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Dead Light
…a matter of light and death…
In the sleepy college town of Cumberton, MD, an old cemetery must be moved to make room for a new dormitory, and an ungodly Light, buried for centuries, escapes. A rash of gruesome student suicides rocks the town. Sheriff Estin Booker teams up with former Baltimore homicide detective Anna Tucci to investigate the deaths. What neither expects is to have all roads point to a 2000-year-old legend which, if true, could lead to the destruction of mankind.
The most frightening account of the power of evil breaching our world since The Exorcist, DEAD LIGHT will teach you the most improbable lesson you will ever learn:
FEAR THE LIGHT!
In the sleepy college town of Cumberton, MD, an old cemetery must be moved to make room for a new dormitory, and an ungodly Light, buried for centuries, escapes. A rash of gruesome student suicides rocks the town. Sheriff Estin Booker teams up with former Baltimore homicide detective Anna Tucci to investigate the deaths. What neither expects is to have all roads point to a 2000-year-old legend which, if true, could lead to the destruction of mankind.
The most frightening account of the power of evil breaching our world since The Exorcist, DEAD LIGHT will teach you the most improbable lesson you will ever learn:
FEAR THE LIGHT!
387 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2011
6 people are currently reading
287 people want to read
About the author
Mike Pace
10 books68 followersNo matter what path thriller author Mike Pace has walked, it’s always been with a story to tell.One of Mike’s earliest memories is helping to write the fourth grade Christmas play at his Pittsburgh elementary school.
Born in Pittsburgh, Mike attended the University of Illinois on an art scholarship, and graduated with a BFA degree.
Mike has written for the stage and screen. The Washington Post called one of his plays “engaging … entertaining and … witty.” He wrote and directed a short film that was accepted into film festivals in Kansas City and Portland.
He’s a member of the International Thriller Writers and the Maryland Writers Association. He’s a strong believer in community responsibility, having served as president of his local school board.
Born in Pittsburgh, Mike attended the University of Illinois on an art scholarship, and graduated with a BFA degree.
Mike has written for the stage and screen. The Washington Post called one of his plays “engaging … entertaining and … witty.” He wrote and directed a short film that was accepted into film festivals in Kansas City and Portland.
He’s a member of the International Thriller Writers and the Maryland Writers Association. He’s a strong believer in community responsibility, having served as president of his local school board.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
May 9, 2013
In a word: finely paced plotting, graphically descriptive, engaging characters and a terrifying and deadly light...
Why is it that stories rooted in Biblical legend can scare the bejesus out of me, but I can read books about vampires and werewolves all day long with nary a goose bump? There's something unsettling about the devil, probably because of his religious affiliations. Debut novelist Mike Pace cuts to the heart of this fear with this top-notch horror story about what happens when the devil decides to visit a small town.
Here’s a quick run-down on the plot: In the small (and very conservative) town of Cumberton, Maryland, Reverend Jimmy Starr has convinced the town officials to relocate a 350-year-old cemetery so that he can build a dormitory for his fundamentalist Christian college, Starr College. Unfortunately, an old and very dangerous box is unearthed during the construction, and once it is opened, bad things start happening to the townspeople of Cumberton. And I do mean bad.
After a seemingly stable co-ed named Jill inexplicably drowns herself in Chesapeake Bay, Sheriff Estin Booker and visiting homicide detective Anna Tucci begin to investigate Jill’s death. But Jill is just the beginning. Soon people begin dropping like flies, and all the deaths appear to be suicides. But to Estin and Tucci, the clues add up to something else entirely. With the help of an English Lit professor named Harvey, O’Hara the old town eccentric, and even Reverend Starr himself, they begin to piece together a frightening picture of what’s really happening. Can Estin and Tucci fight the devil, and win? You’ll just have to read the book to find out!
I got so many Stephen King vibes while reading Dead Light, from the small town setting to the eccentric and quirky characters to the stomach-churning visceral horror. Pace doesn’t pull any punches when it comes to describing each gruesome death, and what makes it all the more horrific is that the deaths themselves aren’t supernatural in nature at all. The author has a talent for building a sense of dread. Before each person dies, they all experience the same things: the smell of burnt cookies, a stinging scratch on the back of their neck, and a pulsing light, followed by a frightening vision of someone from their past. So when Tony suddenly smells burnt cookies, you know what’s coming.
