Customer Reviews

Land of Echoes: A Cree Black Novel

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

As a long time Daniel Hecht fan, I could not wait for this next installment of the Cree Black series, and "Land of Echoes" does not disappoint. Hecht adds several new characters to his already stellar cast (Cree, Edgar, Joyce) and they are excellently rendered. Tommy's plight is fascinating and creepy and heartbreaking. The descriptions of Navajo country and people are beautiful, and easy to imagine, and they provide the loveliness and mystery which defines this book. It is a rich and exciting read. I highly recommend "Land of Echoes"!!!

Parapsychology fans will relish the return of Cree Black, who becomes immersed in a case of spiritual possession which will test all her resources and draw them into a dangerous New Mexican desert confrontation. A talented Navajo student falls ill with violent seizures attributed to the spirit of a dead ancestor, involving Cree in a dangerous world of spreading possession which keeps Land Of Echoes fast-paced and involving. Highly recommended.

I really enjoyed City of Masks, so when I finished that, I searched out to find if the author had written additional books with his character Cree Black. To my joy, he had one other, this book. A new Cree Black book is due in June.

Cree Black is a parapsychologist with an empathic ability to bond with her clients. Cree had been married ten years ago to Mike, who was killed in Los Angeles in a car crash. At the moment of his death, Cree was in Philadelphia and saw Mike standing twenty feet away from her in a crowd. He looked like a man with shocking news to tell. Cree went to meet him and found to her confusion that Mike was gone.

In her grief over Mike's death, Cree became a parapsychologist and now tries to help people with their own hauntings. Cree is called in to examine a fifteen year old Navajo boy at a boarding school who is manifesting symptoms of posession by an unknown entity. The story of her attempts to identify the spirit and why it is haunting the boy is the plot of the book.

It gets a little slow in some areas, but I'm glad I perservered. I would start out with the first novel, City of Masks, first, to get a better understanding of the character.

This is a wonderful novel. As a Certfied Ghost Hunter and author of "Ghosthunting Illinois" and "Ghosthunting Ohio," I can say that Dan Hecht really knows his stuff. His heroine, Cree Black, and her team of paranormal investigators, use all the principles, theories and equipment employed today by serious paranormal researchers. Reading this novel is very much like being on an actual paranormal investigation. Believe me, I should know.

Hecht doesn't need to resort to cheesy bloodied ghosts and other ridiculous entities to strike fear in the reader's heart. His research into actual cases and investigative methods makes the novel all the more spookier; this could have been real. I am also well acquainted with Native American culture and I was glad to see that Hecht treated the subject with respect and authenticity in this novel. Don't miss this one. It's a great read.

Excellent read.....leaves you wanting more. Geographically I've lived there and Hecht got it right.The characters are true...bravo!! The land, the people and the culture are dynamically rendered. I will absolutely be passing this along.

Some time ago I picked up City of Masks, Hecht's first Cree Black story and was more than pleasantly surprised. In the supernatural genres, it is an unusual author who spends time carefully developing characters and setting, rather than pushing ahead on bare plot. Hecht has done an excellent job with Cree Black in creating a psychic investigator whose initial exposure was a visitation by the ghost of her husband at the moment she died. She is a talented empathy as well as one who can speak for the dead, and her experiences have left deep scars. In company with he co=workers Edgar Mayfield and Joyce she makes up a team that specializes in hauntings and possessions.

In Land of Echoes one of Cree's old mentors brings her into the case of a young boy who attends a boarding school for gifted children that serves the Navajo reservation. Tommy's situation has gotten steadily worse and Julieta McCarty, the school's principal must either resolve the situation or hospitalize the boy. The Navajo believe that ghosts are evil and dangerous and Tommy is not only a threat to himself, but also a danger to the school. It is up to Cree to unravel a tangled web of motivation and history in order to bring the ghost to closure and resolve the present day conflicts that stand in her way.

Hecht relies on solid writing and research to make his stories work. I don't know how familiar he is with Navajo culture, but he captures the conflict between the old and new on the reservation perfectly, without ever overplaying the card. In the same way, the author delves into the psychology of his characters without ever turning this into a psychological thriller. One of the reasons I like this novel is that, as complex as it is, there is no wasted writing. Pacing is excellent as well - Hecht takes the time to make sure that events develop steadily, without the frantic action that is often used to cover up a lack of real plot.

If you haven't run into Daniel Hecht yet, let me recommend him. All of his novels are enjoyable and well written.

This is a very, very good mystery that again gives us a team of professional "ghost busters," involving Cree (a prestigiously trained clinical psychologist), an engineer, and a wonderful Tae Kwon Do kicking administrative assistant. Cree is drawn into a case at a private school for talented native American kids. What is going on? Is it a haunting? Is it a nature spirit? Is it something involving some ancient ancestor of the boy, Tommy, who is the target of the haunting?

Cree must find all this out before Tommy is either killed, or destroyed by being treated by contemporary medications. Also, this wonderful school could end up closed. We also meet the owner and principal of the school, Julieta, who has her own issues, along with a marvelous local doctor of Navajo descent.

The thing I really liked about this book was how textured it was. It wasn't a fast read for me and I got to know all the characters quite well. The author, Hecht, doesn't give us the sense that the book is just an outline (which I find all too often, these days, in many mysteries).

So I recommend this fine mystery without hestitation.

I really enjoyed this book, right from the beginning. I liked the way Hecht kept going back & forth between characters and time. Adding interesting things about New Mexico's past made it especially interesting. I highly recommend this book - it was hard to put down.

If you love the desert and enjoy a good, and scary, mystery, you will LOVE this book. I couldn't put it down. What a great story. I fell in love with the desert setting and really felt like I was there. With it's supernatural aspects, I recommend you don't read it if you are alone, or in the desert..

It's enjoyable. It's an okay read, but it just doesn't have the vision of some of his earlier works i.e Babel Effect.