Lantern Pass: A Supernatural Alpine Thriller by Serge Lehman, Frederik Peeters (Illustrator) due mid-November 2026; read via an online reader copy
Moods: dark, adventurous, tense, challenging, mysterious, emotional, and occasionally, in the middle of the violence, funny.
Triggers: Addiction, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Bullying, Confinement, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Gore, Gun violence, Misogyny, Rape, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Police brutality, Medical content, Kidnapping, Grief, Mass shootings, Medical trauma, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Sexual harassment. It might have been easier to say what wasn’t a trigger.
We start our story with Frank and M. Umber in a small town looking for a young man who they are tasked with finding as his wealthy mother is looking for him. Umber used Frank and his brother Philip a few years ago when her son went missing. Since then she thought she was done with this duo of intense private eyes, but this case brings them together in magical, mysterious and deadly ways. A missing rich boy, a missing supernatural girl, a sacrificial cow, a drug ring, a power hungry mob family, a dog trainer, ghosts of the literal and metaphorical kind, and a boyfriend who is afraid of turning into a werewolf later, you have Lantern Pass.
All through things, I wanted to look away, but I couldn’t. It is haunting. It is over the top graphic at times. I did not want to see that. But I was why? And, again, I couldn’t look away. (It reminded me of Black Flame by Gretchen Felker-Martin, where I wanted to stop, I wanted to put it down, (I wanted to close my online reader site), but couldn’t. I was sick while reading, but wanted to know if there was a cure.) It is confusing. It is all too understandable. The images are grotesque, unless we are looking at the beauty of the land. The land is the only character that is worth our time. Even the people who are the so-called “good guys” are not all that good. Everyone has a past, everyone has an agenda, and who knows if things are “really real” or one big drug trip. I can’t say I liked things, can’t say I didn’t like them either. I think it is a case that it was an experience, one I won’t be doing again (or should say, I won’t be reading it again and probably won’t go onto other titles by the author). 
Do I think it was a good read? Honestly? No, it is not good. Is it addictive? Yes.
