Book Details:
Author: David Morabito
Release Date: June 8, 2026Series:
Genre: Fantasy, science-fiction, romance, suspense
Format: E-book
Pages: 239 pages
Publisher: –
Blurb:
A captivating story on the adventures and hardships of Frank Knightlite, a man who strives to illuminate darkness with his lantern in search of answers to life’s questions.
We explore the happiness and tragedies suffered by this ill-fated soul as he sojourns through life. He enters into a romantic relationship with Beth a girl whom he met as a child, who then becomes his fiancé in early adulthood. While exploring the swampy fen lands of England, he suffers a debilitating coma when encountering a mysterious blue orb, believed to be a lantern carried by a disembodied spirit according to ancient folklore.
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After several months in a comatose state, Beth gives up on Frank thinking he is all but dead. As a consequence, she forms a relationship with another man becoming pregnant by him.
A mysterious man arrives in England and exorcises Frank from his comatose state restoring him into a state of consciousness. Beth is informed of Frank’s recovery, and is confronted by him with much emotional spillage. As Frank is traumatized by Beth’s betrayal, she suffers great turmoil and regret followed by a miscarriage. She severs her relationship with the other man only to enter into a relationship with the man who freed Frank from his comatose state; one Raymond Mann, a rough and crusty character.
Frank continues his life heartbroken, and moves to the suburban town of Lexicon. He takes on a job in its Hall of the City Fathers, a notorious criminal organization masquerading as a benevolent civics group. Feeling a need for deep purpose in life and to serve the community, he agrees to be a mole and secretly report on the nefarious activities of this organization only to get caught up in its intrigue.
The novel climaxes with a shocking admission made by Beth who is now confined inside a psychiatric ward after suffering a nervous breakdown.
Review
The Lantern Man by David Morabito is a historical supernatural mystery that combines folklore, romance, speculative fiction and noir-inflected adventure within an impressively expansive narrative. Born in 1920s America, Franklin “Frank” Knightlite is still a child when a journey through Ireland and the English fens introduces him to stories of mysterious marsh lights and the ominous figure known as the Lantern Man.
Years later, Frank returns to England with Beth, his childhood companion and romantic interest, only to become entangled in the disappearance of a family he once knew. An unusually immaculate fireplace, a missing clock, bodies discovered in the marshland and reports of inexplicable lights gradually transform a personal investigation into something considerably stranger. Morabito is particularly effective when writing about the fenlands: their mist, mud, isolation and deceptive lights create an eerie setting in which folklore and physical danger become almost indistinguishable. The mystery of the blue orb deepens this atmosphere and ultimately changes the direction of Frank’s life.
What makes the novel especially intriguing is its refusal to remain within the boundaries of a single genre. What begins as a historical family story develops into a transatlantic romance and folkloric mystery before expanding into a larger supernatural world involving unusual abilities, altered states of consciousness, time-related phenomena and institutional corruption. The enigmatic Ray Mann introduces both extraordinary possibilities and emotional complications, while the later chapters set in Lexicon bring Frank into conflict with the secretive City Fathers and their formidable blue-pinstriped associate. These sections possess an eccentric, almost surreal noir quality, giving the novel the flavour of an old-fashioned serial adventure in which every answer seems to uncover another mystery.
Frank provides the story with a sympathetic centre. His journey from an inquisitive boy carrying a lantern through unfamiliar terrain to a man repeatedly drawn towards danger and unanswered questions lends the novel emotional continuity even as its world becomes increasingly unpredictable. His relationship with Beth brings warmth to the earlier chapters, while Ray’s arrival introduces a more complicated exploration of love, loyalty, power and betrayal. Morabito’s greatest strength lies in his imagination: ghostly lights, unexplained disappearances, strange powers, secretive organisations and flashes of eccentric humour coexist within a story that repeatedly finds new doors to open.
The novel’s considerable ambition occasionally works against its cohesion. Its movement between historical drama, romance, supernatural mystery and the peculiar political landscape of Lexicon can feel abrupt, particularly when the narrative shifts its attention away from Frank for extended periods. The large cast and growing number of subplots sometimes dilute the central mystery, while certain conversations explain ideas that the surrounding scenes have already communicated. Greater compression and smoother transitions between the different stages of Frank’s journey would have strengthened the momentum. Readers should also approach the book as the opening instalment of a continuing adventure, since several major conflicts and mysteries remain unresolved and the conclusion primarily prepares the ground for the sequel.
Nevertheless, The Lantern Man is an imaginative, atmospheric and delightfully unconventional novel whose unpredictability becomes an important part of its appeal. It should particularly interest readers who enjoy supernatural mysteries, historical adventures, strange folklore, secret societies and stories in which an apparently ordinary life becomes connected to forces far beyond conventional understanding. Morabito has created a peculiar and ambitious world, and although I occasionally wished for a more concentrated narrative, I remained curious about where Frank’s lantern—and the darkness gathering around him—would lead next.
The Reading Bud 
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