The Falling Away – TL Hines

Dylan Runs Ahead has a name that fits him especially well. Seems like he’s always been running. First running from his past on the Crow Reservation; now running from folks who’d like to kill him. Ironic considering he has a bum leg – something he picked up in the army when an IED was set off a bit too close. His buddy hadn’t been so lucky. In the aftermath of the accident, Dylan becomes a painkiller addict, using and dealing to satiate the addiction – and to keep the pain away. But his efforts to run out of trouble throw him into a whole new set of circumstances.

Dylan calls it the kill box. That’s where bad thoughts go to die. Thoughts about his sister, thoughts about Claussen, thoughts about the messed-up state his life was in. In The Falling Away, T.L. Hines crafts a tightly-paced thriller that laces the supernatural with mythology and psychology.

Dylan’s story is intriguing, but it soon morphs into something beyond just him. A woman named Quinn – who has her own eccentricities – is claiming to see things other people don’t, and that Dylan is chosen. Chosen? Dylan feels like he’s been the castaway his whole life. Things get even more complicated when a mysterious organization called HIVE gets involved.

T.L. Hines writes “Noir Bizarre” stories, mixing mystery with oddities. The Falling Away examines such oddities like the psychology of Dylan’s kill box and Quinn’s embedding as methods of controlling pain, or as Hines portrays it, of controlling the evil that came from The Falling Away. Hines uses these as symbols to show us that ultimately the only way we can make sense of the pain and master it is to fall into the gracious and loving hands of God.

The Falling Away deals with the supernatural in an intriguing way, and in a classic Hines twist leaves some gaps open for the imagination to close. The book’s theme alone makes it a must-read as Hines raises several important questions through the art of story, but such a theme is complimented through unique and well-written characters readers will not soon forget.