Price by Alexandra Sokoloff

From the Publisher

“A stunning, riveting journey into terror and suspense.”—Michael Palmer

Boston District Attorney Will Sullivan dreams of becoming the next governor of Massachusetts. With his beautiful wife, Joanna, and adorable daughter, Sydney, Will seems destined for greatness…until Sydney becomes seriously ill. Now both parents resolve to do anything to save their daughter’s life.

 “A heartbreakingly eerie page turner…”—Library Journal

But in the twilight world of the Briarwood Medical Center, nothing is as it seems. Patients on the brink of death are not only surviving but thriving, while others wither away…and the recoveries all revolve around the ministerings of a mysterious counselor, who takes an unsettling interest in Joanna. When Sydney’s health miraculously improves, Will suspects that Joanna made a terrible bargain to save their child. Now Will must face a powerful, unknown evil before he loses…everything.

 “Pyrotechnic [and] cinematic.”
—Publishers Weekly on The Harrowing

VOYA

AGERANGE: Ages 15 to Adult.

Will Sullivan is a respected political figure campaigning to become the next governor of Massachusetts when his aspirations take a sharp nightmarish detour. Will's daughter Sydney has developed a malignant tumor that doctors at Briarwood Medical Center believe is untreatable. As Will desperately seeks to find a way to deal with his daughter's imminent death, he begins to encounter bizarre happenings in the hospital halls. Patients on the brink of death make miraculous recoveries only to have their loved ones appear to meet tragic ends. Will is astounded, but he is afraid these fantastical images are a product of his crushing grief. When Will sees his wife Joanna conferring with the counselor of some of these same patients, he suspects that the counselor has ulterior motives. Will's inquiries to hospital staff confirm that no such counselor works for the hospital. When Sydney makes a rapid recovery and Joanna becomes a shell of her former self, Will scrambles to save his family even if the bargain he makes could destroy his own soul. Sokolof strives to produce a bone-chilling psychological thriller, but the details become muddled. Many of the strange occurrences that Will encounters are random scenarios that are not fully developed, leaving the reader wondering what significant clue was missed. Sokolof is on target with her portrayal of terror in the loss of a loved one and her atmosphere of suspense, including the lengths to which people will go to save their family members. Readers who have encountered loss will identify with the horror of grief and its manifestations. Reviewer: Laura Panter
April 2008 (Vol. 31, No. 1)

Carolann Curry - Library Journal

Will Sullivan has his sights set on becoming the next governor of Massachusetts. With everything falling into place on his campaign, Will is regarded as a shoo-in; that is, until he and his wife, Joanna, discover that their daughter, Sydney, has a malignant tumor. As her illness progresses, Joanna becomes increasingly distant and removed from reality. With the future of both his campaign and his marriage hanging in the balance, Will fights for his daughter's life. But things are not as they seem at Briarwood Medical Center, host to several supernatural-like happenings, and Will's sense of hope and reality is further challenged when he encounters a mysterious man who knows too much about Briarwood's patients. Bram Stoker Award winner Sokoloff's (The Harrowing) emphasis on character paints a vivid image of the struggle between reality and the unknown; even the hospital comes to life. This heartbreakingly eerie page-turner is recommended for fans of such authors as Heather Graham, Dean Koontz, and John Connolly and is suitable for popular fiction collections in public libraries.

