The Troupe
By Robert Jackson Bennett
Published by Orbit Books
Released February 21, 2012
Paperback | Kindle

Holy Author of Creation! Robert Jackson Bennett‘s latest book, The Troupe, is the wondrous and heartrending tale of 16-year-old George Carole, a gifted pianist whose mother died in childbirth and who is on a quest to find the father he’s never known. After reluctantly telling George that his father is in show business, he leaves his nagging grandmother to work at Otterman’s theater in the hopes of finding him one day. As soon as he learns his father’s traveling vaudeville troupe, The Famous Silenus Troupe, is performing in the nearby town of Parma, George quits his job and jumps on a train.

What he notices first as he steps off the train is that tiny Parma is creepy. The quality of light is all wrong and there’s an extra-dark darkness that hovers over the town. As he gets close to the hotel where the troupe is staying, George notices something else – all the sounds of the world die out and a mysterious man in a gray suit emerges from the thickening shadows. He heads straight for George and asks him about Heironimo Silenus.