Synopsis
In this world, two souls inhabit a single body, one by day, one by night. But though they live alongside one another, their ends do not always align. For Special Inspector Morden, whose hunt for a dangerous witch takes him far from home, this will be a problem…
Christophor Morden lives by night. His day-brother, Alexsander, knows only the sun. They are two souls in a single body, in a world where identities change with the rising and setting of the sun. Night-brother or day-sister, one never sees the light, the other knows nothing of the night.
Early one evening, Christophor is roused by a call to the city prison. A prisoner has torn his eyes out and cannot say why. Yet worse: in the sockets that once held his eyes, teeth are growing. The police suspect
the supernatural, so Christophor, a member of the king’s special
inspectorate, is charged with finding the witch responsible.
Night-by-night, Christophor’s investigation leads him ever further from home, toward a backwards village on the far edge of the kingdom. But the closer he gets to the truth, the more his day-brother’s actions frustrate him. Who is Alexsander protecting? What does he not want Christophor to discover? And all the while, an ancient and apocalyptic ritual creeps closer to completion.
Review
I went a little out of my comfort zone for this read. I’m not usually one to choose a horror or detective genre book. And this one was a mix of both! Yet, I’m extremely thankful that I did! Equinox is a brilliantly executed tantamount world to our own that had me bewitched and unable to put the book down. David Towsey has managed to combine a true crime detective story with the supernatural in the best of ways.
Equinox has many unique aspects going for it. One in particular that I loved and really want more of is how all of mankind has been given multiple personalities. I use the word ‘personalities’ loosly because it seems clear to me that these duel minds living in the same body are actually separate persons altogether. We can even see this by the multiple POV style it is written in with the two MCs being each a half of this one body yet completely different in every way. David’s ability to write 2 personalities for every person in the story made this a mind bending story that really had me guessing the entire time.
On a similar line of thought, David’s characters were really enjoyable to read. Having to deal with the constant tension of someone else in your body half of each day really comes through and helps the dialogue become much deeper. My favorite character probably being Alexsander, was really fun to see his character development throughout. Plus the other interesting people met along the way.
You can imagine how this dual souls situation makes for some very interesting detective concepts. I truly was stumped throughout the entire book. I had theories but I failed in the end! In my mind that means this story succeed in this genre! I think if you like detective shows or books you would very much enjoy this even with the horror side of it!
Speaking of the horror side, I feel like I need to speak on that side of this story some. In a way I don’t want to call this horror but I just don’t know what else you would call it. With supernaturally horrid things happening causing death and all sorts of stuff, I feel like it must be. Yet, I did struggle to find any of the situations truly scary. But this may also be because I’m not a horror reader and am not used to reading such things. Yet, David’s execution of these was on point. The entire book there certainly is a tension that the characters feel and you as the reader experience. This ultimately trumped any negatives just because of how well that was written into the setting and dialogue of the story.
The only negative I have for Equinox is that at times I felt like the pace felt a little slow. However, some of that was because of the mood of the book. You definitely need to be in a darker and moodier mindset when you go into this book or else you mind find parts a little dry. I have been in a reading slump recently and I think this actually helped me back up because of how different it was from so much of the other stuff I read! So even though some scenes were dragging a bit it hardly affected my enjoyment.
Finally I wanted to talk about some of the major themes I picked up throughout! The largest being, in my mind anyways, the constant inner struggle that everyone has with themselves. We all have a dark side and a light side, a serious side and a care free side, etc. Sometimes these bump heads throughout our life and cause issues. This was certainly true in the story and I think you’ll find the expiration of this very interesting. You’ll also find a lot about how our actions affect others besides ourselves. Other smaller themes being the consequences of war, is mankind really worth saving, evidence doesn’t always lead to guaranteed truth, and can kids be trusted?
As you can see, I really enjoyed this book. If you are a fan of any of the things you read above then I really believe you will like this book! So go take a look on amazon by clicking the link on this review and give it a shot!
I’m so thankful for Head of Zeus Publishing for letting me take part in this tour! If you haven’t checked out their website, here’s your chance! www.headofzeus.com
Author Bio
David Towseyis a graduate of the Creative Writing programmes at Bath Spa University and Aberystwyth University. Born in Dorset, he now lives in Cardiff with his girlfriend and their growing board game collection. Together, they write under the pseudonym of D.K. Fields whose Tales of Fenest trilogy is also published by Head of Zeus.
David’s first novel, Your Brother’s Blood, was published by Quercus, and was the first in the Walkin’ Trilogy. He is also one half of the indie games company,Pill Bug Interactive, who have released three titles across PC and Nintendo Switch™.
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