People with the power to create and sustain the narratives that we live by tend to paint Christianity in pastel shades of positivity. We see children eagerly awaiting Christmas, couples begining new lives, infants being welcomed into communities of faith who promise to nurture them.
Of course we all know that awful things have been done in the name of religion. Take that mess over in Salem, Massachusetts where supposedly possessed children named alleged witches.
But that was then; we know much better now, you may be thinking.
Are you sure about that?
In her chilling debut dystopia, Amber Hathaway introduces readers to a rural Maine town where daily life revolves around the conformity to rules and hierarchy, where the most vile acts masquerade as virtue, and parents must make the most heartbreaking sacrifices.
After their grandmother's death siblings Alice and Andy are sent to the small town of Evanston, Maine to paint and clear out an ancestral property so their parents can sell it. They're expecting a week or two of mind numbing physical labor, rural boredom, and spotty, if not nonexistent, wifi. They have no warning of the evil that awaits them.
It becomes clear when they arrive in Evanston that its residents are different. They are dressed strangely, especially the girls and women who wear floor length dresses. Alice is given the unsolicited advice that "It would behoove you to cover up. Us ladies must maintain our modesty, so we don't tempt men to sin." And there not only is no wifi, but no landlines. A woman describes phones as "corrupting influences that corrode the moral fabric of society."
And ominous evidence begins to appear. Alice finds a picture of her grandmother as a child with what appears to be three sisters. On her death bed her grandmother had mentioned three sisters who were murdered. When she visits a graveyard she discovers that the three girls and an alarming number of others had July first mentioned as their death date.
Local teen Riley has been sent to help the siblings get the farmhouse sale ready. He and Alice have been discovering themselves to unlikely kindred spirits. He's in with them when seemingly the town is hunting them down relentlessly.
What sets Little White Flowers apart from many other chillers is the masterful development of setting and characters. You really feel like you're in the gloomy woods, the creepy church with its bizarre symbols, and the locked dungeon. And you care whether Alice, Andy, and Riley make it out alive.
And it's the first volume in a truly suspenseful trilogy.
On a purrrsonal note, it's been such a privilege to see Amber develop as a writer from her early days of scribbling stories in notebooks and scaring her neighborhood friends with really convincing stories set in Greystone to her debut novel. It's also been a privilege to see Little White Flowers evolve from first draft, getting more complex and spellbinding each step of the way.
A great big shout out goes out to Amber and to her partner, Brian, who couldn't possibly be more supportive of her work.
Jules Hathaway
Sent from my U.S.Cellular© Smartphones
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