‘Secrets bring terror, and the result of terror lasts for a very long time. It doesn’t go away.’
American student Pip Durrant arrives in Romania to continue the research of the late Dr Marcu into the Transylvanian village of Arva, where a high incidence of mental illness amongst the women is coupled with a shocking history of ritual child rape and murder. But, once there, Pip finds his rational, scientific worldview being increasingly challenged by the seemingly supernatural horrors he encounters. What’s more, he soon realises that the mysteries surrounding the village seem to be somehow linked to traumatic events in his own troubled childhood. Could he really be falling prey to the timeless evil of the Pied Piper of Hamelin …?
The Piercing is the long-awaited second book in acclaimed author Helen McCabe’s chilling Piper trilogy.
320pp approx. B-format paperback novel.
ISBN: 978-1-84583-899-7
Published 30 September 2014
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Helen McCabe is a highly regarded author whose love of writing and powerful imagination, coupled with a determination to succeed, have ensured a long and successful career. Her lifelong fascination with literature, history and research and an interest in the paranormal have enhanced Helen’s immense gift for creative storytelling.
She graduated with Honours from London University, where she read English, and holds an MA degree in 18th Century English Literature from the University of Keele.
Her long career began with her first novel at the age of seven, with poetry published at 13 and read on the BBC. She started her true career as a novelist after becoming well-known for her short stories and serials in popular magazines. In 1995 her first full-length novel – Two for a Lie, about the 19th Century Princess Caraboo – was published, gaining much interest and critical acclaim. Since then, in tandem with work and family, she has written more than 30 novels in various genres, including historical, romance and more recently horror/thriller and crime. She also writes scripts for film, television and the stage.
Alongside her writing, Helen has worked in a variety of jobs, beginning as an assistant librarian and finally as a lecturer and teacher. She is a member of the Romantic Novelists Association, the Crime Writers’ Association, the Horror Writers of America and the West Country Writers’ Association.
Helen was invited to join Mensa, the high IQ Society, in 1989.
Helen lives in Worcester and has three grown-up children and a grandson.
Her website can be found at www.helenmccabe.com.
Geoff Nelder –
The Piercing by Helen McCabe
Book 2 of The Piper Trilogy
Reviewed by Geoff Nelder
Ever since I was hoisted on my dad’s shoulders in 1949 to watch a Pied Piper procession in the German city of Hamelin and watched mouth open, the thousands of local children dressed in medieval garb following the flautist, I’ve been hooked on the legend. Hence Helen McCabe’s first in this trilogy meant something personal and I’ve hungered for its sequel, The Piercing.
So pleased was I to find the young, lame and mute Pip from book 1 has matured and found his voice here. Yet his past haunts him as his post-doc research is spuriously manipulated and people he interviews are ominously killed before too much information is revealed. Even so, Pip is persuaded to stay and find the missing jigsaw pieces in this intriguing puzzle. Whoever thought the paedophile Pied Piper was a simple legend, done and dusted is in for rude shock.
McCabe is a master of descriptive phrases. We always know where we are and how to feel about the setting. Usually that means dark and spooky, crafted with literary flair as in “a timid wind crept across the well-cut lawn and started to rattle the shutters, snivelling to be let in.” Marvellous. I’ve not been to Transylvania but now I can picture it where “A red-streaked dawn threaded itself through the night clouds, then flamed into life, illuminating the Carpathian mountains and turning their snowy heads into blood.” This is a murder mystery as well as an enquiry into the rapes and heinous practices of the evil Grandsire as he appears to reincarnates himself every 36 years since 1376.
As in real life much of the book is in dialogue between characters so real you could touch them. To my dismay I often witness real people live their lives keeping secrets only to be found out and then making excuses, digging their lying holes deeper. McCabe is brilliant at such dialogue as she was in Piper, and I love the obliqueness of it such as when Pip’s fibs are nearly uncovered such as when Ghita’s father introduces Pip as a history student when Ghita – unbeknown to her father – had met Pip and knew he was a psychologist and yet she played along with the lie. As another character says, “Secrets bring terror.”
I love the way McCabe paints the weather with human attributes. Surely we’ve all heard the wind’s wild laughter and beware the snow, dear readers, and bolt those window shutters when the flakes fall to stop its demons entering.
Aficionados of medieval and gothic legends will find The Piercing a gripping yarn worthy to sequel Piper.