ALICE ISN’T DEAD by Joseph Fink
“Keisha Taylor lived a quiet life with her wife, Alice, until the day that Alice disappeared. After months of searching, presuming she was dead, Keisha held a funeral, mourned, and gradually tried to get on with her life. But, that was before Keisha started to see her wife, again, and again, in the background of news reports from all over America.” That’s what the liner notes said. I was expecting, oh, some sort of road odyssey, some grand pilgrimage across “all that raw land that rolls in one unbelievable huge bulge over to the West Coast, and all that road going, and all the people dreaming in the immensity of it…” (interjected Kerouac quote because that was the direction my thoughts were taking.) My goodness, was I mistaken. There was plenty of road going, but…
I nearly didn’t get through the first 20 pages because, first thing Keisha has an encounter with a creepy being who was very zombie-like, and Kristine doesn’t like zombies. Or the horror genre. Nevertheless, she persisted. Yes, there were zombie-like creatures and also hoodie-wearing, alien, oracle characters and a deeply dark origin of evil type of character and, as Keisha pressed on, people who knew what was going on and many others who pretended they didn’t and people who got eaten alive and ones who escaped. But, for me, it ultimately turned into another chapter in the long saga of Good vs. Evil and Love Conquers All. An unusual read, for certain…but, also, very entertaining and, for this reader, satisfying. If you feel like taking a trek off the beaten path, give ALICE ISN’T DEAD a try. Also a podcast, I hear!
