Beneath

by Kristi Demeester

Overview

When reporter Cora Mayburn is assigned to cover a story about a snake-handling cult in rural Appalachia, she is dismayed, for the world of cruel fundamentalist stricture, repression, glossolalia, and abuse is something she has long since put behind her in favor of a more tolerant urban existence. But she accepts the assignment, dredging up long-buried memories as she seeks the truth.

As Cora begins to uncover the secrets concealed by a veneer of faith and tradition, something ancient and long concealed begins to awaken. What secrets do the townsfolk know? What might the handsome young pastor be hiding? What will happen when occulted horrors writhe to the surface, when pallid and forgotten things rise to reclaim the Earth?

Will Cora--and the earth--survive? The answers--and pure terror--can only be found in one place: Beneath.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781939905291
Publisher:	Word Horde
Publication date:	04/30/2017
Pages:	320
Sales rank:	215,356
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.72(d)

About the Author

Kristi DeMeester writes pretty, spooky things in Atlanta, Georgia. Her work has appeared in publications such as Black Static, Apex Magazine, The Dark, and several others. Her work has been reprinted in Year's Best Weird Fiction Volumes 1 and 3. Her debut short fiction collection, Everything That's Underneath, is forthcoming this year from Apex Publications. In her spare time, she alternates between telling people how to pronounce her last name and how to spell her first. This is her first novel.

Editorial Reviews

04/10/2017
For her debut novel, short story veteran DeMeester has cooked up a concept that will make readers squirm, but the story lacks narrative coherence. Reporter Cora Mayburn is still haunted by the abuse that a preacher inflicted on her in her childhood when she’s asked to take an assignment in Hensley, N.C., in 1988. She’s given two weeks to interview Pastor Michael Wayne, a snake handler, and uncover something interesting and worth writing about. What she finds is 16-year-old Leah McDowell, who was born with a red mote in her eye and seems to be a host for something horrifying, and a town on the brink of ushering in an ancient evil called the Great Worm. Cora is only vaguely sympathetic, and she keeps offering to help Pastor Wayne even though she finds him repulsive. However, some scenes are genuinely shudderworthy, particularly those involving the transformation of Hensley’s children into creatures who creatively slaughter their parents for fun, and the sweaty, gritty Appalachian setting is full of religious fervor and salacious secrets. Sex (including fantasies about a teen girl) often shares the page with violence, and readers shouldn’t expect a tidy conclusion. (May)

Publishers Weekly