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While on an African safari, Helen Pendergast is attacked and killed by a rare red-mane lion. Twelve years later, while checking the gun she used in Africa, Special Agent Aloysius Pendergast discovers that his wife was actually murdered. Though the trail has grown cold, Pendergast is still determined to hunt down his wife’s killer and make sure justice is served—even if it means putting a bullet in the killer’s head.
Pendergast asks Lieutenant Vincent D’Agosta to take a leave of absence and help him catch the man responsible for his wife’s death. When they arrive in Africa and start asking questions, they end up with an assassin on their trail—and they start to wonder who Helen really was.
Helen had become obsessed with naturalist painter John James Audubon, who died in a mental institution over a century ago. She spent years looking for the artist’s last painting, known as the Black Frame. But what did this have to do with her death in Africa—and who is trying to get rid of D’Agosta and Pendergast?
Pendergast’s search leads him deep in the Louisiana bayou, where violence erupts and shocking questions are answered.
Though the books in Preston and Child’s Pendergast series are usually about something supernatural, Fever Dream is more like something on the fringe of science. As I kept reading, the whole plot began to feel spooky. The mystery surrounding the Black Frame sent chills up and down my arms for reasons I didn’t fully understand—but the authors definitely have a talent for adding creepy suspense to the story.
Aloysius Pendergast is an unusual character. His methods are definitely unorthodox, but I still couldn’t help but laugh when he got even with the rednecks in Louisiana in his own unusual way. He may appear harmless, but you don’t want to mess with him. He’s extremely intelligent, backwoods wise, and so incredibly likable.
Written with a hint of unknown creepiness, this clever, fast-moving story is both thrilling and uncanny. You’re going to want to read Fever Dream—and, once you do, you’ll want to go back and pick up the other books in the Aloysius Pendergast series, too.
