BOOK REVIEW | STAY IN THE LIGHT | A.M. SHINE

 

ABOUT THE BOOK

YOU MAY HAVE ESCAPED... BUT YOU'LL NEVER BE FREE.

After her terrifying experience at the hands of the Watchers, Mina has escaped to a cottage on the west coast of Ireland. She obsessively researches her former captors, desperate to find any way to prolong the safety of humankind.

When Mina encounters a stranger near her home, she fears the worst – for she knows the figure is not what it seems. Soon, people she has encountered start to disappear.

Mina knows the Watchers' power is growing. She flees for her life, but when she reports her fears she finds her sanity questioned. Can she convince people that the Watchers are real, and ready to strike – or will she suffer the fate she has dreaded since she first encountered those malevolent beings?

A chilling modern twist on the Gothic horror novel, perfect for fans of Kealan Patrick Burke, T. Kingfisher and classic horror.

REVIEW

In this second book we catch up with Mina and ‘the yellow one’ shortly after the events of the first book,discovering that she has now to a new place by he sea after been warned by Madeline to move out of the city.

Whilst living on a farm in a building that the owners have converted for their daughter, Mina almost resembles the things that she escaped from. 

Drinking herself into oblivion whilst attempting to find out more about the Watchers and get as much information about possible sightings throughout history, Mina lives almost the same as she did in the Coop.

In addition to this, we get the point of view of Seam Kilmartin, the son of Professor David Kilmartin who has discovered evidence of an archeological find in an area known as the Burren, which would prove his father’s theories and research. 

Stay in The Light moves the story of Mina and The Watchers along brilliantly and expands on the world of Irish mythology that A. M. Shine created in the first book. He introduces other elements of Irish folklore, subverting it to create a mesmerising follow up.

The book does take some patience to find its stride, but once it does it flies by. 

As usual, Shine writes with his beautiful prose, but it is his characters that are so wonderfully rounded. Mina, who still remains a shade of herself and has virtually imprisoned herself in her new home. Almost becoming a representation of the Watchers themselves as she lives in the house that the owners of the boarding house that we learn that she originally moved to, built for their daughter. We learn that she looks remarkably like the daughter and she seems to mimic her persona. 

For the most part of the book, we spend most of the time with Mina as an observer as she quietly drinks to forget the events that occurred in The Watchers, occasionally visiting Clara, but mostly staying cooped up in the house, which seems to be a self imposed isolation from the outside world. However the book changes pace when Mina is forced out of her reverie to fight the threat from The Watchers encroaches heavily and she has to fight the horror to come. It’s at this point that the pace of the story picks up as Mina has to fight to make others believe that The Watchers are real and that this is not some figment of her imagination.

Whilst the book is different in tone and scope from the first book, Shine expands both the world where th Watchers is set and the mythology surrounding them. Mixing this with fast paced story telling, I can’t wait to see how this trilogy will end.