Night Prey by Carol Davis Luce

     In less competent hands, Carol Davis Luce's psychic thriller could be a trite mess of a read. Fortunately, Luce knows how to draw characters. Her main character, Robbi is an extremely likable protagonist with plenty at stake. Even the psychic element is kept interesting and isn't overplayed as is usually the case in a book of this type.  It has elements of horror, mystery, romance, and suspense.  All of these elements are balanced well, and woven into a very suspenseful, sometimes disturbing read.

     The villain in the story isn't the most original idea in the book, but it doesn't matter.  Luce is a very skilled mystery writer who knows how to draw the reader in.  The villain is well-rounded enough to make us dread the passages they are in...in a good way. 


      Night Prey is violent, sometimes a little gory, and always a little suspenseful.  It does have it's weaknesses, though.  The most noticeable weakness is the absolute silliness of some of the situations the main characters are put into.  You will know what I mean when you read them.  This does detract from the overall storytelling and serves to take the reader out of the story for a short time.

      I would recommend this book to anyone looking for a good, entertaining, late-night read as the pacing is perfect to steal a night's sleep, and there is enough suspense to keep picking it up at every free moment. Do yourself a favor and pick this one up.

     If not for the books main weaknesses, this book would have a nearly perfect score.  As is it, though, being taken out of the story at times detracts a full star.  My final score is 4 out of 5 and  I recommend Night Prey to anyone who enjoys a good suspense story with elements of horror.

    Final Score   **** 


This book can be found on the Kindle store, and the paperback seems to be out of print, but is available from abebooks.com at a good price.  It is currently available for $2.99 on Kindle and Nook.

Scott.