The Devil's Labyrinth

June 4, 2007
Bestseller Saul (Suffer the Children
) links an exorcism of the devil with a plot to kill the pope in this over-the-top religious thriller. When thugs at a Boston public high school savagely beat 16-year-old Ryan McIntyre, who's struggling with the death of his father in Iraq, Ryan's mother transfers him to a Catholic school. At St. Isaac's Preparatory Academy, where a student's disappearance and other bizarre events have caused worry, a popular priest, Father Sebastian, takes a special interest in the newcomer. When word reaches the Vatican that Sebastian may have revived a long-lost rite to invoke the primitive evil latent even in the most innocent, the supreme pontiff himself plans a visit to St. Isaac's. Those looking for a more subtle treatment of a similar theme might prefer Whitley Strieber's The Night Church
, but Saul fans should be satisfied.

June 1, 2007
Horror specialist Sauls new thriller is a careerhigh for him, one that may prove controversial. Its a demonic-possession yarn set in a Catholic prep school in Boston, to which 15-year-old Ryan McIntyres Iraq Warwidowed mom, on the advice of boyfriend Tom Kelly, sends him after he is hospitalized from beingbeaten at public school. Two boys Ryans age havedisappeared from St. Isaac, but Kelly assures her that his good friend at the school, Father Sebastian, psychologist as well as priest, can help Ryan accept his fathers demise. By the end of Ryans first week at St. Isaac, one of the missing boys has been killed by police while committing bloody murder. During week two, Ryan finds the corpse of theother missing boy in the underground tunnels beneath the school. But Father Sebastian near-simultaneously finds Ryan. The psychologist-priest is an exorcist, too, and has found an ancient summoning rite that allows an exorcist control of the evil to be found in anyone. Sebastian has been testing his find on St. Isaacs students, and he definitely has an agenda, part of which is to get Pope Innocent XIV to come to Boston. Gratifyingly full of creepy, gory, and repulsive incidents leading to a nail-biting climax, the novel may draw fire as well as rapt readers for linking not just Islamic terrorism but Islam per se to absolute evil.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2007, American Library Association.)