Have You Read This? August's Eyes by Glenn Rolfe

 Ghosts can haunt us, but so do memories. These ghosts of memory haunt us with the joys we can never again know as well as the regrets that make us second-guess ourselves. Sometimes, these memories can be patient. They can wait a long time, emerging years later, clawing their way out of our psyches where we buried them. Such is the fate of the protagonist in Glenn Rolfe’s supernatural thriller August’s Eyes.

When John Colby was a boy, he saw something he shouldn’t have. He saw a young friend get kidnapped by a killer the press called the Ghoul of Wisconsin. John buried this event deep in his mind until years later, when an adult John, now married and a social worker, is tormented by dreams where he is a boy and trapped in a place called Graveyard Land, and there is a Ghoul in that graveyard that he doesn’t want to find him. John thought that it was just a dream but that dream is intruding on the waking world, terrorizing his family and friends. The Ghoul is also very real, and he wants little Johnny to come with him to Graveyard Land and stay there forever.

Rolfe’s work is very reminiscent of Stephen King with its developed characters, slow-building tension, and epic, otherworldly confrontations. However, there’s a little bit of Jack Ketchum creeping in, or at least an extreme sensibility that shows Rolfe doesn’t mind exploring the subject of child abduction and assault. The book does indeed get dark, but it never feels exploitative. Rolfe does this by populating his book with characters that are more than one-dimensional hostages, characters that the reader can get to know, love, and cheer for as they fight their way through the story’s darkness. From wife Sarah, who is supportive of her husband while having her own interests, to Patrick, a hard-working teenager who gets a chance to put his true crime knowledge to use. Finally, there’s John Colby himself, who has his flaws, but he is still a likable protagonist and ultimately demonstrates the strength of character needed to fight back against the Ghoul and his minions. The book left a few gaps in the overall mythology, placing the main villain too deeply into the shadows at times, while the plot also moved too quickly, zipping quickly between chapters and storylines, but August’s Eyes  is still a great read for people who wish Stephen King would really cut loose. The book was still an enjoyable stroll through Graveyard Land even with some serious darkness always nipping at my heels.