The Midnight King

Author: Tariq Ashkanani
Genre: Thriller
349 pages
Publisher: Viper, 2025

Synopsis
‘This is a work of fiction. This is not a confession.’

Lucas Cole is a bestselling writer. He is also a father, a widower, and a beloved celebrity in his small town. He is an unassuming man ­- tall, thin and quietly friendly. Lucas Cole is also a serial killer.

Nathan Cole has known the truth about his father since he was ten years old. Too terrified to go to the police, he ran away from home as soon as he was able, carrying the guilt of leaving his sister behind. But when Lucas is found dead in a dingy motel room, Nathan returns to his childhood home for the first time in seventeen years. It’s there he finds The Midnight King, his father’s final unpublished manuscript, a fictionalised account of his hideous crimes, hidden in a box of trinkets taken from his victims. Trinkets that include a ribbon belonging to a missing eight-year-old girl who disappeared only days before his father’s death.

Now, Nathan must deal with the consequences of keeping his father’s secret. But it may not be as simple as finding a lost child. For The Midnight King holds Nathan’s secrets as well as Lucas’s, and he is not the only one searching for the truth…

My review
The Midnight King by Tariq Ashkanani is a dark and unsettling serial killer thriller with a unique twist on the genre. Rather than focusing on the gruesome details of murder, Ashkanani dives deep into the psychological fallout by exploring the lingering effects of trauma and the slow, inevitable descent into madness. It’s a disturbing yet fascinating concept, perfect for readers who crave dark, unique, and uncomfortable crime fiction.

The writing is sharp and accessible with clean, snappy sentences, and I was immediately drawn into the story. Despite the heavy subject matter, much of the violence is implied or revealed after the fact, making it eerie without relying on too much graphic detail. The novel’s atmosphere is tense and claustrophobic with a constant sense of unease that builds steadily throughout.

The story alternates between two main perspectives: Nathan Cole, a man returning to his hometown seventeen years after fleeing it, and Isaac Holloway, a private investigator hired to find a missing child. Nathan’s father, Lucas Cole, was a notorious serial killer, and Nathan’s discovery of his father’s unpublished manuscript, The Midnight King, along with “trophies” from his victims, forces him to confront the horrific truth he’s spent his life running from. One of those trophies, a child’s red ribbon, belongs to an eight-year-old girl who vanished just days before Lucas’s death.

Isaac, once Nathan’s childhood friend, becomes entangled in the case as he searches for the missing girl. His connection to both Nathan and the Cole family adds an extra layer of emotional tension to the story. Both perspectives intertwine seamlessly, and pulled me into a world haunted by guilt, loss, and the question of whether evil can ever truly be left behind.

The Midnight King is a chilling and unique psychological thriller that explores the lasting damage of a toxic upbringing and the blurred line between nature and nurture. It’s dark, disturbing, and was completely absorbing until the last few chapters. My rating reflects my one main critique — the final chapters took on a slightly different tone from the rest of the novel and lost some of the psychological nuance that made it so compelling. Still, I highly recommend this book to fans of dark, character-driven crime fiction.

My recommendation: worth the read!