Anna Fort tries to be a good wife – really she does. Her husband Charles is a writer, skeptic, and amateur scientist, though he has little respect in the academic and literary communities. While Charles makes their family look ridiculous with his wild theories, Anna works herself to the bone. Finally, Charles might have a patron willing to put them up while he finishes his book. When the couple arrives at the eccentric patron’s sprawling private island, things are not what they anticipated. Anna finds herself surrounded by rumors of missing girls, stories of dead wives, and on an island she cannot escape.
| Title: King Nyx | Author: Kirsten Bakis |
| Release Date: February 27, 2024 | Genre: Historical Fiction / Mystery / Horror |
| Page Count: 320 | Publisher: Liveright |
| Audio Length: 10 hr. 30 min. | Audio Publisher: Recorded Books |
Synopsis
A haunting mystery about lost girls and the woman driven to find them, from the author of the contemporary classic Lives of the Monster Dogs.
Anna Fort wants to be a supportive wife, even if that means accompanying her husband for the winter of 1918 to a remote, frozen island estate so he can finish his book as the guest of an eccentric millionaire. When she learns three girls are missing from a school run by their host, Anna realizes finding them is up to her—even if that means risking her husband’s career, and possibly her life.
Her husband’s masterpiece-in-progress features strange meteorological anomalies along with wild speculations about “facts” he believes scientists hide from the public. Most people think Charles Fort is a crackpot. That’s about to change now that wealthy Claude Arkel is his patron.
Yet Anna is sure something’s not right on Prosper Island, though the alarming return of her “troubles” makes her question her own sanity. Is the figure in the woods really the ghost of her long-lost friend Mary, or a product of her disturbed imagination? Accompanied reluctantly by a fellow guest, the elegant and troubled Stella Bixby, Anna embarks on a dangerous quest to find the missing girls before Arkel finds her—or her own mind unravels.
A contemporary feminist tale with a dreamlike, gothic setting, King Nyx reintroduces readers, twenty-five years after her acclaimed debut, to one of our most astonishingly imaginative storytellers.
Review:
King Nyx is unsettling and incredibly thoughtful. American gothic Victorianism practically oozes from the pages. Memory, misremembering, and trauma are themes at the forefront of the novel, but King Nyx never feels heavy-handed or cliche. If you enjoy literary fiction with a speculative edge, King Nyx is a must-read. With conversations about mental health, lost girls, fair wages, and gender inequality bubbling under the surface, it’s all too timely.
I’ve noticed a theme this year with the February speculative-leaning historical fiction books. Katherine Arden’s The Warm Hands of Ghosts, Lee Mandelo’s The Woods All Black, and now Kirsten Bakis’s King Nyx, are all set from 1918 through the 1920s. Though the books are considerably different, the vibes in The Warm Hands of Ghosts and King Nyx are similar, and both were excellent reads for me. Both focus on mental illnesses and “lost” people, and each has an inescapable haunting quality that’s difficult to describe. I think if you like one, you’ll also enjoy the other.
Bahni Turpin skillfully narrates King Nyx, slowly building tension throughout the novel with her performance. Turpin has narrated audiobooks for a wide variety of genres, including Grady Hendrix’s The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires, Angie Thomas’s The Hate U Give, and Tomi Adeyemi’s Children of Blood and Bone, so it’s no surprise she excels in the genre-blending King Nyx.
Rating: 4.5/5 Stars
Thanks to Recorded Books for providing me with an advanced listening copy! All the above thoughts are my own.
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