by Roger Zotti

If you intend to hunker down with a well-written book, one with twists and turns, penned by an author with a huge imagination, check out “Ashes” (StoneHouse),  Estevan Vega’s most recent novel, where two of its characters, Arson Gable and Emery Phoenix—who both figured prominently in Estevan’s previous work,  “Arson”—have been kidnapped and experimented on at  Salvation Asylum. Though “Ashes” is the sequel to “Arson,” it stands by itself. “If you stumble on this book before the first one, you won’t be confused,” Estevan explained. “Ashes” begins with a flashback and “and jumps forward. I provide little narrative clues as to what happened in [“Arson”].”

And yes, writing a sequel proved challenging. After all, Estevan had never written one before. “Because the first book’s ending was a cliff-hanger, I asked myself, ‘Where do I go from here?’ But I really had no choice. So I sat down and forced myself to write it.

The book’s focus involves Arson trying to identify with his past and what that means regarding what the future will bring and where his position is in life. It all gets very intense. Because it’s both a sequel and a longer book than ‘Arson,’ everything is raised— the problems are bigger and involve more than just a few characters. In this one, a huge issue comes into play.

”Three things stand out in my mind as the book’s highlights. First, there’s Estevan’s Edgar Alan Poe-like opening sentence: “Her screams tormented the hall.” Second, there are his skillful descriptions.  One will suffice. The scene involves  Adam, a puzzling character, and  Emery, who have escaped from the asylum and reached a dead-end street.  Estevan’s word-picture of the house is vivid and disturbing: “A bleach-white door sank at the center of the house’s anorexic chest. Shattered windows looked out of place….The straight path toward the pale entrance betrayed the house’s sense of health…defaced and longing for peace. The house was ill; wounded and left alone.”

Then Adam scans “the other homes on the block….he hadn’t noticed any vehicle parked in any driveway, no car on the entire block….Nothing but a bike with twisted handlebars and flat tires and some tiny windmills spinning an eerie tune as it creaked with the loose wind.”

Third, there’s Emery’s father.  Given much more page time in this book than in “Arson,” the alcoholic and tortured Joel Phoenix emerges as a complex, intriguing character. As he searches for Emery, he receives help from an unlikely source, a street smart, 19-year-old named Kyro, who believes Emery is being held captive at Salvation Asylum and warns Joel that the place is “evil”— and it is.

So exciting, engrossing, and fast paced is the novel’s narrative that at some point you’ll probably have to stop, take several deep breaths and then continue reading.  In “Ashes” Estevan Vega’s skill as a storyteller is on full display and re-affirms the  Portland, CT resident as a writer of enormous potential.

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