A Twisted Ladder

by Rhodi Hawk

Book Overview

Psychologist Madeleine LeBlanc has spent her whole career trying to determine the cause of her father's schizophrenia. She always felt that if she could unravel the disease's origins, she could cure... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1615235817
• ISBN13: 9781615235810
• Release Date: January 2009
• Publisher: Forge
• Length: 540 Pages
• Weight: 1.64 lbs.

Customer Reviews

A Great Read, Couldn't Put it Down

I'm not a regular reader of suspense novels, but a friend gave this to me after a recent trip to New Orleans. I read it cover-to-cover in just a couple of days. Rhodi Hawk creates a great cast of characters and does an amazing job making the setting--New Orleans and the Louisiana Bayou--come alive as an intricate part of the story. While some of the major plot points become easy to predict by the end of the story, others kept me guessing and made the book hard to put down. I hope there's a follow-up in the works!

Completely original

I loved this book, although I occasionally lost interest in the earlier, parallel plotline. "A Twisted Ladder" was the most original book I've read in years. As someone with an advanced degree in psychology, the suggestion that there's something to the idea of psychic ability being related to evolution was fascinating, as was trying to discern what was supernatural, what was schizophrenia, and what was something else entirely. Highly recommend this to Southern Gothic lovers.

fantastic

i love this book! the story line is captivating. I am creole so i appreciate the ties that i have to it and all of the history. I love the appreciation for the southern language. it was simply amazing. can't wait to se what else she has to offer

Refreshingly different kind of a haunting

Loved it! This is a new kind of haunting, and it's nice to read a creepy story that isn't a rehash of something that's been done before. Looking forward to the next one!

exciting urban psychological suspense fantasy

Tulane University psychologist Dr. Madeleine LeBlanc has a personal interest in cognitive schizophrenia as her father "Daddy Blank" and her brother Marc suffered from the illness. Maddy has spent her medical career seeking the cause of the crippling disease and its prevention. Since her brother's suicide while fishing on Bayou Black, she fears the disease will prove genetic. Maddy is also afraid she might be schizophrenic or a schizoid psychotic when a "devil-child" visits her psychically. With help of Tulane neurologist Ethan Manderleigh, Maddy investigates her heritage especially on the family sugarcane plantation. However, instead of a better understanding of herself and her kin dating back to her nasty voodoo queen great-grandmother, she believes a childhood friend is a serial killer though she wonders if her conclusion is caused by her mental state rather than facts. The fun in this exciting urban psychological suspense fantasy is the blending of voodoo with modern mental health research. The story line is refreshing due to those ties that connect in the soul of Maddy. She fears she will be a chip off the old block of her schizophrenic father or her nasty century plus old voodoo queen great-grandmother; either side is a genetic loser in Maddy's mind as each lead to madness. With her only hope for survival rests in understanding her complete heritage, Maddy flashbacks to Prohibition New Orleans to comprehend Chloe's salad days. Fans will enjoy the aptly titled A TWISTED LADDER as the heroine ponders nurturing vs. naturing with her DNA and her childhood tainted in this terrific refreshing character driven thriller. Harriet Klausner