Ghosts of the desert by Ryan Ireland

The back cover of this book describes it as a 'harrowing and hypnotic' literary crime hybrid, and although this statement is certainly true I would describe it more as harrowing due to the graphic content of the story.

Told in a non linear flashback style, we encounter Norman, a scholar studying desert ghost towns and escaping from past actions he can't quite reconcile with the present. I found the first few pages hard to follow as we see Norman warned off a site he is researching, then seemingly kidnapped and part of a cult group, living on the Utah desert.

The thing I found impossible to get past when reading the book, although I enjoyed the gradual revealing of Norman's life in society and his actions leading to the start of the book, was the graphic sexual element, which the author seemed to almost revel in. This type of mysogny and sexual violence is fine for a reason or to further a character, but the book contains so much graphic sexual violence I almost gave up reading half way through as it seemed for the sake of it, rather than to take the story anywhere.

As cult leader Jacoby tells Norman, 'Live out here for a time an you'll learn there's no bottom, no limit to what you can do, what your capable of'. Just like Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, Ghosts of the desert leads to the question of who is civilised? Those who wear the mask of normality but are monsters underneath, or those who show themselves for what they are, except Conrad said it better.

Out in the UK 5 May 2016, thanks to the publisher for this advance copy.