A new image begins to form within the cobwebs of my mind; it fights vehemently to take hold. Through the fuzziness the form of a person struggles to exist, but instantaneously vanishes, leaving a warm, melty feeling inside me. I focus, once more and I can see a smile with straight teeth. Teeth that make me want to climb my tongue inside and feel around.
A disturbance at her neighbor's house piques Eilida’s curiosity. What she discovers is so shocking it sends her running through the mountainous woods during a thunderstorm. She slips on the wet ground, plummets down Mount Wilde, and slams into a large boulder beside River Freedom. Eilida is transported to Lyden, where Sunshine, a receptionist at the local paper becomes engrossed in her story. The further Sunshine delves into Eilida’s life the more entangled their lives become. Paranormal events, frightening dreams, and terror filled memories draw the women together into an unthinkable web of horror.
Excerpt
Samantha, dressed in a dark blue dress suit and three inch heels, clacked her way over to me. “You’ve been falling behind. Look at the amount of files on your desk,” she leaned in running her fingers across their open edges. “ I understand it’s been busy, but that doesn’t mean you neglect your work.” She ridiculed in a sweet tone undercut with daggers. Her temple pulsed rapidly behind her thin ghostly white skin. At that moment I felt a deep hatred for her consume me. Considering I had undergone two accidents in less than twenty four hours and my body felt like a Mac truck had hit it repeatedly, I thought I was making great progress.
I painted on my best smile and used my most syrupy voice, “Samantha, can I help you?”
Professional Reviews
Taking the paranormal to a different level
Eilida suffers from amnesia, the result of a head injury when she frantically runs away from a horrific murder scene. While Eilida recuperates in the hospital, Sunshine, a local newspaper receptionist, not only begins to have strange dreams and paranormal occurrences connected to Eilida’s past, but also takes on Eilida’s character at times. After further investigation including sneaking into Eilida’s hospital room, Sunshine concludes that she must be Eilida’s twin. Yet to confirm her theory, Sunshine has to retrace Eilida’s steps, beginning with the murder investigation. As the puzzle pieces come together slowly, the truth unfolds. But it is more surreal than one can only imagine.
Rising author Elle Klass takes the paranormal to a different level in her latest novel. While there are scenes reminiscent of the movie The Sixth Sense, Klass draws readers into the dark and disturbing world of two young women. Eilida is desperately trying to recall her memory. Concurrently, Sunshine, who appears to be quite a levelheaded gal on the cusp of marriage, begins seeing people that no one else sees—not to mention that the weather suddenly turns stormy with her apparitions. But before a scrolling marquee of “I see dead people” runs across reader’s thoughts, Klass’s plot splits into different directions—between Sunshine’s seemingly split personality and her relationship with one guy (Jay) while she prepares to marry another (Jerry), her involvement in the murder investigation, and her delving into parapsychology and hypnosis in the hope of getting answers to her personal connection with Eilida.
In the first book in The Ruthless Storm Trilogy, Klass’s sinister tale is replete with a small but well-developed cast, many of whom function as foils to enhance the principal characters, Eilida and Sunshine. Of course, included in the mix are a tight handful of antagonists who throw all sorts of twists and turns into the plot. Speaking of twists and turns, Klass’s narrative includes a unique point-of-view design. Alternating between the first-person viewpoints of Eilida and Sunshine, and a third-person unnamed narrator, Klass cuts down the confusion between the various voices and adds nuance in the process to those title changes by replacing each woman’s name with symbols: Eilida (◊◊◊◊◊) and Sunshine (☼☼☼☼☼). While all of these elements keep the plot flowing, Klass also throws in a few hot and steamy romance scenes, as well as quirky but eye-catching word plays, such as Dr. Jekal, Eilida’s chemistry professor, and Dr. Weered, Sunshine’s hypnotist.
An absolute thriller from beginning to end, Eye of the Storm: Eilida’s Tragedy closes with a cliffhanger that will keep readers anxiously waiting for its upcoming sequel, Calm Before The Storm: Evan’s Sins.
Originally posted on San Francisco Book Review
Anita Lock, Book Reviewer
Ready for some Mental Hide & Seek?
Settle back, keep a few flashlights handy, bolt the doors get ready to enter Elle Klass’world, where the unexplainable happens and things go bump in the night, but are they real or a figment of a young girl’s battered imagination? Eye of the Storm is one of those psychological thrillers that will leave you looking over your shoulder, listening to strange sounds and delving into
your own past to be sure you didn’t miss a family member or two.
Eilida lies unconscious in a hospital bed after fleeing from a horrendous scene of death and its gruesome aftermath. Sunshine, who works at the local newspaper becomes obsessed with finding out who the unidentified girl is and what happened to her. The webs of this tale run deep and entrap her in a world of nightmares, horrific memories and strange events as these two strangers are drawn together by an inexplicable, yet powerful force. Did fate deem that their paths would cross? How can two women share the same mental imagery? They’ve never seen each other, but there is something otherworldly going on. The question is what? Is it possible to connect with another so deeply you could take over their life or is it all a terrible dream belonging to only one of them?
Pay close attention as Elle Klass tries to strip away your skills to ferret out the answers ahead of time, by creating a whirlwind of action, twisted plotting and pure terror! I love it, I want more, but I admit, I will be sleeping with the lights on for a while as the unknown plays hide and seek with my mind.
A challenging read from the mystical realm!
Author Elle Klass takes a bold step into the mystical and paranormal genre with her Eye of the Storm. The title itself is open-ended, as readers will discover, and Klass leaves readers with the notion that the storm is not over, its effects spreading widely into a world of shadows and unknowns.
Klass apparently has a streak of playful wit as she sets up her story for her readers. Be sure you read every word of her book carefully or you’ll miss it. I did, until a fellow reader explained. Klass plants her challenge, and buries deep other nuances for the reader to figure out. After all, you’ve now entered Elle Klass’s mystical world.
Fans of the paranormal genre will welcome Eye of the Storm to their reading shelf. It’s a fresh take on the off-center, the off-kilter, and the unexplainable world without the clear-cut boundaries of reality.
But Klass is not content to deliver a neat little cookie-cutter story for her readers. Instead the ending is the beginning of yet another mystery with an edge as sharp and penetrating as a precision scalpel, and yet as murky as the mystical twilight zone.
Writing about things or an “existence” that reeks with the unexplainable must be difficult and a challenge for a writer. I tip my eReader to Klass’s debut entry into the paranormal genre and give her Five Stars for Eye of the Storm.
