The Children of Red Peak is a sensitively written tale about five children who survived a post-apocalyptic cult. It flashes back to their time with the Family while taking place in the present as they come to terms with their shared trauma. The story is riveting without feeling exploitative, and the way the characters deal with their past feels genuine and true. The characters are nuanced and real, and I was ultimately satisfied with the ending. If you're looking for a book on cults that is horrifying without being hyper-focused on the gore and shock value at the expense of story, this is the book for you. Very well done! It's my favorite book I've read this year.

“The Children of Red Peak”, by Craig Dilouie, had me at cult. Anything having to do with cults magnetize me immediately. I mean, really, who does not love a good doomsday cult novel?

In “The Children of Red Peak” we meet three main characters…David, Beth and Deacon at the funeral of their childhood friend Emily, who has committed suicide. She left a note that saying “I just could not do it anymore.” Fifteen years prior, these four people were the sole survivors of a cult mass suicide out in the Desert of Red Peak.

The chapters alternate between characters and past and present time periods. Dilouie slowly reveals how these children became part of the Family of the Living Spirit. The idyllic days of the family living on a remote farm in central California where the family was free to wander and form bonds. Once the book reached the middle the pace quickened a little bit.

The book has a dark and heavy atmosphere but does not feel like horror the entire way through. Dilouie focuses on the character development as he explores the kids survival and the religious cult. The end of the book left me with far more questions than answers.

3.5 stars

Very sad book but I loved the descriptions of the "back to nature" lifestyle that was a part of this story. Over the past few decades many individuals and groups have looked to this situation as an answer to the question "how can I gain eternal happiness". You will never forget this read.

I'm torn on this book. One the one hand, horror and cults? SIGN.ME.UP. However, the ending left me kind of...meh. I wasn't impressed by that. So there are good and bad things about it, but if you like cults, it's worth a read.

I feel like I have been writing this in a lot of my reviews but I will say it again “It was so good UNTIL the supernatural stuff starting to happen”

It had everything: cults, flashbacks, murder, romance and then the end just ruined all the great elements.

I started reading and thought it might be an interesting read. The story is well written and began to draw me in but then "bible' and such started to show up and "cult" but in a very negative way... and for some reason, even though I wasn't raised in a cult, it hit too close to home. I skimmed reading a bit from each chapter and am sure this is a book that will appeal to many but I couldn't read it word for word as it truly did bother me. It made me think of being told things similar to the characters in this book were told and as I have given up on those beliefs...did not want to be reminded of them or revisit them so did not read word for word.

This is a great story. A mix of mystery, thriller, and a little horror. I'm part of that small sub-genre group that loves stories about cults, and this book did not disappoint. It is a page-turner, and I wanted to keep reading to see what would happen next, and solve that mystery of - did something really happen? were the believers right?

If you like stories about cults, and the psychology behind people who join them, you'll like this book. Even if you just like a good mystery or a story that alternates between present day and the past to slowly reveal the mystery and what actually happened, you'll like this book.

Thank you for the ARC, I'll definitely be looking to read more of Craig DiLouie's work.

There are always multiple sides to every story, but rarely does the audience get to experience them all at the same time. That is truly the concept of Children of Red Peak. This is a psychological thriller which presents an intriguing mystery to unravel centered on a group of friends who experienced a tragic childhood while forced to live amongst a religious cult who all mysteriously died one night during a strange event and no bodies were found. The children were the only survivors.

The book swaps between a few time frames, spanning from 2002 when they were children, and 2020 when they’re adults as they reconnect and decide to confront their fears and problems head on by revisiting Red Peak, where this cult resided. The switching from past to present made me care about these characters even more than usual because seeing their personalities, hopes and dreams as kids materialize now that they’re all around 30 was very fun to me.
And though it kept my attention the entire time as I desperately wanted to know what happens next, it definitely takes the "some thriller but mostly filler" technique. Like the scary bits take a while to creep in but when they do, they’re well done, satisfyingly eerie but to me, the book is really dulled down with a lot of conversations. Some main characters were also far more intersting then others which is hard to pull off and differs from reader to reader.

