Equinox
by David Towsey
#Equinox

Christophor Morden lives by night. His day-brother, Alexsander, knows only the sun. They are two souls in a single body, in a world where identities change with the rising and setting of the sun. Night-brother or day-sister, one never sees the light, the other knows nothing of the night.

Early one evening, Christophor is roused by a call to the city prison. A prisoner has torn his eyes out and cannot say why. Yet worse: in the sockets that once held his eyes, teeth are growing. The police suspect the supernatural, so Christophor, a member of the king’s special inspectorate, is charged with finding the witch responsible.

Night-by-night, Christophor’s investigation leads him ever further from home, toward a backwards village on the far edge of the kingdom. But the closer he gets to the truth, the more his day-brother’s actions frustrate him. Who is Alexsander protecting?

What does he not want Christophor to discover?

And all the while, an ancient and apocalyptic ritual creeps closer to completion...

Equinox is a book with a cool and unique concept, however, I find the slow pacing of the story had affected its quality, next just when things are getting interesting, I felt that the ending was rushed a bit, and finally I wished that the author had explained further how the magic system of the world works. Despite all this I would still recommend it to those who are looking something new and that is why I believe that it's still worth a try.

Thank you NetGalley for providing with an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review!

One of the reasons I love science fiction and fantasy is that genre isn’t a narrow field it’s not just epic quests and travels to alien planets. The genres contain many flavours of comedy, tragedy and every other type of tale. Fantasy mixed with mystery we tend to think of belonging to contemporary fiction with various wizards and witches solving modern crimes with the odd quip but mysteries can appear in other forms. Pratchett’s Guards or RJ Barker’s Assassins move the case to more recognisably fantasy secondary worlds. In David Towsey’s novel Equinox we get a mystery to solve that brings danger, witchcraft and some truly innovative ideas to make a highly memorable tale.

It is 1721 in the town of Esteberg and a time of witches, magic, and imminent war with the realm’s neighbours. Christophor is a very experienced and sombre Special Inspector trained to identify the signs of the practitioners and ensure they receive swift justice. He is ordered by the King to inspect a young thief in prison who is discovered to have removed their own eyes due to the presence of teeth in the sockets. A new witch is at work. Christophor is then ordered to the thief’s hometown of Drakenford on the borders where war is looking to find this new witch amongst the towsfolk and prevent them getting more powerful. Christophor starts to fear an ancient ritual is being performed but he is also frustrated as he knows once the night ends that his day-brother Alexsander takes over his body living his life as musician and without the focus to solve the crime as various strange events start to take place.

I found Equinox a brilliant, strange, and often disturbing bit of dark fantasy. What for me makes this work is very little is explained in this world and instead the reader has to piece together clues. The great concept though is that everyone has a night and day side to themselves. A totally different person who often has different wants, needs and behaviours to their counterpart. Towsey gives us a world where prisons have to let the non-guilty party walk out during the time of their sentence, they’re not responsible for. People can have different relationships with different people and each can leave messages and instructions for their ‘sibling’ who also shares a dim remembrance of the previous day or night’s encounter.

Ultimately Towsey has created a late 20th century almost eastern European world where there are two different worlds occupying the same place but separated by the rise and fall of the sun. Some people do share the same roles but often people do not. For a mystery this works as our suspects may not be even aware of their other side’s guilt and tracking them down is harder. But on top of that this is a strange world where magic is real and to be feared from the moment, we see a prisoner whose eye sockets have teeth you know this is not going to be a gentle adventure. It is instead a world with secrets, where visions and ancient knowledge do exist to be used for good and ill and Towsey is not afraid to cerate strange and starting imagery often with forms of body horror or scenes where reality alters and feels oppressive and dangerous. . It is one of the creepiest fantasy reads I’ve read for a while.

