moments of bravery and instances of appalling malevolence, both earthly and extraterrestrial. This is a remarkable achievement: a horror novel that is primarily a tribute to the human inventiveness, and to devotion and companionship. “We longed for a tale to embrace and {now we’ve got one|presently we possess it|currently we hold it,” says this character as the friends gather at the table, preparing to summon their dragon into being with the force of their minds.

As Hill puts it in his opening statement: “Hic sunt dracones”. Don’t miss them.