https://thebookloversboudoir.wordpres...ARC from @ericjguignard and voluntarily reviewedI loved this book. It reminds me so much of The Talisman by Stephen King. An impressive feat, believe me. I loved the way the book weaves back and forth between the past and present. I love books that effectively use time shifts. Luke is a great character. The book delves into his tragic past and shows how he became a hobo. He’s a tragic, sympathetic character. I loved the fact Luke encounters famous historic...

3/5Two-time Stoker winner, Eric J. Guignard, has built his name around writing horror and dark fiction. However, his debut novel is pretty far from horror and closer to fantasy.The concept behind Doorways to the Deadeye is a great one and therefore lures you in with ease. The early stages of this story build you up for something exciting and interesting, but unfortunately, a lot of it doesn’t pan out. There are several reasons for this, like the historic figures he uses as characters (their mann...

An American Odyssey. Doorways to the Deadeye is beautifully written, I love the setting, the use of the hobo code and then the parallel overlapped world inhabited by America’s memories. Great world building. Often my first impulse with a book I really like is the desire to convert it to a roleplaying game, so I can spend more time in that world. With Doorways to the Deadeye I felt like it would make a brilliant setting or sourcebook for Atlas Games Unknown Armies.

As an editor and publisher, the Bram Stoker award-winning author Eric Guignard has really done wonderful work highlighting overlooked authors with his excellent "Exploring Dark Fiction" series. His collection That Which Grows Wild was excellent and showed great range. I was excited to give Guignard's first novel a shot. According to what we can glean from the acknowledgments the author fell into one of the many pitfalls typical to first-time novelists. Apparently, an earlier draft was much longe...

Loved this book. It’s an epic fantasy of alternate history and stories wrapped within stories, mixing together a lot of genres and styles, such as action, horror, hope, the works, which works as ultimately it’s all an allegory about the power of storytelling, of keeping memories alive, and what happens when memories or those stories are changed. It was a lot to unpack, and the ending blew me away, that everything had been built together from the beginning and all led to the unexpected final scen...

** Review copy received from the author for review consideration **I’ve been long-impressed by Eric J. Guignard’s tremendous output both as an editor and an an author, and Doorways to the Deadeye is a stunningly original, well-executed project. We start off with Luke Thacker, the protagonist, in 1955. He’s on a train going to Charleston, and has a reputation as “Crossbuck Luke,” something of a cult figure part of the hobo community. The first chapter ends on one of the most suspenseful notes I h...

If a reader imagines that they are not particularly keen on the horror genre, this could be one of those gateway books that eases the way. This is actually quite philosophical and thus surprising.Filled with famous people such as John Dillinger, Harriet Tubman, Wyatt Earp, Paul Revere and even Pocahontas, stories intertwine as one character searches for answers about life and death and love. Some take-aways include:*Every person on earth writes their own history.*People have a history only as lo...

My review of DOORWAYS TO THE DEADEYE can be found at High Fever Books.Eric J. Guignard presents a stunning work of magical realism and American folklore in Doorways to the Deadeye, revolving around the growing legend of train-hopping hobo Lucas Thatcher. Luke has a special skill, you see. He can read the hobo code with surprising ease, including those glowing mystical symbols nobody else can see, those symbols that plot a course to Athanasia, a world inhabited by the dead that exists alongside o...

(Doorways To The Deadeye), blew me away. The cryptic world of Luke along the way with his beloved friends and evil enemies, transformed into an EPIC world of tragedy, loss, love, heroism, determination, and the greatest history lesson ever, by the worst pupil.Eric J. Guignard held his characters tight, and many there are...he believed in them, as you will too...he butchered his soul for this novel, and the central star shines very bright and moves with the chronology effortlessly because of this...

