Sometimes, to end a curse, you have to return to where it began.
2024
Howie Burke swore he’d never go back to Newport after the childhood murders that shattered his life. But twenty-five years later, a desperate call from his mother drags him home—and straight into the horrors he thought he left behind. The town feels wrong the moment he arrives. Old ghosts lurk in the shadows, and something far darker has been growing in his absence. The secrets he and his childhood friends uncovered were only the beginning.
1978
Jessica and Henry Black move to Newport, searching for a fresh start. For Jessica, it’s a chance to escape her fanatical upbringing and finally choose her own path—but the town offers a new kind of faith: one built on secrets, sacrifice, and blood. As the townsfolk take a chilling interest in her, Jessica begins to understand the truth: she isn’t just welcome here. She’s wanted, chosen, and necessary.
Two timelines. One curse. And the only way out… is through the coven that began it.
Overall, this was a really solid and likable edition to the series. The clever storyline, mixing together the different storylines and time periods involved in this one with the connection to the previous books and returning characters getting introduced following the earlier events in the childhood sections, as well as continuing the storyline in the modern setting, offers up quite a lot to like. The remnants of the coven still lingering over the town and impacting the lives of the survivors who are unwilling to be around it anymore, unless they absolutely have to be, create an intriguing setup that touches on the same type of demonic influence that the rest of the series employed, so everything comes together to offer up some fun elements. Since it follows the surviving members of previous encounters as they go on with their lives after these events, carrying the sense of trauma and cursed narrative beats alongside the new characters who come to visit and fall under the spell lording over the town.
As a result of this, the fact that this one comes off as well as it does with the light, airy writing style for the kind of atmosphere-heavy approach favored here. Everything is given a nice touch with the presentation, favoring the atmosphere and tone of the community as time goes on, working through the old-school characters growing up and trying to come to terms with their new life, while the past comes creeping back into their lives. The dread explicitly favored here is enhanced with the secondary storyline involving a series of reveals about how one of the past characters became involved in the origins of the demonic coven that's at the center of everything, which helps to tie together the different storylines interconnected throughout here, which is the main drawback with this one overall. Since it relies so heavily on the connections to the past, it manages to be a bit awkward and confusing for those not familiar with their story that ties everything together, but as that is the main issue here, it's not that detrimental overall.
4.5/5
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