Purgatory

In Eekhaut’s thrilling sequel to 2018’s Absinthe, irascible Belgian Chief Insp. Walter Eekhaut and his feisty current boss, Amsterdam Chief Commissioner Alexandra Dewaal, confront an intensely disturbing scene—a snowy clearing in Belgium’s Ardennes Forest where seven people have been chained to stakes and burned alive. Walter and Alexandra’s investigation points them to the Society of Fire, a cult whose members believe they must cleanse impure people in flames before the imminent end of the world. Bureaucratic hindrance and personal conflicts hamper the police efforts to close in on the fanatics. The stakes rise when the Society of Fire strikes back by kidnapping a detective’s girlfriend. Meanwhile, Baphomet, the head of the cult, plans an atrocity that will incinerate a crowd of thousands in the heart of Amsterdam. Eekhaut expertly ratchets up the tension while providing insights into the cultural differences between the Belgians and the Dutch. Fans of Thomas Harris’s Black Sunday will find a lot to like. (July)