THE KING’S EVIL
Will Heinrich
A horrific story of an emotionally abusive relationship between a grown man and a lonely child. Joseph Malderoyce begins painting at a very young age, but when he encounters Mondrian’s artwork, he realises he would never match his skill and ultimately gives up. After receiving a large inheritance from his family, he leaves his job at a law firm and moves to a small town in the far north. Living a solitary life in his house near the forest, one morning he finds a badly beaten child sleeping on his porch. Abel, who is clearly alone and helpless, dives into Joseph’s life and quickly becomes his closest friend. As their relationship grows, Abel, who possesses a cunning intelligence, starts to behave strangely. Eventually, Joseph must face the problem he has unknowingly nurtured within his home.
This meticulously crafted, thought-provoking, and irresistibly unsettling novel delves into the darker aspects of the human soul. The King’s Evil is one of those books where events unfold not only between characters but also secretly between the reader and the characters.
“Shiver, reader. Shake.”
―Kirkus Reviews“The King’s Evil is a remarkable fable of maleficence, a kind of Brothers Grimm version of The Exorcist in which a guy gets in touch with his inner child at considerable risk.”
—LA Times“Will Heinrich has written a dark fable about the boundaries of humanity. Set in a world not quite our own. The King’s Evil is an uncompromising story of two characters locked in a life-and-death struggle over the everyday minutiae of existence. Heinrich deftly examines the roots of power, evil, and love―the things that make us human, the things that separate us from inhumanity.”
―Adrian McKinty“A thriller, a fairy tale, a love story, a treatise on art and disease―this small book, somehow, becomes all of these. This is a book you will pick up and read through the night like you did as a child.”
―Andrew Sean Greer, the Winner of the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction
- Praised by bestseller authors, such as Adrian McKinty and Andrew Sean Greer.
- Praised by renowned magazines, such as Kirkus Reviews, Publishers Weekly and LA Times
- Winner of 2004 PEN/ Robert Bingham Fellowship