I loved all the characters, but I have to say my favorite was Tucci, the brash and tough-speaking detective from Baltimore, who unwittingly ends up helping with the investigation. Estin Booker can’t stand her at first, as she criticizes and makes fun of the small-town characters of Cumberton. But she proves to be a smart cop, and as they get nearer to the truth about why so many people are committing suicide, she and Estin get closer as well. Tucci’s got her own tragic past, mostly told through flashbacks, and it makes her more likeable. I was pleased to see a female character that doesn’t fit the usual norms in fiction.
The author alternates his present-day story with flashback chapters that take place in the 1660s and partially explain the mystery behind the wooden box and how it came to be buried in the cemetery. I thought he did a great job with these chapters, and even though I felt they were a bit too spread out, they were important to the reader’s understanding of Lucifer’s Light, the blinding flash of light that has escaped from the box. He also uses flashbacks with some of the key characters to explain their feelings of guilt that lead them to commit suicide.
A couple of things didn’t quite work for me, like the mysterious ice cream cones that keep appearing at the crime scenes, a reference to Tucci’s past that probably seemed like a good idea at the time, but ended up feeling forced; and a couple of misleads about the case suggesting mass drug use and subliminal messages that were just confusing. But these are small things in an otherwise tightly crafted story.
Pace makes a tongue-in-cheek moral statement about sex and death, since several of the characters meet their demise after having forbidden (to the fundamentalist church) sex. He also gives Tucci and Estin a firm disbelief in the supernatural, so it takes them a while before they start to believe that the deaths are connected to the light that’s escaped from the box. The final showdown between good and evil takes up the last quarter of the book, but by that time you’ll be turning the pages as quickly as possible to find out what happens.
Dead Light is a novel of Biblical proportions, literally! If it’s the dark you’re afraid of, you ain’t seen nothing’ yet. As Dead Light’s victims say right before they die, “Beware the Light.”
Many thanks to the publisher for supplying a review copy.
This review originally appeared on Books, Bones & Buffy.
Why is it that stories rooted in Biblical legend can scare the bejesus out of me, but I can read books about vampires and werewolves all day long with nary a goose bump? There's something unsettling about the devil, probably because of his religious affiliations. Debut novelist Mike Pace cuts to the heart of this fear with this top-notch horror story about what happens when the devil decides to visit a small town.
Here’s a quick run-down on the plot: In the small (and very conservative) town of Cumberton, Maryland, Reverend Jimmy Starr has convinced the town officials to relocate a 350-year-old cemetery so that he can build a dormitory for his fundamentalist Christian college, Starr College. Unfortunately, an old and very dangerous box is unearthed during the construction, and once it is opened, bad things start happening to the townspeople of Cumberton. And I do mean bad.
After a seemingly stable co-ed named Jill inexplicably drowns herself in Chesapeake Bay, Sheriff Estin Booker and visiting homicide detective Anna Tucci begin to investigate Jill’s death. But Jill is just the beginning. Soon people begin dropping like flies, and all the deaths appear to be suicides. But to Estin and Tucci, the clues add up to something else entirely. With the help of an English Lit professor named Harvey, O’Hara the old town eccentric, and even Reverend Starr himself, they begin to piece together a frightening picture of what’s really happening. Can Estin and Tucci fight the devil, and win? You’ll just have to read the book to find out!
I got so many Stephen King vibes while reading Dead Light, from the small town setting to the eccentric and quirky characters to the stomach-churning visceral horror. Pace doesn’t pull any punches when it comes to describing each gruesome death, and what makes it all the more horrific is that the deaths themselves aren’t supernatural in nature at all. The author has a talent for building a sense of dread. Before each person dies, they all experience the same things: the smell of burnt cookies, a stinging scratch on the back of their neck, and a pulsing light, followed by a frightening vision of someone from their past. So when Tony suddenly smells burnt cookies, you know what’s coming.
I loved all the characters, but I have to say my favorite was Tucci, the brash and tough-speaking detective from Baltimore, who unwittingly ends up helping with the investigation. Estin Booker can’t stand her at first, as she criticizes and makes fun of the small-town characters of Cumberton. But she proves to be a smart cop, and as they get nearer to the truth about why so many people are committing suicide, she and Estin get closer as well. Tucci’s got her own tragic past, mostly told through flashbacks, and it makes her more likeable. I was pleased to see a female character that doesn’t fit the usual norms in fiction.
The author alternates his present-day story with flashback chapters that take place in the 1660s and partially explain the mystery behind the wooden box and how it came to be buried in the cemetery. I thought he did a great job with these chapters, and even though I felt they were a bit too spread out, they were important to the reader’s understanding of Lucifer’s Light, the blinding flash of light that has escaped from the box. He also uses flashbacks with some of the key characters to explain their feelings of guilt that lead them to commit suicide.
