King Nyx, Kirsten Bakis
King Nyx, Kirsten Bakis
List: $25.99 | Sale: $18.20
Club: $12.99

King Nyx
A Novel

Author: Kirsten Bakis

Narrator: Bahni Turpin

Unabridged: 10 hr 30 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Recorded Books

Published: 02/27/2024


Synopsis

A haunting mystery about lost girls and the woman driven to find them. From the author of the contemporary classic Lives of the Monster Dogs.

Anna Fort wants to be a supportive wife, even if that means accompanying her husband for the winter of 1918 to a remote, frozen island estate so he can finish his book as the guest of an eccentric millionaire. When she learns three girls are missing from a school run by their host, Anna realizes finding them is up to her—even if that means risking her husband’s career, and possibly her life.

Her husband’s masterpiece-in-progress features strange meteorological anomalies along with wild speculations about “facts” he believes scientists hide from the public. Most people think Charles Fort is a crackpot. That’s about to change now that wealthy Claude Arkel is his patron.

Yet Anna is sure something’s not right on Prosper Island, though the alarming return of her “troubles” makes her question her own sanity. Is the figure in the woods really the ghost of her long-lost friend Mary, or a product of her disturbed imagination? Accompanied reluctantly by a fellow guest, the elegant and troubled Stella Bixby, Anna embarks on a dangerous quest to find the missing girls before Arkel finds her—or her own mind unravels.

A contemporary feminist tale with a dreamlike, gothic setting, King Nyx reintroduces readers, twenty-five years after her acclaimed debut, to one of our most astonishingly imaginative storytellers.

Reviews

Goodreads review by The Speculative Shelf on April 09, 2024

A tightly woven and haunting gothic mystery that left me supremely satisfied. A creepy island, a reclusive benefactor, and three young girls vanished into thin air. If those ingredients weren’t enough to hook you, the evolving mystery at the heart of the book does a tremendous job of pulling you deep......more

Goodreads review by Kirsten on January 25, 2025

I enjoyed parts of King Nyx although overall the book dragged for me. It took a long time for the plot to develop, then almost halfway through it got interesting, and then it wrapped up to a nice conclusion that should have been the end. And then it went on. And then it hit another good ending place......more

Goodreads review by Stitching on April 02, 2025

Neutral 2.5 rounded up, it certainly was a book. The main character was so bland and the ending so convenient, then again I'm not a fan of gothic literature so maybe take my opinion with a grain of salt.......more

Goodreads review by Margaret on March 23, 2024

I really wanted to like this and was in the mood for the atmospheric creepy read à la Wilkie Collins that the blurbs promised. I did make it through, but I had to force myself to persevere through the last third of the book after it had been revealed that the most intriguingly weird elements held no......more

Goodreads review by Isabel on March 22, 2024

3.5 ⭐️ "King Nyx" is an evocative novel set in 1918 on the secluded Prosper Island, blending gothic mystery and contemporary feminist themes. It explores the enigmatic circumstances surrounding Anna and Charles, married guests of millionaire Claude Arkel, amidst the backdrop of the island's dark sec......more