Gwendy's Magic Feather

by Richard Chizmar
333 pgs  (Gwendy series #2)

If I'm going to be entirely honest, even though there were two authors' names on the cover of Gwendy's Button Box, only one of the names mattered to me (guess which one it was). Not because I didn't like Richard Chizmar, I'd just never read anything by him before. That being said, I enjoyed the story so much, that when I learned that Richard Chizmar had written a sequel by himself, it didn't really matter to me that Stephen King's name wasn't going to be on the cover. I wanted to know what happened next.

Gwendy's Magic Feather continues the story of Gwendy Peterson, now a 37-year-old, first-term congresswoman from Maine. Her life since the events of the first book has been relatively charmed. She's found success as a novelist, a filmmaker, and now in D.C. representing her constituents back in Castle Rock.

When the button box reappears inexplicably in her townhome one evening a few days before Christmas, without a note or another appearance by the mysterious Richard Farris, Gwendy is left with only the temptations of her own thoughts as to whether the box, and the powerful gifts it dispenses, could, or should, be used again.

When Gwendy flies home to see her parents for the holidays, she takes the box with her. But she returns to a Castle Rock currently under a dark cloud. Two girls have recently gone missing, and the police have no idea what's happened to them. Soon after her arrival, a third girl goes missing, and Gwendy, with her box, might be the only chance any of them has for surviving.

Any disappointment I might have had with Stephen King not being an author of this book were quickly forgotten when I started reading it. Richard Chizmar does both the character and town King created justice. Like the first book, it's a novella, and with its short chapters, it makes for a very quick, but satisfying read. I enjoyed it enough to place an order for another of Chizmar's books as soon as I finished this one, and I'm looking forward to seeing what else he has to offer.

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