Dagny’s got a lot to learn, and she’ll likely get her chance.

She’s also prone to childish temper tantrums. One of the novel’s most powerful scenes features Dagny’s new friends correctly calling her out for being a selfish manipulator. But Breen elevates these genre elements by successfully incorporating moments of sibling rivalry, budding romance, and the grit of human relationships. There’s a sense of a supernatural hand guiding Dagny toward reuniting with her sister. As a fantasy thriller, EVER THE NIGHT ROAD has an Indiana Jones vibe combined with the “lawless frontier” themes of a good Zane Grey western.

Breen subtly builds the world of EVER THE NIGHT ROAD, revealing hints of what once was: a patch of asphalt roadway peeking out from dirt and weeds, crumbled church steeples, and decayed buildings overrun by an untamed forest.īreen packs a lot into his novel. Breen handles both styles with skill the action is suspenseful, and the love scenes are tender. Missing years and vastly different life experiences threaten to break the childhood bond between the sisters, leading to a family drama that is as riveting as the novel’s swashbuckling premise. Hats off to author Michael Breen for continuing Dagny and Gretchen’s story beyond the limits of a traditional rescue tale.

How did Dagny’s little sister become so street-wise and book-smart? Why does she seem older and more mature than Dagny? Who is rescuing who? Dagny vows to rescue her. But Gretchen is quite capable of taking care of herself. But Gretchen lives, though she has fallen in with a band of ruffians in a bad part of town. After Dagny rescues a lost child, she’s given clues that lead her on a far more personal quest: the search for her long-lost sister, Gretchen. For years, Dagny believed her younger sister had died in the tenement flood. The world is again filled with exotic and unexplored places, superstitions, and spirit guides.ĭagny and her friends consider themselves “adventurers,” searching through the relics of a long, dead world for prophecies of the future. But, while the world has devolved technologically, a subtle type of magic has returned. Dagny lives in a futuristic Dark Age the Regime of Man has long passed, leaving only relics and remnants reclaimed by nature. EVER THE NIGHT ROAD is the story of Dagny, a poor girl taken in by a prosperous family after her tenement home is washed away in a flood.

Night road book review