A couple of things didn’t quite work for me, like the mysterious ice cream cones that keep appearing at the crime scenes, a reference to Tucci’s past that probably seemed like a good idea at the time, but ended up feeling forced; and a couple of misleads about the case suggesting mass drug use and subliminal messages that were just confusing. But these are small things in an otherwise tightly crafted story.
Pace makes a tongue-in-cheek moral statement about sex and death, since several of the characters meet their demise after having forbidden (to the fundamentalist church) sex. He also gives Tucci and Estin a firm disbelief in the supernatural, so it takes them a while before they start to believe that the deaths are connected to the light that’s escaped from the box. The final showdown between good and evil takes up the last quarter of the book, but by that time you’ll be turning the pages as quickly as possible to find out what happens.
Dead Light is a novel of Biblical proportions, literally! If it’s the dark you’re afraid of, you ain’t seen nothing’ yet. As Dead Light’s victims say right before they die, “Beware the Light.”
Many thanks to the publisher for supplying a review copy.
This review originally appeared on Books, Bones & Buffy.
May 4, 2013
I can not believe this thriller/horror story is a first novel out of Mike Pace...let me say awesome!! This book is dead scary in my humble opinion and had me saying, what if this could really happen. Oh my goodness, I wanted a come to Jesus meeting and wanted to bring the characters along with me! Mike did an excellent job of character development. The protagonist, Estin Booker, was a good ole boy, pretty well laid back and definitely in for the long haul when it came to being the Sheriff in Cumberton, MD... aka as Mayberry. Anna Tucci, although a detective with anger issues out of Baltimore, vacations on demand by her boss in Cumberton and is immediately sucked into the investigation of a co-ed suicide, or is it murder? Anna is as sarcastic as she is angry, but she rather enjoys her days in Mayberry, until both Booker and Tucci start to believe the unbelievable and come to grips with their own what if's.
Mike's humor comes through loud and clear in his storytelling and I found myself laughing at different times throughout. The humor was almost a necessary reprieve from the dark horror of the story which had me rivoted.
Do you like a tense thriller? Do you enjoy horror? I think Mike Pace may be in line with some of the major names in horror/suspense writing and you certainly won't snooze through this read!!
Mike's humor comes through loud and clear in his storytelling and I found myself laughing at different times throughout. The humor was almost a necessary reprieve from the dark horror of the story which had me rivoted.
Do you like a tense thriller? Do you enjoy horror? I think Mike Pace may be in line with some of the major names in horror/suspense writing and you certainly won't snooze through this read!!
May 3, 2013
This scary, fast-paced story kept me reading late into the night. The premise and history of the ancient evil was fascinating, believable and uniquely developed. When an ancient curse is accidentally released in a sleepy college town, and pious students mysteriously begin dying in gruesome ways, Sherriff Booker and detective Anna Tucci find themselves racing the Devil in what becomes a challenge of biblical proportions. The plot they eventually uncover leads to a decision that could be the last hope of mankind.
I loved the way in which the story evolved as the evidence piled up. With a diverse and eclectic cast of characters this plot-driven novel transcends most other horror tales because the characters were so well-drawn – flawed, yet determined to use their individual strengths to support a common cause. At first flummoxed, they resourcefully begin to recognize the magnitude of the assault unknowingly unleashed against their unsuspecting community. This book kept me awake, engaged, and wondering “What if” as the story drew me deep into its complex and diabolical mystery.
A complimentary copy of the book was provided in return for my honest review.
Reviewed by Laurie-J
I loved the way in which the story evolved as the evidence piled up. With a diverse and eclectic cast of characters this plot-driven novel transcends most other horror tales because the characters were so well-drawn – flawed, yet determined to use their individual strengths to support a common cause. At first flummoxed, they resourcefully begin to recognize the magnitude of the assault unknowingly unleashed against their unsuspecting community. This book kept me awake, engaged, and wondering “What if” as the story drew me deep into its complex and diabolical mystery.
A complimentary copy of the book was provided in return for my honest review.
Reviewed by Laurie-J
August 31, 2013
An ancient evil is being unleased on a small quiet college town of Cumberton, MD all because an old cemetery needs to be moved to build a new dormitory. When 2 students venture to the cemetery for something more than studying, one falls into an open grave. There they discover an old box and decide to open it thinking maybe treasure, but when they open it they see a flash of light and then nothing. What they have done is unleashed Lucifer's light and later that evening the suicide's begin because it's hungry for souls.
