Demon Night

by J.Michael Straczynski

review by John W. Herbert
Recently re-issued by iBooks, the first novel by Babylon 5 creator J. Michael Straczynski, originally publish in 1988, might be described as "Stephen King Lite." And that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
The story takes place firmly in King country, a small town in Maine called Dredmouth Point where an ancient evil has been waiting, gathering its strength, while prodigal son Eric Matthews, whose family was killed in the town when he was a child, has returned to unlock the secret of his family’s death, and the strange and mysterious black outs he suffers.
Straczynski tells his story in solid, non-flashy prose. He gets straight into the story and drives it ahead quickly. Whereas King might have used 200 pages of back story and small town life to slowly develop the mood, Straczynski sets the creepy mood from the outset as Matthews slowly discovers what killed his family, what is slowly destroying the town, and his destiny.
No one will mistake Demon Night for a great work of art, but as a solid and capable first novel, it is another example of the excellent story-telling we’ve come to expect for the ubiquitous "jms."

Originally published in Neo-opsis magazine and reprinted in Under the Ozone Hole #18.