Hokey Pokey

Hokey Pokey starts as a classic jazz age mystery with an Agatha Christie vibe and quickly deteriorates into a deeply disturbing thriller. Dr. Nora Dickinson is on a mission to expose her friend’s wife’s infidelity at a fancy hotel when she overhears what she assumes to be fraudulent prophecy about herself.

We delve deeper into Nora’s past and discover horrors there, as well as in the main timeline. She is a not-quite-human supernatural being, able to repeat anything she hears as a perfect copy. She uses this in dogging the steps of her friend’s errant wife now, but she has used it in far shadier avenues in her murky past. That shady past is starting to catch up to Nora on her current assignment.

Kate Mascarenhas’ writing style and storytelling pacing was excellent and I was extremely annoyed when real life intruded on my reading time and I had to stop. Who needs sleep anyway? You certainly won’t be able to after reading some of the scenes in this book.

Even when scenes in this book contained more mundane events, the vibe of a tense thriller was still palpable, which is to me a real skill. I was constantly on edge. The parts of the book that took a turn into horror and thriller territory fully pushed me into a small panic response. This is exaclty what I want in a thriller book, but if you are avoiding some triggers, perhaps tread lightly.

Relevant triggers: murder, dismemberment, child abuse