What the Hell Did I Just Read

Wong’s wildly mind-bending third installment (after This Book Is Full of Spiders) of the adventures of protagonist David Wong is filled with the humorous horror readers have come to expect. David; his girlfriend, Amy; and his friend, John, are still living in the town of Undisclosed, so referred to for “privacy reasons.” Their lives have slowly returned to something resembling normal after their previous brushes with the weird, and all seems well until their expertise is requested on the case of a missing child. What follows is a rapid descent into brilliantly convoluted psychological terror, action, and suspense with a few brief forays into the inner workings of the human mind. When the culprit is revealed to be a shape-shifting entity with questionable motives, and 10 more children go missing, the trio must do battle with an enraged father, a shadowy government organization, a mysterious bat-human hybrid creature called the Batmantis, and their own metaphorical inner demons. While the story gleefully wallows in absurdity, thoughtful themes of addiction, perception, and the drive to do the right thing quickly emerge beneath the vivid and convoluted imagery. The plot’s rapid pace holds the reader’s attention to the truly bitter end. Agent: Scott Miller, Trident Media Group. (Oct.)