So while Red Peak's summit and characters left something to be desired, there is definitely something there that makes this a page-turner, and perhaps most horror fans will enjoy. Like I see myself still recommending this book because I still think about it long after I’ve finished it, overall it’s a 3 star read out of 5 for me. Now if Craig de louie wrote a fantasy, that would change the game for me.

The Children of Red Peak is a psychological thriller with a supernatural horror element. Author Craig DiLouie describes it as "a novel about the search for the meaning of life and the yearning for existence beyond death." It is an absolutely riveting story.

The story is set in 2020 and California is on fire again. Wildfires are raging across the state, and David Young is headed south on Interstate 5, on his way to the funeral of his childhood friend, Emily. She wrote him a note before she took her own life: "I couldn't fight it anymore." David has never told his wife, Claire, about his past. He adores their children, Alyssa and Dexter, and has established a rewarding, successful career as an exit counselor. While deprogrammers are usually retained by family members and their goal is to re-train cult members and convince them to abandon their belief systems, exit counseling is voluntary and the interventions David stages are more akin to addiction interventions. His sister, Angela, is a police detective whose anger about the past fuels her.

At Emily's funeral, David is reunited with Deacon Price, a rock musician with dyed black hair and numerous tattoos. And Beth Harris, the only one of the survivors who graduated from college, earning a doctorate in clinical psychology, but she has never married. She's a successful psychologist, with a practice in Santa Barbara, who is "dedicated to a life of mental surgery to fix her scars." When they were growing up together, she was in love with Deacon and still may be. He seems interested in rekindling their attraction, but she is unsure if it is a good idea.

The fifteenth anniversary is quickly approaching of the horrific event that David, Deacon, Beth, Emily, and Angela survived. They were the only survivors, and with Emily gone, only the four of them remain.

In 2002, eleven months after 9/11, David's mother was convinced a war that would kill millions was coming. And they needed to be ready to meet Jesus. So she loaded all of their belongings into a U-Haul trailer and moved with nine-year-old David and Angela from Idaho to the Cummings Valley, near Tehachapi, east of Bakersfield, to join the Family of the Living Spirit, led by the Reverend Jeremiah Peale. She tells her children, "They live a pure life there, simple and close to God. We're going to live off the land."

Indeed, the Family of the Living Spirit existed in the wilderness where members erected a cluster of white buildings, one of which was their church. In a narrative commencing in 2002, DiLouie describes David's arrival and assimilation into the Family. He and Angela meet the other children, and gradually become accustomed to the lifestyle, playing in the vast open spaces, attending the school and church services, and adapting to the rules imposed by Jeremiah, their charismatic and caring leader.

But as time passes, Jeremiah changes. He goes off on pilgrimages by himself and when he returns, delivers new edicts, claiming that he has received messages about how the Family should function. In 2005, he leaves Shepherd Wright in charge while he is away to "investigate an important spiritual matter" and is not pleased when he returns and discovers that "new ordinances" have been enacted. He reports that he went to Red Peak, the Mountain of the Great Spirit on the western side of Death Valley, where God told him, "Deliver your tribe unto me!" So the Family migrates to Red Peak where living conditions are much worse, and Jeremiah leads them into hard labor, starvation, trance states that facilitate mind control, and unspeakable acts culminating with one horrific tragedy that destroyed the Family of the Living Spirit -- with the exception of five traumatized children.

