In rural Maine, a stop on the Underground Railroad is menaced by a supernatural force in this terrifying novel of pre–Civil War horror.
Davis Bentwood has nearly finished medical school when he meets an abolitionist dwarf walking across Harvard Yard. Jeb Coffin is a nonpracticing doctor, a devoted student of transcendentalism whose home life has been shaken by tragedy. The two men become friends, and Coffin invites Bentwood to rural Maine to save his family from itself. The Coffins are noted abolitionists, their home a stop on the Underground Railroad, and lately they have been menaced by a supernatural terror. The tragedies are countless: two brothers killed, a father driven mad, and a baby frozen solid in its crib.
At first Bentwood cannot bring himself to acknowledge the impossible horrors that have cursed this family. But he will not survive his sojourn in Maine unless he can open his mind to the possibility that something evil is waiting in the dark.
Review
“Gloomy, graphic and gory.” — Publishers Weekly
“An old-fashioned morality tale, with the children paying for the sins of the father.” — Bangor Daily News
About the Author
Rodman Philbrick grew up on the coast of New Hampshire and has been writing since the age of sixteen. For a number of years he published mystery and suspense fiction for adults. Brothers & Sinners won the Shamus Award in 1994, and two of his other detective novels were nominees. In 1993 his debut young adult novel, Freak the Mighty , won numerous honors, and in 1998 was made into the feature film The Mighty , starring Sharon Stone and James Gandolfini. Freak the Mighty has become a standard reading selection in thousands of classrooms worldwide, and there are more than three million copies in print. In 2010 Philbrick won a Newbery Honor for The Mostly True Adventures of Homer P. Figg.
From the Back Cover
THE FROZEN BABY
Physician Davis Bentwood, making a lengthy housecall at the Coffin family mansion on the coast of Maine, finds the newborn grandson of Captain Cash Coffin, stiff and cold as a block of ice, in a cradle not ten feet from a roaring fire. Young Davis can find no medical explanation for the baby's death.
After a mysterious accident at the family shipyard caused the simultaneous death of his twin sons, Cash Coffin locked himself in study, and threatened to shoot anyone who approached. Cash's youngest son, the dwarf Jebediah, has asked his old friend Davis to try to help the old man.
Another Coffin son, an experienced ship's master, dies at sea in a freak accident that defies a natural explanation. And on a moonless night, Davis Bentwood is awakened by an eerie light that leads him to the Coffin family's darkest secret.
Cash Coffin traded in slaves.
Davis Bentwood's blood-chilling discovery holds the key to the family's destruction. Can the ancient evil being visited upon the Coffins be stopped?
"Philbrick does an admirable job in capturing the flavor of the times, and it's enjoyable to see such historical figures as Frederick Douglass and Elizabeth Cady Stanton pop up seamlessly in the narrative. Like the best works of Poe, Coffins has no happy ending. It's an old-fashioned morality tale, with the children paying for the sins of the father."-- The Bangor News
"Mesmerizingly suspenseful. Compelling: an intriguing and unusual story."-- Kirkus Reviews on Rodman Philbrick's Freak the Mighty
--This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.
From Publishers Weekly
Best known for his young adult novels (Freak the Mighty), Philbrick swerves from his usual path with this adults-only supernatural horror show, certainly not for the squeamish or faint of heart. Just before the Civil War, young doctor Davis Bentwood befriends a dwarf named Jebediah Coffin. Jeb may be small of stature, but he has the brains and energy of 10 men. Davis is a doctor who does not practice; he is a lazy and self-centered young man who dabbles in science and the new fad of transcendentalism. When an urgent telegram summons Davis to the Coffin family home in Maine, he is unexpectedly thrown into a shocking world of curses, madness, malevolence, hauntings and violent death. Jeb's twin brothers have been cut to pieces in a sawmill, and his baby nephew is found frozen to death in a stifling hot nursery. Jeb's father, Capt. Cash Coffin, raves like a lunatic, and the entire family is paralyzed with fear and grief. Davis learns that the wealthy Coffins are proud abolitionists, even using their home as part of the Underground Railroad to help escaping slaves reach safety in Canada. He also learns of a terrible secret and a horrible curse put on Jeb's father 20 years earlier. The curse is now acting itself out, and the Coffin family is crazed with fear as the Coffin sons die gruesome deaths one by one. The body count is high, and Philbrick uses gloomy, graphic and gory means to dispatch the victims, but the story lacks suspense and pegs very low on the spooky meter. Sadly, the well-crafted pre-Civil War abolitionist angle is merely window dressing for an unconvincing tale of superstition awash in blood and body parts.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Description:
In rural Maine, a stop on the Underground Railroad is menaced by a supernatural force in this terrifying novel of pre–Civil War horror.
