Illusive Intrusion by @Ricztom #thriller #review
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Illusive Intrusion
Written by Tomasz Chrusciel
Genre(s): Psychological Thriller
Hatred can kill you from the inside, little by little. The only cure is to find the person who caused your misery.
Bianka is weary with her ordinary life in Dublin, and she desperately needs a vacation. When her younger sister, Niamh, receives an exciting job offer by surprise, Bianka eagerly accompanies her. Why wouldn’t she?
Two weeks in a luxurious hotel on Gran Canaria is all Bianka desires. But what starts off as a fabulous and relaxing gateway turns to fear and awe when an inexplicable blackout engulfs the island—and the people.
Among the chaos, Bianka must struggle to keep her sanity because she might lose Niamh’s trust and friendship when her little sister falls for a ladies’ man, Goyo. Niamh feels secure with him around, but Bianka is torn inside because just when she decides that maybe she could trust him, he tells her about his mysterious friend, Elizabeth.
Although her name doesn’t sound familiar, the story of how Goyo met her is vivid, like a recurring delusion. It frightens Bianka even more than the awareness that a new wave of darkness might summon them again.
Bianka’s senses scream: YOU SHOULD NOT BE HERE! She will have to listen to her intuition or she will become another of Elizabeth’s unwitting puppets.
Bianka is weary with her ordinary life in Dublin, and she desperately needs a vacation. When her younger sister, Niamh, receives an exciting job offer by surprise, Bianka eagerly accompanies her. Why wouldn’t she?
Two weeks in a luxurious hotel on Gran Canaria is all Bianka desires. But what starts off as a fabulous and relaxing gateway turns to fear and awe when an inexplicable blackout engulfs the island—and the people.
Among the chaos, Bianka must struggle to keep her sanity because she might lose Niamh’s trust and friendship when her little sister falls for a ladies’ man, Goyo. Niamh feels secure with him around, but Bianka is torn inside because just when she decides that maybe she could trust him, he tells her about his mysterious friend, Elizabeth.
Although her name doesn’t sound familiar, the story of how Goyo met her is vivid, like a recurring delusion. It frightens Bianka even more than the awareness that a new wave of darkness might summon them again.
Bianka’s senses scream: YOU SHOULD NOT BE HERE! She will have to listen to her intuition or she will become another of Elizabeth’s unwitting puppets.
Roy McCarthy's Review
I enjoyed this debut novel on the whole. Chrusciel clearly enjoys his travelling and combines a working holiday to Gran Canaria by two of his protagonists with a jaunt through Europe and North Africa by a boyfriend. He writes well when describing locations with good use of imagery. I had no problem in framing mental pictures of his various locations.
His characters too are well-drawn; a feisty young woman (Niamh) with dreams of becoming a professional model, a protective older sister (Bianka), a struggling photographer (Goyo) with a seductive history and a slightly alarmingly possessive boyfriend (Kacpar).
The plot too begins convincingly with Niamh and Bianka travelling to Gran Canaria to meet the photographer Goyo and working with him. A bit too obviously there is immediate sexual tension in the air. And then a mysterious outage plunges the island into isolation. A mysterious figure from Goyo’s past appears – Elizabeth, who has him in thrall. A good scenario.
Then I believe the author loses much of what he has built up with an over-complicated denouement which involves the ancient keepers of the island’s purity and a mixture of fantasy and reality that I found difficult to follow. The end is reached and I didn’t really understand what had happened.
Chrusciel is a good writer and I’ll look out for his next book. But a good editor would not allow him to fail at the last when he has his reader gripped.
His characters too are well-drawn; a feisty young woman (Niamh) with dreams of becoming a professional model, a protective older sister (Bianka), a struggling photographer (Goyo) with a seductive history and a slightly alarmingly possessive boyfriend (Kacpar).
The plot too begins convincingly with Niamh and Bianka travelling to Gran Canaria to meet the photographer Goyo and working with him. A bit too obviously there is immediate sexual tension in the air. And then a mysterious outage plunges the island into isolation. A mysterious figure from Goyo’s past appears – Elizabeth, who has him in thrall. A good scenario.
Then I believe the author loses much of what he has built up with an over-complicated denouement which involves the ancient keepers of the island’s purity and a mixture of fantasy and reality that I found difficult to follow. The end is reached and I didn’t really understand what had happened.
Chrusciel is a good writer and I’ll look out for his next book. But a good editor would not allow him to fail at the last when he has his reader gripped.
Disclaimer: Book provided by the author free of charge in exchange for an honest review.