In the present-day, DiLouie compassionately explores the pain-wracked lives of David, Deacon, Beth, and Emily. They were rescued from Red Peak and provided treatment. But they carry with them the atrocities they witnessed as Jeremiah descended further into madness and his flock obeyed his crazed directives. Each of them suffers from survivor's guilt, questioning why they did not meet the same fate as the other members of the Family, and struggles to make sense of their history and present circumstances. To develop each character, DiLouie says he defined their individual personality traits and then worked to "show how their dominant childhood trait is now taken to the limit as a crutch in adulthood. This trait and their response to what happened to them form their character arc, their professions, and the choice they make at the end of the novel when the mystery is revealed." For example, "David was easily scared as a child and so he’d often hide from what scared him; as an adult, he’s now a cult exit counselor — he helps people escape — and he emotionally shuts down when confronted by stress, which costs him meaningful relationships and may cost him his marriage."

Something supernatural, defying scientific explanation, took place at Red Peak on that unforgettable day. Deacon believes that wholeheartedly, David copes by living in a state of busyness and denial, and Beth chalks it up to a "glitch of mental perception." As the anniversary approaches, Beth proposes that they return to Red Peak to see if any memories resurface. "Confront the source of our trauma, clarify our memory in safety, and put it behind us forever." She is convinced that no matter what happens at Red Peak, she will "come home a new woman, strong and complete and wanting nothing." Deacon immediately agrees, but David is hesitant, noting that when Emily committed suicide he experienced the first panic attack he'd suffered in many years. But he is convinced when Beth explains that exposure therapy is an effective way to treat post-traumatic stress disorder -- returning to a place that is frightening under conditions that permit the patient to safely confront his/her fears. Angela had already returned to Red Peak numerous times in search of clues and in a quest for justice, convinced that the Family was duped.

DiLouie illustrates the quartet's pilgrimage to Red Peak in search of answers and relief from years of torment. Emily had been investigating, and learned that events similar to the one in 2005 had happened before. Could it happen again? Each of them has a theory, but they are determined to find answers . . . and peace. DiLouie proves himself a master of suspense, horror, and science fiction as the story races toward its shocking and explosive conclusion.

The Children of Red Peak is both an insightful, tender exploration of the psyches of five damaged people who, after experiencing unimaginable events, strive to carry on and make meaningful lives for themselves. It is also an inventive, clever study in horror and the powers of the supernatural. DiLouie says his inspiration for the story was a reading of Genesis and the story of Abraham. God commands Abraham to offer his only son, Isaac, as an offering but stops him from killing Isaac at the last second. DiLouie observes that many "people view this story as a wonderful testament about faith and obedience. Me, I wondered: What would the story sound like if it was told from Isaac’s point of view?" Cults are, of course, fascinating from psychological and sociological perspectives, but DiLouie wanted to tell a story "through the lens of a religious group that is insular but relatively content, and how it logically slides into horror after its leader comes back from a trip and basically says, 'I talked to God, he’s waiting for us at a mountain, we’re going to Heaven, and we’ll be tested when we get there' They’re of course going to go, and if the tests are horrifying, they can’t be bad if they are from God."

DiLouie says his goal was to create a story readers would find "emotional and captivating." He has succeeded. The Children of Red Peak is heart-wrenching and nightmare-inducingly terrifying. Parts of the story are extremely upsetting and difficult to read, but it is also fascinating, thought-provoking, and a powerful exploration of the meaning and limits of faith, how we respond to and overcome trauma, and the resilience of the human spirit.

I really enjoyed this book overall. This book went back and forth a lot between the past and present and where this book really shined was in the past and its depiction of the cult. Watching the religious fervor take over these kids loved ones and take a turn for the worse was really arresting. This book managed to escalate the darkness in really gruesome ways that I loved. I find a lot of cult books tend to shy away from really "going there" and this one certainly did not. The ending wasn't at all what I was expecting and I was really impressed. The present storyline didn't do much for me and I almost wish this had just been about them as kids but overall, I really solid book.

This is a good, slow-burn, example of cult/religious horror. At times I wished I had several hours to just dive in and get lost. It’s a slow paced build and I think it’s better suited to having a chunk of time to devote solely to getting lost in the Red Peak Forest. I didn’t have that time all at once and I think it may have affected my reaction. Reading in the 20-30 minutes segments I found myself with made it harder to dive back in the next time.

