Author: Charles de Lint writing as Samuel M. Key
Pages: 240
Genre: Horror, Fantasy
Publisher: Tom Doherty, 1990
"All that's left is a killing time."Synopsis: In the early 1990s, Charles de Lint wrote and published three dark fantasies under the name "Samuel M. Key." Now, beginning with Angel of Darkness, Orb presents them for the first time under de Lint's own name. — When ex-cop Jack Keller finds the mutilated body of a runaway girl in the ashes of a bizarre house fire, he opens the door to a nightmare. For a sadistic experiment in terror has unleashed a dark avenging angel forged from the agonies of countless dying victims....
Review: Charles de Lint has become one of my favorite fantasy authors. He made a pseudonym for his darker, more horrific novels so that his readers would be forewarned what to expect. This is the first of the 'Key novels' that I've read. It will not be the last....stop hurting me...
This is not a book for the faint of heart or squeamish. Between the spousal abuse, the sexual abuse and the serial killer, there's plenty of disturbing sequences. The angel (who is more like a fury) is the evil that threatens. Only she is not really evil, just a terrifying force of nature brought to life from humankind's own sadistic tendencies to hurt one another.
I finished this book in less than two days. I couldn't put it down, at least not during the day. At night, I left it be. Nightmares abound in these pages. Reminiscent of King when his horror makes forays into the fantastical, this novel is disturbing, scary, and completely fabulous.
Rating: 9 / 10
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