Draw the Dark by Isla J. Bick

“The things I draw: They tend to die.”

There are things the people of Winter, Wisconsin, would rather forget. The year the Nazis came to town, for one. That fire, for another.  But what they’d really like to forget is Christian Cage.

Seventeen-year-old Christian’s parents disappeared when he was a little boy.  Ever since, he’s drawn obsessively: his mother’s face…her eyes…and what he calls “the sideways place,” where he says his parents are trapped.  Christian figures if he can just see through his mother’s eyes, maybe he can get there somehow and save them.

But Christian also draws other things.  Ugly things.  Evil things.  Dark things.  Things like other people’s fears and nightmares.  Their pasts.  Their destiny.

There’s one more thing the people of Winter would like to forget: murder.

But Winter won’t be able to forget the truth, no matter how hard it tries.  Not as long as Christian draws the dark…

Draw the Dark was a pleasant surprise.  It’s dark in a delightfully creepy way.  Bad things happened in Winter before Christian was born and he has the opportunity to set them right.  The plot threads include self-discovery, a mystery and high school horror.  I enjoyed the way Bick combined the subplots with the main plot.

It’s nice to see a teenage protagonist who doesn’t have everything figured out.  He wants friends but doesn’t have them.  When he finally gets one it’s partly because she points out he can’t recognize when someone is being friendly towards him.

I’ve read several books with World War II as the setting and this was the first time I’d heard about POW Camps in the U.S. with German soldiers.  It was nice to have a new element added to my knowledge of the war.

About the Author
Ilsa J. Bick is an award-winning science fiction author primarily known for her Star Trek novels and short stories. Her first Star Trek novel, Well of Souls, became a 2003 Barnes & Noble bestseller. In addition, she has written several stories, novellas, and novels for the BattleTech and MechWarrior: Dark Age franchises. She has also published a number of short stories in various magazines, anthologies and other online venues. “The Key,” a supernatural murder-mystery about the Holocaust and reincarnation, was named “distinguished” in The Best American Mystery Stories, 2005, and a novella-length sequel is forthcoming. Before she became a successful author, Bick was a child/adolescent and forensic psychiatrist. She holds a degree in literature and film studies, and has presented and written widely on applied psychoanalysis and film.