Definitely recommend this for people who like cult/religious horror.

Gave me chills and I didn't want to read it after dark. An incredible book! Will be purchasing for the library's fiction collection.

The Children of Red Peak delivered, hard. Five survivors, all children.

What happens to these children, and in their adult lives, unfolds. We move from past to present until the penultimate collision course, atop Red Peak..

Each survivor lives their life to the best of their ability, until they don't. A suicide becomes the catalyst to open old wounds. The story takes us through the lives of David, Amanda, Deacon, Beth, and Emily. We are invited to meet those they love/d, endure with them the horrific ending to what was meant to be an idyllic life, and the answers they have all been seeking. The journey is prolific; the conclusion filled with a freedom unexpected, yet filled with sadness.

This was a heartfelt read. When I come across a book like this, it will take me a considerable longer period of time to finish it. I felt for each character. This is not a happy feel good book. This is a book that will move you through the lives of those attempting to survive and/or thrive after great trauma. And maybe question their sanity along with your own.

Thanks to NetGalley and Redhook for an ARC in return for an honest review.

Hmm. This one’s tough for me.

It’s the story of a religious group that starts as an isolated commune (the characters argue that it wasn’t a cult in the beginning, but I would argue it was, just a cult lite) but then turns very, very dark when they believe that the time comes to ascend into paradise with the Lord. (We’re talking really dark, people, be prepared.) Five children of the hundred or so members of the Family survive, and when one of them dies, the group reunites for the first time in 15 years and begins to face the reality that they’ve never really dealt with their past trauma. Now, they prepare to ultimately face the tragedy of what they survived and see if they can truly move on.

The book alternates between the perspective of three of the survivors and between the present day and the time the group spent in the Family of the Living Spirit group, including during the pivotal last weeks.

So, this book had some great writing and had some amazing potential. The characters were all incredibly well drawn and the author took a lot of care to draw them as fully-fleshed out people, each with their own ways of coping with the trauma they survived and their own new lives in the present. It was really interesting to see because It was like looking at all the alternatives for how people could possibly have dealt with such a deep tragedy.

The timeline with the Family was also really well done. You could feel the tension, even amongst the kids themselves, as they struggled with both realizing the behavior of the adults was increasingly crazy and that the adults around them were loving and the only people they knew, the one who took care of them. It was very moving.

Warning - mild, mild spoilers ahead (I’m trying really hard not to)

Where things got muddled for me was the ending. It had a supernatural element - which was fine - but it was confusing and kind of weird. I don’t want to give anything away, but it was too much of a validation for some things in the book that it made me a little uncomfortable. Like, I didn’t love the fates of some of the characters and I didn’t understand the choices some made. Or even really what exactly what happened, though I think I got the jist.

And all that kind of tainted the book for me.

Anyway, go into this one with caution. Know that it’s a really good book with some really great potential, but that you may be disappointed with how it resolves.

Children of the Red Peak was a difficult read for me, it moves back and forth between the time 4 children survived a cult mass suicide and the years since they survived it. The scenes during their time in the cult are horrifying vivid, involving graphic torture and mutilation. It's definitely a gripping novel but the content may be a too much for sensitive readers.

4.5 stars.

Like a lot of readers, I do love me a good cult novel. Honestly, I just like books based on weird stuff and this fit that bill super well. I like creepy situations, haunting atmospheres, and flawed characters who sometimes make terrible decisions. Check, check, and check.

The Children of Red Peak is really well-written and I found it to be quite gripping. The writing style is right up my alley and kept things nice and tense while still doing a magnificent job of doling out information and creating a wonderfully creepy atmosphere. The pacing was somewhat slow and steady, but there was always something happening. It was an emotionally traumatic train wreck from beginning to end and I was totally here for it.

