Those Across the River (Christopher Buehlman)

Those Across the River
Christopher Buehlman
Ace
Fiction, Historical Fiction/Horror
****+ (Good/Great)

DESCRIPTION: Scarred by the Great War and academically ruined when he had an affair with his then-married current fiancee Eudora, Frank Nichols was in desperate need of a fresh start, somewhere - anywhere - to rebuild a life with the woman he loves. The letter from the aunt he never knew, leaving him control of the long-abandoned Savoyard Plantation in Georgia, was a lifeline, for all that the late woman's final letter warned him to simply sell the property without ever going there himself. Instead, Frank and Eudora pack up their Model A and head to the small town of Whitbrow, not far from the property. Like many small towns, it's an insular community with some peculiar local legends and customs, such as driving two pigs into the woods across the river every full moon, but it seems harmless enough. Frank even sets his mind to settling in and writing a book about the Savoyard, whose master - his ancestor - was notorious for cruelty even among his cruel peers and where the slaves rose up in a bloody and gruesome revolt to end his reign of terror after the Confederacy's fall. But from the start Frank gets warnings and signs to leave the ghosts of the past alone, and to avoid the ill-omened woods across the river where the old ruins stand... and where something dark and malevolent may still lurk today, something ever hungry for fresh blood...

REVIEW: I was very impressed with Buehlman's fantasy novel The Blacktongue Thief and am eagerly awaiting the sequel, but in the meantime I figured it was worth my while to explore his other works. While lacking the dark humor of The Blacktongue Thief, Those Across the River is still an excellent, bleak, and occasionally twisted tale of monsters and secrets and scars, physical and psychological, that reach out of the past to consume the present and the future.
Frank starts with more than ample scars on his body and mind, suffering from post-traumatic stress after his time in the trenches of World War I. His would-be wife Eudora, once the wife of his mentor and fellow professor in his old university job, is among the few who can handle his moods and frequent nightly screaming fits; it is clear from the start that she and Frank are truly in love, not merely in lust, for all that their affair (and her divorce) destroyed both of their reputations. Coming to Whitbrow is the change of scenery they both need; she can get a job teaching at the small school, while Frank works on landing another professorship and tries to write the story of his notorious ancestor, a figure who both repels and oddly fascinates him. In town, they find an assortment of small town characters, as well as a secret that has lingered since the days of the Savoyard Plantation's heyday, a secret tied to the odd pig festival that lean times finally end... only for the townsfolk to be reminded of why the sacrifice has been needed all these years. Frank and Eudora both get pulled far deeper into the mystery than either intended, doomed almost from the start by a certain air of fate unfolding. Even when they get a chance to leave, they realize it's too late to avoid what's coming, for them and the whole of Whitbrow. The tale unfolds under a dark cloud that only grows darker with every chapter, managing to draw out the suspense without making me feel like I was being strung along, in part because it delivers on its ominous warnings and foreshadowing in full (and then some).
The squeamish are advised to steer clear; blood, death, and mutilations abound, especially as things pick up toward a climax that tests Frank and Eudora's bond to the breaking point. All through the tale are themes of the deep scars left by the brutality of slavery and how easily people can become the very monsters they fear and despise, generation after generation. By the end, it has taken the reader on a truly harrowing journey through one man's personal, inescapable Hell. Very well written and compelling, though not for the faint of heart.

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