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Read an Excerpt

Prologue
Dead of winter, and snow falls like stars from a black dome of sky. All sound is swallowed by the swirling white chaos.
No human life out there on this night. The city of Boston sleeps in the storm. . . .
But underneath the ice beats a great heart that is never still.
Beneath the falling snow, a vast complex sprawls like a frozen spider buried in the white drifts—the architectural wonder of Briarwood Medical Center: six state-of-the-art hospitals symbiotically entwined. Labyrinthine underground tunnels and high glass bridges above the snow-swept streets mate the white marble, Doric buildings of the old Massachusetts Bay Medical College, the dark brick buttresses of Mercy, the sleek curves of Briarwood Children’s Medical. Torturously twisting corridors wind through Gothic arches and classic Colonials and angular modern structures, creating a bewildering, futuristic maze.
Inside, the hospital has a peculiar vacuum quality of silence. In the fluorescent halls, medical personnel walk in measured paces; dazed, dreamy patients in robes drift past the open doors of darkened rooms. Snow flies outside the windows, beating soundlessly against the glass.
Deep within the labyrinth, a man moves in the endless halls: tall and dark, a graceful shadow against the white of the walls.
He is at home here—his movements fluid and unhurried, his angular face thoughtful and intent.
The corridors twist and turn, drawing the man deeper into the hospital, past vast wards with the injured and terminally ill moored in their beds. There is a throbbing pulse around the man, the heartbeat of the hospital: life-support machines augmenting laboredbreathing, soft moans of pain, quiet sobbing . . . and a whispering, barely audible at first, but increasing . . .
The man cocks his head slightly, listening.
The sound builds around him . . . the prayers of relatives keeping vigil . . . pleas in all languages . . . overlapping . . . rising and falling in waves . . . through anger, through tears:
Please, God . . . please help her . . . Don’t let him die . . . Dear Lord . . . Signora, aiutami . . . Hear me, Jesus . . .
The dark man closes his eyes, listening to the music of the voices. Then his face sharpens, eyes opening and focusing to pinpoints, at the sound of one fierce, stark vow:
I would do anything. Copyright © 2008 by Alexandra Sokoloff. All rights reserved.

Read a Sample Chapter

The Price
A Novel

By Sokoloff, Alexandra St. Martin's Press
Copyright © 2008
Sokoloff, Alexandra
All right reserved.

ISBN: 9780312357511

Prologue
Dead of winter, and snow falls like stars from a black dome of sky. All sound is swallowed by the swirling white chaos.
No human life out there on this night. The city of Boston sleeps in the storm. . . .
But underneath the ice beats a great heart that is never still.
Beneath the falling snow, a vast complex sprawls like a frozen spider buried in the white drifts—the architectural wonder of Briarwood Medical Center: six state-of-the-art hospitals symbiotically entwined. Labyrinthine underground tunnels and high glass bridges above the snow-swept streets mate the white marble, Doric buildings of the old Massachusetts Bay Medical College, the dark brick buttresses of Mercy, the sleek curves of Briarwood Children’s Medical. Torturously twisting corridors wind through Gothic arches and classic Colonials and angular modern structures, creating a bewildering, futuristic maze.
Inside, the hospital has a peculiar vacuum quality of silence. In the fluorescent halls, medical personnel walk in measured paces; dazed, dreamy patients in robes drift past the open doors of darkened rooms. Snow flies outside the windows, beating soundlessly against the glass.
Deep within the labyrinth, a man moves in the endless halls: tall and dark, a graceful shadow against the white of the walls.
He is at home here—his movements fluid and unhurried, his angular face thoughtful andintent.
The corridors twist and turn, drawing the man deeper into the hospital, past vast wards with the injured and terminally ill moored in their beds. There is a throbbing pulse around the man, the heartbeat of the hospital: life-support machines augmenting labored breathing, soft moans of pain, quiet sobbing . . . and a whispering, barely audible at first, but increasing . . .
The man cocks his head slightly, listening.
The sound builds around him . . . the prayers of relatives keeping vigil . . . pleas in all languages . . . overlapping . . . rising and falling in waves . . . through anger, through tears:
Please, God . . . please help her . . . Don’t let him die . . . Dear Lord . . . Signora, aiutami . . . Hear me, Jesus . . .
The dark man closes his eyes, listening to the music of the voices. Then his face sharpens, eyes opening and focusing to pinpoints, at the sound of one fierce, stark vow:
I would do anything. Copyright © 2008 by Alexandra Sokoloff. All rights reserved.


Continues...

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