Everborn

The Everborn

 

By: Nicholas Grabowsky

2002

Diverse Media

www.downwarden.com

ISBN # 1-4033-5348-4

 

Reviewed by Heidi Martinuzzi

 

Everborn is an eclectic mix of the X-files, Phillip K. Dick, and Clive Barker. Nicholas Grabowsky has succeeded in creating an entire world that is situated over our own, shading our every move with darkness and its ghostly alien presence. Everborn takes the tradition of other abduction and alien encounter books like Communion to the extreme, leaving the reader in utter astonishment as to the amazing detail that Grabowsky’s world has been created with.

 

Max J. Polito is a respected authority on aliens and the unexplained. With his wife, Melony, he lives a relatively normal life writing about the things that fascinate him the most. Never able to truly be at peace regarding his mysterious subject matter, Max always recalls an event in his youth that convinced him that there is an alien and supernatural presence here on earth. As Max and Melony get involved in a scheme to uncover the truth, they find themselves suffering blackouts, strange beings, lies, and visions that don’t make any sense. Andrew Erlandson, and his close friend Ralston Cooper share a strange connection to a being named Scratch, as well as to Max and Melony. Their seemingly random meeting slowly reveals itself as a very fated reunion. With supernatural and alien forces hard at work to accomplish their own goals, Max and Melony must figure out who is worth trusting, before they both end up dead, or worse.

Only through clues, tidbits of information, and odd memories can the truth finally be revealed for the good of humanity, rather than the total subjugation of mankind.

 

A very complicated novel, Grabowsky’s Everborn is the kind of immersion in the macabre that one needs to forget the mundane and trivial. The detailed mythology that he creates with his alien forces ties together more than one earthly superstition, weaving a web that connects the world of the supernatural and the extraterrestrial. Not a small read, Everborn is definitely hefty and will demand one’s total concentration in order to fully be appreciated. Once involved in this dark world, however, the reader will be unable to get the terrifying and original visions out of their head. Everborn is a refreshing look at the idea of extraterrestrials as horror. With all the films having come out in the horror world (Alien, Signs) it’s nice to see someone take a look at aliens as spiritual beings with strong ties to our own religions and legends. In the end, isn’t it really our own myths and superstitions that frighten us and not some accurate account of extraterrestrials? By mixing in our fears bout spirituality, rebirth, and legend, Grabowsky succeeds in making the whole world creepy, not just extraterrestrials.