The Devil Aspect

By Craig Russell

Book Overview

A USA Today Best Mystery of All Time - Steeped in the folklore of Eastern Europe, and set in the shadow of Nazi darkness erupting just beyond the Czech border, this bone-chilling, richly imagined novel is propulsively entertaining, and impossible to put down.

"A wildly entertaining story...Russell has created a truly frightening story." --The New York Times Book Review

Czechoslovakia, 1935: Viktor Kos rek, a newly trained psychiatrist who studied under Carl Jung, arrives at the infamous Hrad Orlu Asylum for the Criminally Insane. The facility is located in a medieval mountaintop castle surrounded by forests, on a site that is well known for concealing dark secrets going back many centuries. The asylum houses six inmates--the country's most treacherous killers--known to the terrified public as the Devil's Six. Viktor intends to use a new medical technique to prove that these patients share a common archetype of evil, a phenomenon he calls The Devil Aspect. Yet as he begins to learn the stunning secrets of these patients, he must face the unnerving possibility that these six may share a darker truth.

Meanwhile, in Prague, fear grips the city as a phantom serial killer emerges in the dark alleys. Police investigator Lukas Smolak, desperate to locate the culprit (a copycat of Jack the Ripper), turns to Viktor and the doctors at Hrad Orlu for their expertise with the psychotic criminal mind. And Viktor finds himself wrapped up in a case more terrifying than he could have ever imagined.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0525564780
• ISBN13: 9780525564782
• Release Date: January 2020
• Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
• Length: 432 Pages
• Weight: 0.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.3" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

Great Mystery/historical fiction and spooky tale all in one

This book surprised me. I found myself really getting drawn in to solving the mysteries; wondering who were the bad guys vs the good guys. There are a lot of intricate characters whose personalities the author describes and brings to life with dialogue. Many historical reference s.. When Hilter and the Nazis invaded, they first took over mental hospitals which is also something I learned as I read this book.