The Guardians

The Guardians

Buy The Guardians:
Amazon.ca
Chapters Indigo
Amazon.com
Amazon.co.uk

“Initially employing a quiet, confiding tone, Pyper reveals his skill with pacing as the story takes on the speed of a midnight dash through a graveyard…This is a page-turner that will make your heart pound.  You’ve been warned.”
– The Globe and Mail

“Everything you could ask for in a thriller. It’s psychologically unnerving, moves like a bullet, and is fraught with so much tension you might crack a tooth reading it. Outstanding in every way.”
– Dennis Lehane, author of Mystic River

“Ambitious…With a well-executed dual narrative, both past and present, strong characterizations and some truly arresting images, The Guardians is a compelling and genuinely creepy read.”
– The Guardian

“The Guardians thrills and scares so well…[Pyper has] made a whole career of subverting readers’ expectations…books that compel furious page-turning and stepping back to contemplate exactly why the momentum builds so fast – and characters who provoke readers to care.”
– National Post

“Pyper is the most striking Canadian crime writer to emerge in recent years and The Guardians is a characteristically intelligent move into Stephen King territory.”
– Mail on Sunday (UK)

“A beautifully crafted haunted house thriller…The horror [The Guardians] evokes has less in common with Stephen King…than with the fevered imagination of Joseph Conrad ferrying himself and the reader into a heart of darkness.  Pyper’s new novel is strikingly contemporary, with a real kinship to the shivery social document created by Britain’s Sarah Waters in her Booker-nominated The Little Stranger…[The Guardians] is compellingly readable and stylistically impressive and it snakes its way towards its ferocious climax.”
– The Calgary Herald

The Guardians is a dark, brooding, compelling story about the loss of innocence and the ubiquity of evil, with a finalé as bittersweet as your 50th birthday party.”
– The Times (U.K.)

“Blisteringly readable.  The language is so tight and carefully honed, yet evocative…The Guardians fires on all cylinders:  it’s a headlong, absorbing narrative enriched by an unflinching literary conscientiousness.  They say you can never please everyone:  The Guardians comes damn close.”
– Vancouver Sun

“It draws you in.”
– The Spectator (U.K.)

“* * * * * [Five stars].  Beautifully written…The characters are drawn with extraordinary skill.”
– de Volkskrant (Holland)

“A psychological tour de force.”
– Peterborough Examiner

“Andrew Pyper delivers a fast-paced, gripping and truly spooky tale with panache.”
– Irish Independent

“A deeply felt portrait of lifelong friendship…Unputdownable and wise.”
– John Barber, The Globe and Mail

“Hauntingly good…The Guardians will chill you far more than winter ever could.”
– Chatelaine

“Pyper’s plot hits a near-perfect pace…”
– Macleans

“Dreadfully good…The Guardians is exemplary – disbelief gets suspended, the pages race by, the prose itself is seamless…and you’ll stay up way too late reading it.”
– Hamilton Spectator

“The writing is so convincing, even the most skeptical readers may find themselves shaking with fear…A white-knuckle thriller balanced with a satisfying character study.”
– Edmonton Journal

“A perfect haunted-house story, a crisp, eerie October night of a book that had me in its clutches from page one.”
– Joanne Harris, author of Chocolat

There’s no such thing as an empty house…

Trevor, Randy, Ben and Carl grew up together in the small town of Grimshaw as many boys do — playing hockey and forging friendships that run deep. Twenty-four years later, when Ben commits suicide, the three remaining friends gather once again in their hometown. But going home means going back, and that’s not always easy. The three men are forced to confront their memories of a sinister crime that happened in an abandoned house in their neighbourhood — a crime that claws its way into the present, leaving its indelible mark on everyone.

“Andrew Pyper is the rare writer who has it all:  he’s a poet, a magician, and a seer into the frail human heart.  In this moving, utterly gripping and gorgeously written novel, he brings all his formidable talents to bear.  Don’t miss it.”
– Lisa Unger, author of Die for You and Beautiful Lies

“* * * * [Four stars].  A very creepy story…Pyper has such a gift for character and setting.”
– NOW Magazine

“So much more than a thriller. Truly great writing, haunting, intelligent, human, terrifying. Pyper is a genius.”
– Deon Meyer, author of Thirteen Hours

“Not just another ghost story.”
– Uptown Magazine

The Guardians manages to be both a heart-pounding and heartwarming read.  It’s a story that will stay with you long after you put it down.”
– ffwd

“Pyper uses his haunted house to maximum effect, finding the right balance between believable detail and supernatural, menacing atmosphere.”
– Quill & Quire

“A splendidly eerie haunted house story, and a superb evocation of small town life. The Guardians gripped me from its opening line and never let go.”
– John Connolly, author of Every Dead Thing and The Lovers

“A master of psychological suspense.  Andrew Pyper knows just how to lure you in to all the deep dark places of the human heart and then…twist.”
– Lisa Gardner

The Guardians is a chilling, screw-tightening ghost story for grownups – it vibrates with menace while delving into the deep, dark matters of loyalty, lust and our own natural, nasty inclinations.  A thriller with brains, heart, and no small amount of goosebumps.”
– Gillian Flynn, author of Dark Places and Sharp Objects

“Pyper writes scenes that make me feel like I’m 12 again, reading The Exorcist while I was supposed to be babysitting.”
– Montreal Mirror

“Pyper’s distinctive, highly visual writing style compliments his plot perfectly.  The story’s developments are all unexpected, but it works.  Every twist and turn in The Guardians is shocking, yet still feels right…Though Pyper gets beyond the traditional tropes of the horror genre, he mines it for all it’s worth and gives readers what they’re really looking for:  can’t-tear-your-eyes-away fear.  The Guardians gave me nightmares, but I didn’t want to put it down.”
– McGill Tribune

“Pyper’s prose is considered, elegant.  What he’s showing creeps up on readers, scaring the shit out of them.”
– The Coast (Halifax)

“In The Guardians, Andrew Pyper draws on an impressive range of gifts: a fine command of suspense narrative, nimble characterizations, and a knack for the felicitous phrase.  The story is altogether scary, compelling, and full of delightful surprises, but be prepared – it might just get under your skin too.”
– Dennis McFarland, author of A Face at the Window