Doorways to the Deadeye is a uniquely creative fantasy riff on the concept of storytelling. And, storytelling is approached from several angles. To begin with, the story is told through the voice of a modern-day reporter who is telling of his meetings with King, an aging hobo, who at times tells parts of his own story, but more to the point tells the reporter about the Prince of Hobos, Luke Thacker, who has the ability to read the secret hobo signs, to travel back and forth to the purgatory wher...

I read this book as a review copy, as it's on the preliminary ballot for the Stokers this year, and MAN, am I glad I did.I used to read and enjoy a webscomic called A Girl and Her Fed. This book has some of what I used to enjoy in that comic--a sense of how people of the past are remembered, strengthens their ghosts and gives them power.I also *love* Tim Powers' books. That I handed "Last Call" to a friend the night before our master's exams at Penn State, and she cussed me out the next day beca...

Crossbuck Luke is a hobo legend known for riding the rails and telling tall tails about the magical world of Athanasia--the land of collective memory where legends live on.There are some concepts that will never get old to me, and stories about the power of stories are at the top of that list, with DOORWAYS TO THE DEADEYE being an especially creative take. It hits on so many notests that really gave me in thrill, particularly how a great story grants a kind of immortality, but also subtly touche...

**More review to come, but first thoughts are that what an beautiful and unique book this is! Thrilling, gorgeous prose, filled with vivid characters and scenes.

Doorways to the Deadeye, the Novel debut by Eric J. Guignard is a story about the power of stories. It’s a fantastical novel that’s well written, and a testament to the authors skill.The story follows Luke Thacker, a hobo living in America during the depression. It’s actually told as a story within a story, and this device works well for what Guignard is doing. This is a tough one to talk about without spoilers, but I liked how Guignard set the story up set that Thacker is able to interact with

Doorways to the Deadeye by Eric J Guignard is dark speculative fiction with strong elements of cosmic horror, alternate history and the supernatural. In short, it refuses to conform to the strictures of genre and subgenre. Much like its characters.Guignard’s characters are rich and vivid, weaving their own tales within the larger tale of Americana folklore where the tale and the telling is everything.Doorways to the Deadeye has all the characteristics of a modern classic but is much more interes...

In Doorways to the Deadeye, Eric J. Guignard tells the tall tales of Crossbuck Luke Thacker, a rail-riding hobo in Depression-era America. The stories are told within the framework of a reporter recording tales told by a fellow ‘bo who knew Luke firsthand. These tales are somewhat episodic, telling of various important moments in Luke’s life, but with an overarching storyline. Luke lives his life on the rails following the Hobo Code, a series of symbols that help guide wayward vagrants like hims...

Today, I’m reviewing Doorways to the deadeye, by Eric J Guignard, the tale of a courageous young hobo, Luke Thacker. Set mainly in the 1920s and 30s, young Luke hops the American rail-lines, following mysterious signs known only as The Hobo Code. But, who has been leaving these signs for Luke to find?~Story~In 2019, a journalist named Daniel Greenberg is interviewing a man nicknamed King, who once knew Luke Thacker. This modern part of the narrative is used as a framing device for the main story...

What a great book. So well-written. So many great lines, so many great twists. I'd be interested in reading the "unpublishable 150,000+ words" it could have been. Really, really good. Fuckin a. This is why I read.

Doorways to the Deadeye by Eric J. Guignard is a captivating tale about the importance of stories and memories. A wonderful mix of magical realism and American folklore, this is a book that will stick with you!Full disclosure: I was given a free copy of this book from the author in exchange for an honest review. This did not affect my review in any way.You know books like this… You start reading it and you’re immediately totally immersed in the tale. Before you know it, you’ve reached the end!Th...

A multi-layered narrative, Doorways to the Deadeye is about the magic of story and the recursive shape of memory. Its story-within-a-story framework is dense and chewy, which might be off-putting for some readers, but it serves as the perfect vehicle for the book's wider themes and tropes. It's a hard book to classify. Is it horror? Fantasy? Alternate history? Perhaps a mix of all the above, and other things besides. The world-building is the truly imaginative part; Guignard crafts an afterlife