NI'IL: THE AWAKENING by James Boyle

Police Chief Dan Connor has his hands full lately.  Dogs are coming up missing all over town and he isn't finding any of them dead or alive.  The town is beginning to get concerned, they love their pets.

A widower of three years, Dan misses his wife greatly, but finds himself thinking about pretty Stephanie, his dispatcher more and more often.  He knows he shouldn't.  He is her boss and quite older than her.

Then one day, one of the elderly town citizens is out walking her dog and doesn't come home.  On investigation, they find the body, but not the dead.  Murdered? Mauled? Dan doesn't know anything except her throat was ripped out.  

At the Mayor's urging, he hires some hunters to try and capture whatever it was.  But then a few more teenagers are found mauled to pieces at a nearby campsite.   Then, while on a hunt with his hired hands, his hunters are killed by the beast as well.  Another wierd occurance is that an elderly Indian man always appears at his crime scenes, but when Dan moves to question him, the man disappears.  Something is definitely not right around town.

Upon further investigation, Dan learns of the Ni'il, Shamans who believe in the balance of four beings in four different worlds.  He can't locate the beast, so Dan figures it is believable as anything.  But when Stephanie is taken, the stakes escalate.  The Ni'il is determined to wipe out the town, unless Dan can figure out a way to stop it.

Ni'l: The Awakening is the first in a new series by James Boyle.  It's a thrilling suspense with a fantasy backdrop.  The characters are well developed and the plot is solid, having this reader up late turning the pages to see what would happen next.  I laughed out loud when Dan saw a forty pound possum hop a six foot fence, so humor also plays a small part. I am looking forward to the next installment in the series, Ni'il: The War Within.  Mystery, suspense and legend merge together into a fantastic story.  You won't want to miss this one!