I think adding to that feeling is our two main characters Christophor and Alexsander neither of whom are wise cracking heroes that we feel entirely safe with. The tale starts with Christophor’s narration and while we can see he is very knowledgeable on dark magic that he is also a man conscious he is getting perhaps too old for his work but at the same time his work is all he seems to be. No sense of humour, very much a loner and hates to share his feeling. In contrast with Alexsander we have a man who wants to play music and have fun; perhaps also getting conscious that his time to drink and seek romance is running out too but he also very little interest in the occult and his brother’s strange role – he feels the more human of the two but also probably the weaker in character. All of which makes him a wonderful fish out of water when they arrive in Drakenfield.

Drakenfield is just full of secrets and suspects. It’s a small town on the regions with its own cultures and no warm love for the remote King who may be making this a future battlefield. Without getting stereotypical we have people in power who appear shifty, children who appear strange and an overall sense of the brothers being in a little too deep. Christophor is himself the introvert who knows too much of dark magic being suspected while Aleksander just meets fellow drinkers and looks for a little romance to his brother’s despair. But you do slowly get a sense that this town is being played with by a very powerful foe and when we see the strange and horrible acts that the witch is capable of then we definitely don’t expect a fully happy ending. It’s a tale that is murky, nightmarish and the mystery is a good one full of twists, clues and revelations that keep us going until the final tense chapters.Even the two main characters get suspicious of the other’s motivations all leading to uncertainty over how this can end well. Towsey even adds strange visions with apocalyptic imagery to raise the stakes and get the sense of the world ending soon as war and disease all start to commence around this strange little town.

Equinox is a fine dark fantasy tale (and looks to be a standalone tale to boot); filled with mystery, unusual characters and a fascinating concept that never feels the need to explain itself too much. I was hugely impressed and gobbled this tale up. Hugely impressed and a name I’ll be looking out for in the future and strongly recommend you to pick this up if an unsettling fantasy mystery appeals

The world is split into day and night siblings and to help the journey between the two states the body must chew a herb before bed to ease the other half of their person into being. This is the story of Christophor who inhabits the main characters night body and Alexsander who is the day character. The two are quite different personalities and normally their worlds do not overlap but when Christophor, a special detective, is sent south by appointment of the King to investigate a case of sorcery the two character clash and fight against each other rather than joining forces against a stronger power.
To explain much more would give away too much of the plot but there is an impressive amount of world building here in this novel and reasonable dose of paranormal and wizardry. The plot unfolds at a reasonable pace and if there a few places where there is a bit of an info dump it is soon rolled over with more action to keep the pace going.
A tense and dark read, with good descriptive passages (the stone animals on the bridge and the jungle in the mansion house, spring to mind) and I quite enjoyed the different characters and their day and night versions — something I found a very intriguing device and one I wished I could have asked some questions about.
All in all a good read and I would be happy to seek out further novels by this author.
With thanks to Netgalley and Head of Zeus for an arc copy in return for an honest review.

A book that has quite an interesting story. Each person has two distinct halves, one only lives at night, the other is the day person.
The book states that The blessing and curse is to know and not recollect what each half does, but as this story unraveled, it appears that some people are more harmonious than others.
Christophor Morden is a special inspector, he specialises in Witch hunting. Alexsander is his day brother, he is a musician. Every day, at dawn and dusk, control of the body moves to the opposite half. So, if I drank way too much, my other half would get the hangover!,
I found this story to be quite Mediaeval in tone and events. It combined religious beliefs and superstition, Witchcraft, and blasphemy, with arcane practices and suffering. When we go to a Cathedral, that just so happens to have an underground library, with forbidden books, I immediately thought of Dan Brown, and The Library of the Dead, by Glenn Cooper, one of my favourite books, that has exactly the same premise.
I found this to be a fascinating concept, that became subsumed by a detective story. It was quite gory at times, but I thought GOT covered these areas just as well. I wanted the emphasis to be more of the duality concept and explored further, that would have made for a more engrossing read. I found various aspects of this story had unanswered questions, you had to take so much on blind faith, pardon the pun!!
Many thanks to Netgalley and the publishers, Head of Zeus, for my digital copy, in exchange for my honest, unsolicited opinion. I rated this as a three star read. I will leave reviews to other outlets shortly.

The feel of this book reminded me a lot of V E Schwab's Darker Shade of Magic series--a series that I love, so anything that gives me similar vibes is always fun--in the way that the line between parallel world's is drawn. I thought that the conflict of the story was really interesting, and paired with a fun and engaging cast of characters and narrative voice, this story was a lot of fun! I think that if you're a fan of fantasy/urban fantasy, then you're going to have a lot of fun with this one!

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I really wanted to like this book as the premise was so interesting but the pace was just too slow for me and I began to get bored so I had to DNF at 45%

The day-siblings concept was so cool but there wasn’t any time spent on explaining that so far and despite having been ‘investigating’ a series of seemingly (and magically) connected occurrences for over half the book, all that seems to have happened is a lot of conversations to garner a very small piece of information.

I was really intrigued by the synopsis of this but unfortunately it just wasn’t for me.
The twin personalities in one body should have made for a great book but it felt like this aspect wasn’t the main focus of the book. It did get better from the second half onwards but I think a lot of people will struggle to get to the good part.

3.5*
I received a free ARC from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

The world of Equinox, in which two people share the same body, one during the day and one at night, is super fascinating. I really enjoyed following witch hunter Christophor and his day-brother Alexsander as they try to solve the mystery and find the witch, and I think their relationship and their disagreements added an interesting, unique aspect to the story, especially since every other character also is two different people in the same body. Aside from this, there is also more magic to this world (hence the witch hunter profession), that ended up being more dark and horror-fairytale-esque than I expected, but I ended up having a really fun time reading it.

As for the plot, I really enjoyed the mystery aspect of it, especially with the witches and demons and war as an added bonus. The plot started out a bit shallow, in my opinion, I was afraid it was going to be too easy to figure out the mystery, but it was not, and towards the end I was very stressed and very concerned for everyone's well being. I did find it to be a bit inconsistent at times, for example in how a whole bunch of people died from some sort of plague that was over after like a week (post covid I feel like that's not how it works), and how someone dies and the very next day he's buried, complete with a headstone (shouldn't those be taking ages to make, especially in this preindustrial world?). Things are being glanced over, and it made the story feel lacking in depth. I think that even though the concept is very interesting, the book as a whole didn't reach its full potential.

Another minor issue I had was that the writing was confusing at times. I would have liked more information, first of all, I felt like I was lacking information I could have had, and there were too many things I was supposed to figure out on my own. Like the opposite of info dumps, if that makes any sense. Also, the language was sometimes weirdly poetic, and I found it difficult to tell whether certain sentences were meant to be literal or metaphorical. Could just be me being stupid, but I also can't remember ever having that issue before. Overall, these things didn't affect my enjoyment of the book too much, though.

I had a lot of fun reading Equinox, and although I didn't think it went all the way for me personally, I can imagine fans of horror fantasy or dark fairytales would really enjoy this!

I couldn’t get used to the writing style and I found myself reading certain things over and over again just to get a sense of what was happening. I was too confused

Equinox is set in a world where everyone has two distinct personalities in one body that changes as the day turns into night and vice versa. Christopher, the night brother, is a Special Investigator while Alexsander, the day brother, is a musician. Christopher was called to investigate a mysterious case of a young boy who tore his eyes out, and suspicion was quickly turned to witchcraft. His job? Find the witch. Trouble is, Alexsander will want to save her. How are they going to solve this?

I'm a little crunched for time so I'm just going to jump straight into my Quick-Fire notes:
- Interesting concept that was predictable with how it applies to/affects the character's (or characters') personalities, interests and POV of the narrative.
- Really enjoyed the creepiness.
- I'd say the first half is okay, but the second half is better. Not so much due to the character's personalities but moreover how the dual-personality concept is played up a lot more in the second half. It adds to the mystery.

<i>Thanks to Netgalley and Head of Zeus (Ad Astra) for providing me with the e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.</i>

This novel’s addictive charm lies in it’s unique world-building, where two people share the same body. One during night and the other during day. As you’d expect, many of these ‘siblings’ are exact opposites and I thought this was going to be a great opportunity to explore more of the social aspects of life. How do siblings juggle their education? Career aspirations? Romance? Families? What if two night friends have day counterparts whom hate one another? What if your sibling decided to have a child? Would you feel cheated, or would you embrace the burden? Unfortunately none of these issues are addressed, and instead the author has chosen to focus on an occult mystery with an elderly, male protagonist.

Christopher is an almost-retired witch hunter who lives alone and has a simple hobby collecting eggs. His night brother Alexsander is a musician. One is stern, brooding and logical; the other is creative, amorous and frivolous. The author creates the implication of two men who struggle to coexist, but when it comes down to it there isn’t too much conflict, as Alexsander generally goes with Christopher’s way because, fair play, being a witch hunter is definitely more important than being a musician. This portrayal of reluctant agreement was tricksy for me, because the crux of the finale is based upon them finding harmony with one another, in order to defeat the witch. This is a sweet point to make, but it fell a little flat for me as I felt the brothers had already reached a certain kind of harmony. If there had been more conflict/frustration/anger between them, it would have felt more significant for them to acknowledge one another.

However, there is certainly a lot to love here – the characterisations are solid (Alexsander and Christopher are two distinct identities you could never mix up) and the scenery/descriptions were perfect. I felt as thought I was in a real medieval village at every moment.

The casts is diverse, but I just wish they had been explored more. As it is, Christopher and Alexsander interact with the inn keeper more than they do with the eventual witch (who's motivation is somewhat glossed over at the end). There was also a lot of political intrigue that was also left unexplored; with hints of a wider picture with an increasingly illogical King and a war on the horizon.

This story could have definitely been a five star read, but lets itself down in key places. Probably a 3.5 rating for me, but I’ve rounded up to 4 because of the brilliant concept and because I’d love to read more from the same universe.

Equinox, by David Towsey, has a fabulous premise that drew me in when I saw the advance reading copy description on NetGalley. In this bizarre world, bodies are split like timeshares. Every day, at dusk and dawn, control of every person’s body switches to its other occupant. Imagine if every time you went to sleep, someone else took control of your person. They lived entire other lives, dated different people, had different jobs, different tastes in decor and hobbies, and generally just moved everything around while you were in blissful oblivion. The potential here is endless. I was excited to read about a cryptic relationship between two friends that could never meet, forever separated by a sunrise, only able to come to know one another via notes. Instead, I feel like I got a middling episode of a long-running British crime serial.

One half of our protagonist is Christophor, an infuriatingly named special investigator for the king. One evening Christophor is woken early by a call to the city prison. A young woman has torn her own eyes out, and the police suspect supernatural causes. The investigation takes Christophor far from home, to a village on the edge of the kingdom. Meanwhile, we occasionally get additional scenes from his “night-brother,” who is hard at work doing things like accounting.

I gave up on Equinox about halfway through because I just couldn’t bring myself to pick it back up anymore. There isn’t anything wrong with it per se. The characters are all aggressively fine, the murder mystery is interesting enough, and the locations, while uninspired, aren’t awful. However, I just couldn’t get over the fact that this book has such a brilliant idea for a setting and then just utterly fails to capitalize on it. I expected something more akin to the recently released MCU Moon Knight show, where you have different personas all competing to control the same body, desperately bargaining with one another to achieve their own personal agendas. The potential of madness and confusion is endless when you can naturally occlude half of all events that happen in a story and parcel them out over time. And Equinox just does none of that.

Looking at other reviews of the book it looks like maybe I quit just before things come together, but it's not reasonable to make a reader sit through 200 pages of nothing only to start pulling in all the lost strands they were looking for in the back half. Maybe I will go back and finish this book when I have more time, but I just had a baby and would rather focus on books that keep me riveted in what little spare time I now have. So for now it will remain unfinished.

