Shadow Season: A Novel Book

This was a straight-up thriller from Tom Piccirilli, the story of a former NYPD detective, now working as a blind English teacher at private girls' school in upstate New York. The first half of the book was a little draggy, trying to set up the scene for the much faster paced last half, which had me wrapped up until the bitter end.

Finn is living on campus in what was formerly a hotel but is now a girls' school. His girlfriend Roz, who came to the school with him, is working as the school nurse, and the campus is closed for the Christmas holidays. Most of the students have gone home to be with family but a small handful remain at the school for various reasons. The resident staff have planned a small party for the remaining students and plans for a festive evening turn dark when a snow storm blows in along with something even more sinister.

The story flashes back to the recent past and glimpses into what happened to former detective Finn, how he became blind, and the horrible truth about how the events leading up to his current situation. The descriptions of how he learned to cope with blindness and the way his other senses adjusted to help him "see" were very interesting. His backstory was pretty convoluted, and I thought more needed to be said about his former partner, Ray, and much earlier in the book. I didn't even realize Ray was still a player until the last quarter of the book. All in all, I liked it. Maybe not as much as "The Last Kind Words" but still pretty good.