Anna Tucci is a Baltimore Homicide detective who is ordered to Cumberton for some R & R and a need to get her anger under control. While on a fishing boat they reel in the first victim and Tucci partners up with Sheriff Estin Booker to investigate.
This is not a book that you can put down. It grabs you from the first page and keeps you til the last with plenty of twist and turns. I have to admit that towards the end I was yelling at the characters and sitting on the edge of my seat. That is the mark of a really good book. I received this book from the author through LibraryThing for an honest review and I honestly loved this book. I highly recommend it and hope to read more by Mike Pace.
Anna Tucci is a Baltimore Homicide detective who is ordered to Cumberton for some R & R and a need to get her anger under control. While on a fishing boat they reel in the first victim and Tucci partners up with Sheriff Estin Booker to investigate.
This is not a book that you can put down. It grabs you from the first page and keeps you til the last with plenty of twist and turns. I have to admit that towards the end I was yelling at the characters and sitting on the edge of my seat. That is the mark of a really good book. I received this book from the author through LibraryThing for an honest review and I honestly loved this book. I highly recommend it and hope to read more by Mike Pace.
May 2, 2013
College kids are committing suicide, or are they?? A teenage couple have a tryst in the towns cemetery one night. They fall into an open grave from the 1600's where they find an old box...that is when their nightmare begins. A clever take of good against evil and which faction will win in the end. The characters were written with compassion, I loved Detective Tucci the best though. A hard talking woman sent for a little vacation by her boss because she had shot a perp. What starts as just a ride along with the local cop for her turns out to be one scary ride. I love a good thriller and this book did not disappoint. Reminded me of Stephen King in his older books. Read it with all the lights on though, very spooky indeed!!
May 2, 2013
Wow, Dead Light is absolutely haunting! It is an action packed thriller, that I hesitate to even place within the classification of "paranormal." Yes, it is about the devil's light that he uses to capture souls, but with the references to Scripture, and the way that it is written, it feels so real!
To the point that I would describe it as terrifyingly realistic.
Thankfully, I read this one during the day. Otherwise, I don't think I would have gotten any sleep!
The characters are great, and the plot is so unexpected that you just lose yourself within the pages. There were points where I was literally shaking while reading it. And even once I finished, it still haunted my thoughts.
To the point that I would describe it as terrifyingly realistic.
Thankfully, I read this one during the day. Otherwise, I don't think I would have gotten any sleep!
The characters are great, and the plot is so unexpected that you just lose yourself within the pages. There were points where I was literally shaking while reading it. And even once I finished, it still haunted my thoughts.
May 9, 2013
I absolutely loved this story. I finished the book in an 8 - 10 hour period. The story was thrilling, chilling and psychological that some parts had me believing that such circumstances could possibly be real. The author goes from present to past; from character to character and melds it together so perfectly that there never seemed to be a disconnect. There were times when I thought the book was going to have a predictable ending, but lo and behold, the author pulls a fast one and left me in awe. To me the book was not predictable at all and I enjoyed that aspect.
After reading the prologue, I tried figuring out how exactly that was going to tie in. But the author did a very good job of tying it all together and weaving everything together very well.
After reading the prologue, I tried figuring out how exactly that was going to tie in. But the author did a very good job of tying it all together and weaving everything together very well.
June 28, 2014
In the town of Cumberton, MD, a 350 year old cemetery is being move so that a new dormitory can be built. Two students venture into the cemetery to do more than just study. One falls into an open grave and discover a little red box. A rash series of co-ed suicides take place. Sheriff Estin Booker is teamed up with a detective from Baltimore, name Anna Tucci. Together they will try and put an end to these horrific deaths. Could the end of the world be right around the corner? It seems that Lucifer is gathering all the souls that he can. Can good beat evil? Michael Pace doesn't hold back any punches. Dead Light is a top notch horror story. I would recommend this to readers of horror.
April 18, 2013
Mike pens "Dead Light" in a fast paced, complex plot filled with twists and turns that kept me glued to my kindle. With well developed characters this horror thriller will keep you turning the pages and wondering if it's really fiction or not. A really great read and highly recommended for all horror, thriller fans.
This review is based on a complimentary copy from the author which was provided for an honest review.
This review is based on a complimentary copy from the author which was provided for an honest review.
October 27, 2013
I thoroughly enjoyed this book. The ending something I hadn't expected. I thoroughly enjoyed the characters, especially Detective Tucci from Baltimore. I could actually see her in my mind. I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys mystery with a touch of the "Twilihgt Zone".
October 21, 2012
Amazing book
February 6, 2014
A fun read with twists and turns, and great characters with attitude.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews