INSIDE THE ASYLUM BY MARY SANGIOVANNI: BOOK REVIEW

 
Having enjoyed the previous two novels featuring Kathy Ryan, occult investigator with law enforcement connections, I was very much looking forward to Inside The Asylum, knowing it would feature heavily Kathy’s brother Toby, a character who haunts the two previous books but is very much backstage for the most part; a presence felt rather than seen.
 
This novel does feature Toby more heavily, and SanGiovanni delivers well on his earlier promise; he’s a malignant, cold, calculating and ruthless character, and his interactions with Ryan are potent. That said, he’s not the focus of the narrative. The focus instead is on Henry Banks, a fellow inmate in Toby’s asylum, who has been the victim of abuse… and whose imaginary friends may actually be capable of killing people - whether or not he wants them too.
 
It’s a gripping premise, and SanGiovanni plays it out well, the tension not coming from any sense of whether or not the situation is real or delusional - by the end of the first chapter, we know it’s real - but rather from seeing the rational world in general, and Ryan in particular, trying to make sense of what’s going on as events spiral out of control.
 
The sense of building dread and escalating stakes were very reminiscent of Chills, for me, which is no bad thing, but I think the nature of the threat here was even more compelling. There is a profound weirdness to the events Inside The Asylum, and SanGiovanni pulls out all the stops in terms of both imagination and visualisation, delivering a narrative that drips with tension, and a series of gripping action horror scenes.
 
The story also centers Ryan more than previous entry Behind The Door, which I appreciated; she’s a brilliantly realised character, with a shell of stoicism that protects some profound damage, and this story puts her through the wringer both physically and psychologically; not least because it forces her to work with her psychopath brother to try and avert the threat.
 
Inside The Asylum is another superb novel from SanGiovanni - tense, imaginative, dark as hell, violent and unnerving.
 
KP

INSIDE THE ASYLUM BY MARY SANGIOVANNI​

From "master of cosmic horror" (Library Journal) Mary SanGiovanni, comes the latest terrifying novel featuring occult specialist Kathy Ryan . . .A mind is a terrible thing to destroy . . .
Kathy has been hired to assess the threat of patient Henry Banks, an inmate at the Connecticut-Newlyn Hospital for the Criminally Insane, the same hospital where her brother is housed. Her employers believe that Henry has the ability to open doors to other dimensions with his mind-making him one of the most dangerous men in modern history. Because unbeknownst to Kathy, her clients are affiliated with certain government organizations that investigate people like Henry-and the potential to weaponize such abilities.
What Kathy comes to understand in interviewing Henry, and in her unavoidable run-ins with her brother, is that Henry can indeed use his mind to create "Tulpas"-worlds, people, and creatures so vivid they come to actual life. But now they want life outside of Henry. And they'll stop at nothing to complete their emancipation. It's up to Kathy-with her brother's help-to stop them, and if possible, to save Henry before the Tulpas take him over-and everything else around him.

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