A Good and Happy Child : A Novel by Justin Evans

George Davies can't bring himself to touch his baby boy. After months of excuses, his wife tells him to get help or get out. Desperate to be a good father and to save his marriage, George agrees. He tells his therapist that this is not his first time seeing a psychiatrist. He saw one as a child. The therapist asks him to make journals of that time in his life, and George does so. As he writes of his childhood -- a recently deceased father, a magical Friend, an attempted murder, a strange death -- he wonders: did the therapy help, or the exorcism? Was his Friend the same entity that his father encountered in Guatemala? Is it threatening George's own son? And if it is coming for a third generation of Davies, how can George protect his son?
Told both as entries in George's journals and addresses to his therapist, referred to as "you", the story is easy to follow and engrossing. As a veteran of many a horror book, I was pleasantly surprised by the twist ending.