Raveling by Peter Smith

RAVELING by Peter Moore Smith
Time Warner Audio Books - 2000
ISBN: 1570429103 - Audio Cassette
Suspense / Thriller

Reviewed by Jo Rogers, MyShelf.com
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RAVELING is the story of a man named Pilot James Airie, so named because his father, James David Airie, was an airline pilot, and flying is what he loves best. There were three children born to Hannah and James Airie. The oldest, Eric, is now a doctor, a neurosurgeon. Pilot has been ill, and is staying with his mother, his parents having divorced eighteen years ago. That was two years after the youngest child, Fiona, had disappeared. The parents don't know what happened to her, but Pilot does. So does Eric, but he doesn't admit it.

Pilot is afraid of his brother. He says his brother threatened to kill him when they were kids. He also hears voices in the light fixtures, plotting how they are going to kill him. This was, of course after he went missing for three days and they found him in the woods behind the family home, acting out the fantasy that he is the wolf boy. Pilot was diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic, so the danger was all in his head.

Or was it? Katherine DeQuincy-Joy, Pilot's therapist, begins to wonder when all of Pilot's symptoms disappear, except the fear of his brother. Is it possible the medication erased all but one psychosis? Or does Pilot fear Eric for a good reason?

RAVELING has occasional bursts of profanity that are jarring and unnecessary. Other than that, it is a spellbinding tale of madness and sanity, and how madness can seem so much like sanity. It is masterfully read by actor Eric Stoltz, who actually seems to become Pilot. It provides six hours of pure entertainment.