Legion: A Novel from the Author of The Exorcist

William Peter Blatty

Feb 2011 · Sold by Macmillan

About this ebook

From a master of the genre, William Peter Blatty, comes Legion, the harrowing sequel to The Exorcist and the inspiration to the movie The Exorcist III.

A young boy is found horribly murdered in a mock crucifixion. Is the murderer the elderly woman who witnessed the crime? A neurologist who can no longer bear the pain life inflicts on its victims? A psychiatrist with a macabre sense of humor and a guilty secret? A mysterious patient, locked in silent isolation in the psychiatric ward?

Lieutenant Kinderman follows a bewildering trail that links all these people, confronting a new enigma at every turn even as more murders surface, with each victim suffering the same dreadful mutilations. Kinderman must confront the creeping suspicion that there’s a connection between these crimes and another series of murders that took place more than a decade ago―and supposedly ended with the death of the Gemini Killer.

Legion is a classic novel of breathtaking terror, an extraordinary journey into the uncharted depths of the human mind, and has been hailed as being “infinitely more suspenseful than The Exorcist.” (Los Angeles Times)

At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

Ratings and reviews

A thrilling and ingenious read that takes its time, going deeper than expected, before hurriedly wrapping things up in an ending far less exciting than the plot thus far (and the film version).

I would say that I loved this book if the escalation and climax of the story had been a little more tense and the resolution a little more satisfactory. That being said I nearly loved this book- and I definitely loved our protagonist Kinderman and his wistful melancholy. Legion is full of Kinderman's internal dialogue about the mystery of good and evil, and uniquely- rather than determining that the mystery is unknowable- the novel does attempt to offer its own explanation. This is an excellent mystery novel most of all; one that attempts to solve both the mystery of the gruesome murders that lead the plot and of the evil that creates the resulting human suffering.

I would argue this story is even more disturbing than The Exorcist. Very well written with some wonderfully snappy dialogue, a thick atmosphere of intense foreboding, a good sense of humour and, when it chills, it freezes the blood. One of my favourite horror novels of all time.

About the author

WILLIAM PETER BLATTY (1928-2017) is best known for his mega-bestselling novel The Exorcist. Blatty also cowrote the screenplay of the hilarious Inspector Clouseau film, A Shot in the Dark. Known for his early comic novels, the New York Times proclaimed that "nobody can write funnier lines than William Peter Blatty," describing him as "a gifted virtuoso who writes like S. J. Perelman."