Eyes on the Island

Fiction. Not long ago, Will Fordham was a charismatic young preacher on the rise. But a family trip to the beach cost him everything. Will was struck by an unexpected seizure while wading in the ocean, drowning his young son. In the aftermath of the child's death, Will lost his marriage, his sobriety, and his faith. Once the pastor of his own church, Will is now little more than a groundskeeper. When Will is offered a new assignment at a small church on one of Georgia's barrier islands, he reluctantly accepts the opportunity to put his life back together. Owned by a wealthy heiress and accessible only by ferry, this unspoiled island is home to an artists' colony and only a handful of permanent residents. But once on the island, Will befriends a young boy who tells him unsettling stories about the other islanders. Are they merely products of the boy's overactive imagination, or does something sinister lie beneath the island's peaceful facade?

"A twisty, spooky Southern tale of religion and loss, full of strange visions, dripping with Spanish moss, and haunted by characters who are either predators or victims or both." —Thomas Mullen, author of The Last Town on Earth and The Revisionists

"Frank Reddy conjures up a page-turning tale of a man of God in a godforsaken place, where old evil on a troubled island waits to challenge an already-challenged faith. Reddy is a revelation—this debut novel foreshadows a tidal wave of a career." —Charles McNair, Pulitzer Prize nominee and author of Land O'Goshen and Pickett's Charge