Bedbugs

Another spooky tale for Halloween...one that happens to be fictionally based on current headlines, bedbug infestations! Ew!! Ben H. Winters definitely preys on our fears with his latest novel, Bedbugs, but he adds his own twist to keep things interesting.

Already I think about bedbugs when we're on vacation. I check for husks and for little bodies. This book was right up my OCD alley; I had to check it out. Once started, I couldn't put it down and found myself scratching bug bites I hadn't noticed before. Ugh!

Susan and Alex find the perfect apartment to rent (too good to be true???) - the top two floors of a Brooklyn Brownstone. It's huge, by NYC standards, and it even has a Bonus Room - a place where Susan envisions herself painting away the afternoons. The previous tenants left in a hurry, but the crazy old lady landlord brushes that off. Susan and Alex are so in love with the place, they don't bother to investigate. Soon after they move in, however, Susan experiences some worries about bedbugs. She gets her first in a series of bites. She hires an exterminator, the best in the business- exterminator to the stars!!...but it turns out that there are no bedbugs in her apartment. Hmmmm.

Susan frets over the situation, researching on the Internet, tirelessly searching out her bedbug nemesis, slowly growing paranoid. More and more bites surface on Susan's body, but still, no one sees the bugs and the place has been cleared by the exterminator. Could all of this be a product of her imagination?

As we rip roll to the end of the story with all of the equally creepy subplots converging, the reader is unsure what to think about our overwhelmed protagonist.
All will be revealed, but can you believe it?