Things aren’t really what they’re supposed to be and to Emma’s dismay host and guests gradually reveal their true nature. Only Tony, the brother of her former lover, teaming with a group of newly acquired friends, will be able to find the clue of the mystery and try to rescue Emma from the unnerving and dangerous atmosphere of lust, violence and terror which is engulfing her.

The novel , the latest product of the fertile, sick imagination of the british duo Maynard & Sims, is a perfect , accomplished example of modern horror story, featuring both subtle psychological uneasiness and graphic physical violence while blending personal fears with cosmic terror.

Gripping the reader’s attention from the outset, the story develops in a steady, firm manner, thanks to the authors’ ability to carve credible characters, write plausible dialogues and provide beautiful prose.

But this is no surprise to anyone already familiar with Maynard & Sims’ previous body of work. ‘Demon Eyes’ is possibly their most ambitious book so far , pushing their storytelling abilities beyond the limits of the short story, the novelette or even their debut novel ‘Shelter’.

Not one of the 338 pages constituting ‘Demon Eyes’ is wasted, not one is just a filler, not a single sentence is superfluous and never, throughout the book, that great enemy of horror novel – boredom- makes its unwelcome appearance.

As other stories by the same authors this book would make a wonderful movie. I wouldn’t be surprised to see it sooner or later on the big screen.

Looking forward to watch it, I keep reading.

Mario Guslandi was born and raised in Milan, Italy, where he’s currently living. He became addicted to horror and supernatural fiction more than twenty years ago, after accidentally reading a reprint anthology of stories by MR James, JS Le Fanu, HP Lovecraft and A Machen. Since then his collection of horror books has expanded to the point of requiring continuous addictions of new shelves to his library, in order to avoid the collapse of the whole structure. Most likely the only Italian who regularly reads (and reviews) dark fiction in English, he’s always tempted to hide his true identity under feigned English or american pen-names, just for the fun of it, but then he keeps forgetting to do that.