Rating: Equinox - DNF/10
-Andrew

I

I've always been very intrigued by the body-sharing trope, but was surprised by how quickly this core intriguing feature was shunted aside in favor of the hardboiled detective story playing out. Echoing other reviewers, if the author had devoted more energy to picking one story to tell things would have felt more focused and less convoluted. The first half of the book dragged, largely because I found Christopher dull, but livened significantly in the second half with Aleksandar taking the reins. Although this was rooted in an interesting concept, I didn't feel as though it lived up to my expectations.

I will start by saying the premises of this book had me hooked. Thankfully the book did hold me throughout although there were a few bumps in the road.
Equinox follows the lives of Christophor Morden and his brother Alexsander but these aren’t the normal kind of brothers. Christophor lives by night and Alexsander lives by day. They are two souls in a single body. In a world where identities change with the rising and setting of the sun. Night brothers and sisters never see the sun and day brothers and sisters know nothing of the night but that is how it has always been.

Generally Christophor and Alexsander live in relative harmony or at least as much as can be expected. Until one evening Christophor is roused to attend a summons to the city prison. A prisoner has torn his eyes out and cannot say why. But there is more to this than an atypical type of guilt, the sockets that once held the eyes now have teeth growing. The police suspect the supernatural, and honestly we could blame, so it falls to Christophor, a member of the king’s special inspectorate (a witch finder of sorts), to find the witch or being responsible.

Night by night Christophor’s investigation leads him and his day brother further from home eventually finding them in a backwards village at the edge of the kingdom. But it begins to seem that the closer Christophor gets to the truth his day brother’s actions become frustrating and even an hinderance. Who is Alexsander protecting and what does he not want Christophor to discover? And all the while in the shadows an ancient and apocalyptic ritual creeps ever closer to completion.

I will start by saying that I had a love and hate relationship with the protagonists of this book. I am, unfortunately, predisposed to dislike witch-hunter types since they generally cling religiously to their self-righteous belief. Unfortunately Christophor does fall into this category but he has a few redeeming features. Alexsander by contrast is, I found, a lot more likeable. In the idea of the novel though I found this rather enjoyable – the idea of the night brother being jaded and focused he lives in the night of course while the day brother is more optimistic and likable. That is not to say this falls into tropes. David Towsey makes this story his own, a wonderful blend of fantasy and horror with a sprinkling of the eldritch demonic as well.

The story itself is well paced for what it is. I didn’t find myself losing interest and I enjoyed the world building and characters we met along the way. I particularly liked that Christophor and Alexsander of an older age; it added more character to the novel than the usual younger protagonists. The world building on top of this is brilliant. I particularly loved and was initially drawn to the two souls in one body and the way Towsey builds this into his narrative and sets up the premises is wonderful. It also creates some good conflict throughout the novel with Day brother against night brother.

As usual I won’t spoil the book too much but I honestly really enjoyed this. It blends several genres together perfectly crime, fantasy and horror to make a memorable and unique tale with some good twists along the way. Towsey also made me end up liking Christophor by the end or at least understanding him. I would definitely recommend it to those who love a good dark fantasy with elements of horror.

I was immediately drawn in by the concept of this book - the idea of there being two people in one body, one who only sees the day and one who only sees the night. Along with this was the suggestion in the blurb that the night-brother of this tale, Christopher, wouldn’t know what his day-brother, Alexsander, was doing. Unfortunately, that was portrayed in the description as far more intriguing than the reality of the book as Alexsander isn’t up to much of significance until he decides to help Christopher solve the murders and find the witch - and Christopher is fully aware that Alexsander is doing this. That being said, there was still mystery and intrigue in this book - even if it wasn’t the sort I had been anticipating.

The book got off to a bit of a slow start setting the scene and travelling to the scene of the crimes, and I didn’t connect with Christopher’s character, which I suspect was intentional as he’s quite rigid and very in control of his emotions and actions, something his day brother notes. As the book progressed more into Alexsander’s perspective, my interest grew, perhaps both because of the more engaging narrator and the progression of the mystery as different clues were emerging along with relationships and entanglements.

