“It Devours!” is effing cool. It’s a sunburst yellow hardcover with the cartoonish image of a god’s gaping maw on the front. Flip it open and – HUZZAH – the endpapers are gorgeous. They’re covered in teeth. It’s a book that is marvelously fun to look at and it will make you feel cooler just holding it or having it on your shelf.
Night Vale is a small southwestern town and the desert around it has been grumbling, or maybe it is more of a rumbling. Everyone can deal with a few desert murmurs, but then the sinkholes start and Big Rico’s Pizza is swallowed up. Lead scientists Carlos assigns his subordinate, Nilanjana Sikdar, to examine what the heck is going on. During her investigation, Sikdar stumbles into Darryl Ramirez, a surprisingly hot member of The Joyous Congregation of the Smiling God. Ramirez’s faith states that to find redemption, you gotta get swallowed up by – well, no one is quite sure about that. Sikdar isn’t certain, but it seems that The Joyous Congregation of the Smiling God are planning a ritual that may save/destroy all of Night Vale.
“It Devours!,” by Joseph Fink and Jeffrey Cranor, creators of the “Welcome to Night Vale” podcast, is a charmingly mysterious, fast-paced, standalone read. If you enjoy “Stranger Things,” Neil Gaiman, “Twin Peaks,” or the fabulist work of Kelly Link, this is a definite buy.
— Patty Templeton
