Ill Will: A Novel Paperback – January 9, 2018

This book is everything I want in a thriller: smart, literary, DARK, and creepy. Throw in a plot centered around the satanic ritual abuse hysteria from the 80s and the fallibility of human memory and I'm completely sold.Dustin Tillman's adopted brother Rusty is about to be released from prison—finally exonerated 30 years later for the murder of Dustin's parents, aunt and uncle. Dustin testified against Rusty in the trial when he was a young boy, believing him to have been connected to a sinister satanic cult.Now, Dustin is a psychologist dealing with the recent death of his wife and the news of Rusty's release. Around this time, a mysterious new patient enters his life, asking for Dustin's help investigating a series of suspicious deaths in the area.Early on in the novel, we're given hints that we shouldn't know who or what to believe. As Dustin tells his patients, "we're always telling a story to ourselves about ourselves" and attempting to establish order in our lives by assigning meaning and connection where it may not exist.Ill Will is a story told from multiple perspectives, in different points in time. We come to learn how each character's understanding of events differs depending on their experience, their memories, and the stories they tell themselves.It's a riveting read rooted in a dark, pervasive sense of disorientation, delusion, and dread.How much can we trust ourselves and our memories of the past? It's a disquieting question, but a valid one based on actual research about the fallibility of memory.There's a quote that Chaon used toward the end of the book: "In the end it's the mystery that lasts and not the explanation." This is true of Ill Will, which has a frustratingly nebulous ending that will annoy many readers. Honestly though, I enjoyed the journey so much though that I'm not even that mad about it.

"Ill Will" features a pair of eerie, fascinating mysteries: Was Dustin's step-brother wrongly convicted of killing their family 30 years ago? Is there a serial killer at loose drowning college kids?The author has a way with scene, and does a good job of bringing to life the world surrounding these two mysteries. The characters are also well written, though none are particularly likable and a few blend together so as to be hard to distinguish.Where the book fails is in the author's insistence on placing his own literary stamp on the English language. At first, I honestly though it was a matter of the Kindle version not being formatted correctly. There are weird space, uneven lines, and columns of two or three separate narratives of text running in parallel. Eventually, I figured out what the was attempting to achieve, but it just seemed so unnecessary and distracting.If you want to insert a pause into a character's speech this is not how you do it. Also, when a character is interrupted or loses his train of though youDon't just end the sentence.I'm sure this all plays well in MFA programs, but to me it was an unfortunate distraction from an otherwise interesting story.Edit: I note that Amazon won't even let me write my review the way the author writes this book. It cleans up the missing spaces.

Well, the guy can write. I have enjoyed the sharp, quirky characterizations of his previous books, but this one just went in too many directions at once. It begins with an ordinary family--a nerdy psychologist dad, a nice mom and two teen-age kids and then everything falls apart in a horrifying series of events. We've got a terrible past, a falsely imprisoned adopted brother who might be a threat, Satanic rituals, a series of deaths that might be murder or coincidence, drug use, creepy drug houses, a really weird relationship between the psychologist and his very mysterious client/friend, and two cancer deaths. There was a kind of unrelenting mean spirit to this book that I resisted for a long time then found to be both upsetting and overwrought. The pieces kind of sort of come together at the end but in a way that was forced and unconvincing. Not his best work. I finished it but mostly to get free of the web of horror that was engulfing me.

One reviewer (from 2017) noted it already, but this book on Kindle is horrible. That's why I'm still wondering if I missed pages, or if an entire section was left out. Initially, great premise and an interesting read. But you begin to wonder if Dustin is insane, confused or spot on. At one point, I thought his friend/patient Aqil was imaginary. (Except for the fact that the kids saw him at Christmas.) Though some have praised Chaon's style of writing, I found it very confusing. And the ending. Just...stopped. I clicked back and forth many times. Did I miss something? Is that it? He's going to lead you all this way and then just(yeah, see what I did? That's what the book does.)

It is 2012 and a Cleveland Psychologist is dealing with three things:-His wife has terminal cancer.-An ex-cop is trying to convince him that a number of recent accidental drowning deaths of drunken college students is really the work of a serial killer.-His adopted brother, having served thirty years in prison for the supposed murder of his parents, aunt and uncle, has been released based on DNA evidence that he didn`t do it.Skip back thirty years to the relationship of the brothers and two twin female cousins and the events leading up to the murders. Now forward two years to where one of the Doctor`s two sons , a drug addict who has been in contact with his ex-con uncle, disappears, along with his junkie friend.All this is told in alternate chapters going back and forth in time, with different narrators. In some cases the narrative is in two or three columns on a page with different story lines.The overall effect, going on for 460 pages, is well written and engrossing. I have deducted a star because with the format and conclusion, I feel Chaon is trying to be just a little too clever.That being said, for the discerning reader, looking for something interesting and different, I highly recommend this book.

One of the best books i’ve read in the last couple of years.

I'm kind of disappointed with the closure of such plot. The storyline can keep the grip throughout the almost 500 pages. However, some questions remained unanswered when you finish off the reading, such as what the real motivation for the present crimes was? I also got very upset with the parallel narratives the author placed in some lingering chapters, when you had to read side by side, 2 or 3 at the same time, not to mention the unfinished phrases or missing words in several parts (I initially thought this could be a failure of my e-reader, but later saw a review in which the reviewer complained about the same thing). Not sure what author wanted to accomplish with such style, other than puzzle the reader.

Thriller passionnant. Une histoire de serial killer sur plusieurs générations qui conserve tout au long du livre la même intensité.Dan Chaon utilise une technique de narration particulière multi-facettes tout à fait adaptée à la réaction des différents personnages face à une même situation.

Bizarre and emotional.