Davis Bentwood has nearly finished medical school when he meets an abolitionist dwarf walking across Harvard Yard. Jeb Coffin is a nonpracticing doctor, a devoted student of transcendentalism whose home life has been shaken by tragedy. The two men become friends, and Coffin invites Bentwood to rural Maine to save his family from itself. The Coffins are noted abolitionists, their home a stop on the Underground Railroad, and lately they have been menaced by a supernatural terror. The tragedies are countless: two brothers killed, a father driven mad, and a baby frozen solid in its crib.
At first Bentwood cannot bring himself to acknowledge the impossible horrors that have cursed this family. But he will not survive his sojourn in Maine unless he can open his mind to the possibility that something evil is waiting in the dark.
Review
“Gloomy, graphic and gory.” — Publishers Weekly
“An old-fashioned morality tale, with the children paying for the sins of the father.” — Bangor Daily News
About the Author
Rodman Philbrick grew up on the coast of New Hampshire and has been writing since the age of sixteen. For a number of years he published mystery and suspense fiction for adults. Brothers & Sinners won the Shamus Award in 1994, and two of his other detective novels were nominees. In 1993 his debut young adult novel, Freak the Mighty , won numerous honors, and in 1998 was made into the feature film The Mighty , starring Sharon Stone and James Gandolfini. Freak the Mighty has become a standard reading selection in thousands of classrooms worldwide, and there are more than three million copies in print. In 2010 Philbrick won a Newbery Honor for The Mostly True Adventures of Homer P. Figg.
From the Back Cover
THE FROZEN BABY
Physician Davis Bentwood, making a lengthy housecall at the Coffin family mansion on the coast of Maine, finds the newborn grandson of Captain Cash Coffin, stiff and cold as a block of ice, in a cradle not ten feet from a roaring fire. Young Davis can find no medical explanation for the baby's death.
After a mysterious accident at the family shipyard caused the simultaneous death of his twin sons, Cash Coffin locked himself in study, and threatened to shoot anyone who approached. Cash's youngest son, the dwarf Jebediah, has asked his old friend Davis to try to help the old man.
Another Coffin son, an experienced ship's master, dies at sea in a freak accident that defies a natural explanation. And on a moonless night, Davis Bentwood is awakened by an eerie light that leads him to the Coffin family's darkest secret.
Cash Coffin traded in slaves.
Davis Bentwood's blood-chilling discovery holds the key to the family's destruction. Can the ancient evil being visited upon the Coffins be stopped?
"Philbrick does an admirable job in capturing the flavor of the times, and it's enjoyable to see such historical figures as Frederick Douglass and Elizabeth Cady Stanton pop up seamlessly in the narrative. Like the best works of Poe, Coffins has no happy ending. It's an old-fashioned morality tale, with the children paying for the sins of the father."-- The Bangor News
"Mesmerizingly suspenseful. Compelling: an intriguing and unusual story."-- Kirkus Reviews on Rodman Philbrick's Freak the Mighty
--This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.
From Publishers Weekly
Best known for his young adult novels (Freak the Mighty), Philbrick swerves from his usual path with this adults-only supernatural horror show, certainly not for the squeamish or faint of heart. Just before the Civil War, young doctor Davis Bentwood befriends a dwarf named Jebediah Coffin. Jeb may be small of stature, but he has the brains and energy of 10 men. Davis is a doctor who does not practice; he is a lazy and self-centered young man who dabbles in science and the new fad of transcendentalism. When an urgent telegram summons Davis to the Coffin family home in Maine, he is unexpectedly thrown into a shocking world of curses, madness, malevolence, hauntings and violent death. Jeb's twin brothers have been cut to pieces in a sawmill, and his baby nephew is found frozen to death in a stifling hot nursery. Jeb's father, Capt. Cash Coffin, raves like a lunatic, and the entire family is paralyzed with fear and grief. Davis learns that the wealthy Coffins are proud abolitionists, even using their home as part of the Underground Railroad to help escaping slaves reach safety in Canada. He also learns of a terrible secret and a horrible curse put on Jeb's father 20 years earlier. The curse is now acting itself out, and the Coffin family is crazed with fear as the Coffin sons die gruesome deaths one by one. The body count is high, and Philbrick uses gloomy, graphic and gory means to dispatch the victims, but the story lacks suspense and pegs very low on the spooky meter. Sadly, the well-crafted pre-Civil War abolitionist angle is merely window dressing for an unconvincing tale of superstition awash in blood and body parts.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.