The story is told on a dual timeline perspective, with experiences in both present day and the days of the cult as experienced by David, Deacon, and Beth. This was a great balance of information and I genuinely appreciated all of the little details that were given about backstories and how they moved forward after the events at Red Peak. There was definitely a lot to unpackage here and there could easily have been another hundred pages just about the cult and how the children were "rescued" and "rehabilitated", but the way the story was constructed definitely worked.

I loved the characters--not because they were lovely cinnamon roll types, but because they were the total opposite. Each one of the characters in this book is a freaking mess in their own way. As a result of the trauma they sustained, they are all wonderfully flawed. I particularly liked Deacon and Beth and their messy relationship with one another. It frustrated and pained me, but it also made perfect sense to me. I enjoy when authors don't try to make all of their characters redeemable. The only shortcoming in the character department for me was that I would have liked more of the Angela perspective from beginning to end. She is probably the most level-headed of the characters and, while her perspective would have likely removed some of the overall crazy feel, it also would've added an interesting emotional response and point of view.

When it came to supporting characters, I would have loved more, but I did like how the Reverend's character was developed. He isn't really in the story directly much, but his battered psychological being is definitely present in how it all shakes down. He's incredibly tangible and definitely crafted properly for a cult leader. The charisma is patent despite how few pages he graces and the descent into madness is captured fairly well, though I will admit that I could have used more of the days leading up to the Red Peak events.

I was totally captivated by this story and things moved incredibly fast for me. This was a "don't put it down" read for me and I loved it. The ending was admittedly a mixed bag for me. I felt it moved a little too quickly and there were things that left too many questions and bends in the logic, but the intensity and creep factors were totally on point.

Craig DiLouie has my attention. I'll be scoping out his backlist for sure.

* Disclaimer: I received a copy of this novel from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. *

I rated The Children of Red Peak 4 out of 5 stars. I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

The Children of Red Peak follows four survivors of a doomsday cult, David, Deacon, Angela and Beth. They are all struggling with their own demons and are forced to face those head on upon the death of a fifth survivor, Emily. Following Emily’s death, repressed memories begin to surface leaving the survivors questioning the night they lost their families and fellow parishoners and whether what they really saw was reality or something they drummed up in their head.

I really enjoyed reading The Children of Red Peak. The characters were well developed and the premise of the novel allows the reader to question their own beliefs and choices when it comes to faith and religion. The novel had a very supernatural feel to it and left me wanting to know more about what the characters were going to experience, should they return to Red Peak. The chapters alternated back and forth between characters, past and present. It did not make it confusing and was very easy to follow. I found the book extremely engaging and thought provoking. I will warn that certain parts of the book, when discussing the past, were a bit gory but isn’t that what we love; when a book can make us really picture the scene unfolding? I found myself with goosebumps as I read on because, in this day and age, something along this premise could really happen and has happened throughout history.

I would highly recommend this book for anyone who is interested in horror, cults, and characters who are deep, disturbed, and seeking to change it all.

3.5
Through the years, I've read many types of stories, but not many centered around cults. I wasn't sure what to expect from this novel, but it delivered on the horror, suspense, and mystery I was hoping for. The writing was excellent, and I was pleased that, though we follow the surviving cult members as adults, we get to experience their childhood with them as well and all of the uncertainty and fear as they try to come to grips with what they're told to believe and what they know isn't right. This novel left me with a lot of questions, but I was ultimately okay with that and enjoyed the journey.

I’ve been very interested in cults lately and also only interested in reading thrillers. That means this book is perfect for me.

We spend most of the book not fully understanding what happened at Red Peak. We know broad strokes (everyone but five children died there) but not details. The more I learned, the worse I felt. This story is dreadful and I couldn’t stop reading, even when I really wanted to.

This is not for the faint of heart but I thought it was incredible. And I’ve already bought a few of the author’s other books.

Recommended.

Reliving their traumatic past as survivors of a religious group, a brother and sister try to understand what led to their family joining such a group, and the insidious reasons for the horrific final night of that group. Mesmerizing.