The Rift by Seth C Adams

I would like to thank Flame Tree Press for an advance copy of this novel in exchange for a fair and honest review

Publisher – Flame Tree Press

Published – Out Now

Price – £12.95 paperback £3.82 Kindle eBook

Joe Jimenez, grieving father and estranged husband, on the eve of the anniversary of his son's death is on the brink of complete despair when he witnesses the arrival of a strange atmospheric anomaly. The rift – a curious tear in the very air of his backyard – appears nightly, and after some experimentation, Joe discovers that for everything that's sent through the rift, something similar, but horribly wrong, comes back. And when something on the other side claims to be in possession of his son, Joe has to make the most important decision of his life: should he go through and find out?

Horror often has proxies for real world horrors. Addiction, depression, racism and many more important topics have been explored in fiction. A dark mirror reflecting a painful subject to us in different ways. Unsurprisingly death and grief are a huge part of the genre from ghosts to the undead. In Seth C Adams’ emotionally charged horror tale The Rift a grief-stricken father faces temptation to push himself past the point of our reality in a quest for the impossible.

For Joe Jimenez the world ended a year ago when his teenage son was kidnapped and murdered on the way to school. He cut himself off from the world and has since lost his wife, job and life is just one gut-wrenching day after another. Until in his garden a strange light appears a rift that if someone thing goes in then something very similar and different comes back. A rift where a message appears that says his son is on the other side.

This is a powerful exploration of grief as the rift is in many ways a metaphor for Joe cut off from his won world. The early chapters are filled with that pain, anger and self-loathing that Jim has and yet he is a sympathetic figure. Only when this strange fissure in space and time appears does he actually has a focus again even if it appears a dark obsessional one. The way the former science teacher treats this as an experiment and tests what the rift can do and what may be on the other side ground the tale into its own reality and the third person narration creates a clear sense of foreboding. It is a really a question of how far Joe goes and yet at the same time we understand the desperation that somehow his son and his fractured family can come back. Watching Joe re-connect with the family dog Rusty gives a sense of humanity coming back…but it may be too late.

The horror aspects are good. The mysterious hellish landscape of the Rift and what comes out of it when things return are great body horror and add a clear sense of threat. Things are indeed icky and there is a high price to be paid. I think though the tale does feel a little slowly paced and rather than tension rise I felt it was more heading towards the inevitable and the final perhaps overcooked the final confrontation and revelations. Despite that it was a really enjoyable read and I was very impressed how Adams captures the path of stages of grief throughout the story via clever storytelling. It does ultimately have the feeling of someone learning to battle and accept their demons (in many ways). Worth a look!