Rollicking, globe-hopping, timely and prescient . . . this first novel just blows the doors off

Smart, edgy, fast-paced storytelling at its best

From the first page it pulls you into a compellingly suspenseful story and delivers it at a breakneck pace

Fans of 'Homeland' and '24' will love The Pattern of Fear - a rocket of a thriller that's fresh and cool and totally real

Darkly compelling murder mystery., the novel is also a densely layered engagement with questions of politics, spirituality, environmentalism and meta fiction. It is an incredible book; its echoes sound long after the end has been reached

An intersection between horror story, morality tale, feigned memoir and ecological satire

Tackles the question of what lies beyond with wit and subtlety

The atmosphere of Glister is sustained by Burnside's distinctive and widely praised prose style, spare but ruminative, full of ideas and unusual formulations

Burnside burns most brilliantly when he allows himself free rein to become a prophet of the natural sublime... The world of this chilling novel is steeped in a nature so finely drawn that it aches with its pulsing, crippled mortality

Puts him in the class of Hardy and Lawrence

The unrelenting evocation of toxicity is remarkable

a taut, mystical thriller and a thoughtful meditation on humanity

Burnside's story uses suggestion and ambiguity rather than explicit statement, but has the power that comes from leaving plenty of space in which the reader's imagination can go to work

remarkable, genre-defying...Glister is a remarkable book...a fusion of styles and genres, and it succeeds magnificently on those terms...powerfully imagines and beautifully written...A haunting tale, not as depressing as you might expect, and highly recommended

Writing 'this dreamy melange of gritty urbanism with poetic crime puzzler, will appeal to the right reader very highly

A dark fable

Burnside's writing conveys an almost palpable thrill of discovery, a delight in the play of his imagination over this bleak terrain, an irrepressible joy in cultivating metaphor after metaphor and seeing them all, improbably, bloom...The emotion this brilliant and disturbing novel leaves you with is like the spooked feeling Leonard experiences...It takes your breath away, but you don't know if that comes from awe or terror. The Glister" is that kind of story. It's terrifying, and it feels like a gift.

I'm a year late (quite punctual, for me) in recommending John Burnside's austerely poetic novel