The ending of the book seems quite sudden. There’s a lot of build up and it’s quite slow paced until you’re suddenly delivered to a very gruesome end.

I would have been interested to have the concept of day brothers and sisters and night brothers and sisters explored more as it was incredibly creative and there’s a lot that could be done with it but in the end, it didn’t seem so integral to this story. I hope the author might do this in another book in the future!

This is a book with a fascinating premise: one body is, by day and by night, home to two separate people/minds. Someone’s night-brother or night-sister might have nothing in common with their day counterpart; or, they could be so closely connected that the changing hours do little. In the case of the main character(s) of Equinox, Christopher (witch-finder for the king), and Alexsander (frequenter of pubs, and a musician) share little, but where one goes, the other must follow.

This is a really gripping read - the mystery of the who, the what, and the why, on one hand, and the ever-encroaching dread and horror as events start to spiral on the other, create a tense narrative that I found quite hard to pull away from. (Fair warning, though: there are a couple of slightly stomach-turning descriptions as things progress…). Most compelling for me was the writing itself, and how the relationship between Christopher and Alexsander was written. They’re both distinct from each other, having in some ways a pretty standard sibling relationship, but they are also inextricably connected on a different level through not just their body, but also shadows of memories that move between them, at times blurring the lines between their separate identities within themselves and their own consciousness. Neither is wholly aware of the entirety of other’s life or memories, only knowing what they are told through notes, or if something that had happened left a strong enough impression to linger, and this ambiguity makes for an intriguing relationship, putting us as readers in an interesting position - especially when the narrative voice switches and we get a new perspective on events. Tension builds throughout, and while the switch in narrative voice creates a feeling that something will remain unresolved and that no matter what knowledge we are yet to receive there are wider forces at work, rather than leaving the tension (as whole) unresolved, it is merely given a key-change, modulating into another form, rather than leaving us unsatisfied.

All in all Equinox is a compelling, thought-provoking, somewhat gruesome, but always gripping work that will leave an impression on the mind with its intriguing premise, and engaging writing.

I loved the idea of this book where each body has 2 different souls in it one taking over at night and the other during the day .Having said that I found it difficult to understand this is what was happening and was quite a way into the book before I worked it out and this was only after going to look again at the book blurb .part of my difficulty was in working out which of the 2 day of night each section or chapter was featuring ..This confusion made the story difficult to follow
There were some lovely ideas on the book but I think they were not always fully realised .i would have liked more about the difficulties of sharing one body essentially between two people
The author has a clear easy to read prose style
Ultimately this book wasn’t really for me

There was not a part of this book I did not love. The concept, the characters, the descriptions, the... everything really. The concept of Day and Night-Siblings is one that I loved, and yet when I have tried to explain it to others, I can not do it justice. It raises so many questions of jobs, marriages, travel, children and everything in-between.

The religious elements did not bog down the story, which would have been easy to do with the things that were happening, but you are given just enough to aid the story along, and some extra detail, and in no way felt preached at.

Christophor and Alexsander are brilliant, and I loved how the story flips from one perspective to another's, and it is something the story needs as it help keeps things far from stale.

If you want a historical fantasy horror and keeps you guessing the whole way through, then please read this book.

A book with an very interesting and unique concept for sure.

We are in a world where two people share the one body, one only being present for the night, and the other for the day. Both personalities are distinctly different and we follow the Night Brother Christophor and his Day Brother Alexsander, a Special Investigator and a musician respectively.

Christopher is sent to a small town to investigate accusations of witchcraft on the Kings orders and Alexsander has to tag along for the ride.

Definitely a slower burn book where you are trying to solve a murder mystery, with both brothers only present for their own allowed part of the day. Therefore, each only able to glean evidence and form connections with others available during their part of the day or night.

I really enjoyed this book, it is different from anything I have read. It does have dark themes and sometimes gory parts so bear that in mind.