The Between: A Novel

Written by Tananarive Due

Narrated by Kevin Kenerly

“An extraordinary work of humane imagination . . . call it magic realism with soul.”—Locus

“Finely honed . . . always engages and frequently surprises.”—New York Times Book Review

A man risks his soul and his sanity to save his family from malevolent forces in this brilliant novel of horror and the supernatural from the award-winning pioneer of speculative fiction and author of the classic My Soul to Keep. 

When Hilton was a boy, his grandmother sacrificed her life to save him from drowning. Thirty years later, he begins to suspect that he was never meant to survive that accident, and that dark forces are working to rectify that mistake. 

When Hilton's wife, the only elected African American judge in Dade County, Florida, begins to receive racist hate mail from a man she once prosecuted, Hilton becomes obsessed with protecting his family. The demons lurking outside are matched by his internal terrors—macabre nightmares, more intense and disturbing than any he has ever experienced. Are these bizarre dreams the dark imaginings of a man losing his hold on sanity—or are they harbingers of terrible events to come? 

As Hilton battles both the sociopath threatening to destroy his family and the even more terrifying enemy stalking his sleep, the line between reality and fantasy dissolves . . . 

Chilling and utterly convincing, The Between is the haunting story of a man desperately trying to hold on to the people and life he loves as he slowly loses himself. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: HarperAudio
• Release date: Oct 5, 2021
• ISBN: 9780063138087

Tananarive Due

Tananarive Due is an American Book Award and NAACP Image Award­–winning author, who was an executive producer on Horror Noire: A History of Black Horror for Shudder and teaches Afrofuturism and Black Horror at UCLA. She and her husband, science fiction author Steven Barnes, cowrote the graphic novel The Keeper and an episode for Season 2 of The Twilight Zone for Paramount Plus and Monkeypaw Productions. Due is the author of several novels and two short story collections, Ghost Summer: Stories and The Wishing Pool and Other Stories. She is also coauthor of a civil rights memoir, Freedom in the Family: A Mother-Daughter Memoir of the Fight for Civil Rights (with her late mother, Patricia Stephens Due). Learn more at TananariveDue.com. 

Reviews for The Between

[sarah · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

There is a section near the end (no spoilers) where my heart was racing! It was intense and I just was so invested in finding out what was going to happen to Hilton. This is such a great story for not knowing what the resolution is for the twists and turns- and the narration is fantastic for adding to the thrill and mystery. It has a few moments where it was pretty slow paced and I struggled but it’s worth it. The characters feel very complex and the story.. the story!

[Rebecca Emmons · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Excellent book! So creative yet portrayed characters and relationships realistically

[Chris Metcalfe · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A scientifically diagnosed mental disorder, is used to explain a supernatural phenomenon, by those who have never had a near death experience, resulting in a wonderfully told and well explained ghost story.

[Tressie · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

I wanted to enjoy this book, and I listened to the end. I'm still confused. I couldn't distinguish between Hilton's dreams and his reality. The epilog left me more confused!

[Real Facade · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Wow. Stunned. Love that you don't know anything for sure until the very end. ????

It's just as entertaining as "The Good House." Strong characters. Would love to see it as a movie.

[lizamichelle1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Hilton is living on stolen time. At nine, he lost his Nana to the ocean when she went out to save him, but he knows he lost her way before then. Now, 30 years later, he is a husband and father of 2. He is having dreams; bad, sleep-depriving dreams. So bad he is not sure if the dreams are reality or his reality are his dreams.When a man threatens to kill his wife and children, he really loses it. He starts seeing things that aren't there. Appears to have ESP. Once he chooses to accept who/what he is, he finally gets peace.This book was a slow start for me, but I eventually got into the confusion of his mind/life and enjoyed the journey to his contentment.

[tea58 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

All through the novel THE BETWEEN by TANANARIVE DUE I felt sympathy for Hilton and his family. Hilton is a husband and father of two children, Kaya and Jamil. Hilton suffers insomnia because of unexplained dreams and/or nightmares. Often these horrible dreams will have many doorways down a long hall, sometimes there is a drowning and sometimes his grandmother, Nana, appears in the dreams. When Hilton awakens from the dreams, he is not himself. He is sad, aloof and at times angry and definitely to exhausted to think clearly at work. Thankfully, he goes to see a therapist, Raul. Later, he will go to see Raul's brother for more help. The dreams are so painful he decides to let Raul hypnotize him.I've never thought much about the why of dreams. I know there are people who write their dreams down in journals. Other people believe wholeheartedly that their dreams are meaningful if they can unmix the symbolism. I did empathize with Hilton. I remember before my marriage and while still a child being frightened to death by nightmares. My parents settled for a night light in my bedroom and a lamp in the hallway. Still, I would run to my parents bed and jump in with them. I had no siblings at home who could have comforted me. Finally, my mother helped me to memorize The Twenty-Third Psalm. She said the Psalm would chase the nightmares away. Hilton end up getting a big dog, Charlie. It seems each person has their personal way of escaping the horror at night.I agreed totally with Hilton's bravery to seek counseling. However, he makes a dandy of a mistake which I could not condone. It just made me angry with him. I felt he played upon his psychological pain as a reason to do what he wanted to do just for a thrilling moment. In other words, I felt he used his depression about his dreams to excuse a bad action.The novel, THE BETWEEN, by TANANARRIVE DUE move from real time to Hilton's dream world. It's not a complicated move because the dreams are written in italics while Hilton's immediate and real environment is written in normal type. I liked the swing back and forth from the unreal to the real. I came to realize no matter what we believe about dreams they are an important part of our lives. I am left with questions about dreams. For example, why are we given dreams? Why do some people have more dreams than other people? Why is there so much symbolism in dreams? Isn't it asking a bit much for the average layman to unravel the meaning of these nightmares? In the end TANANARIVE DUE explains the why of Hilton's dreams. Wow! I never would have expected the reason for his sleepless nights. tananarivedue

[lisamaria_c · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A true-page turner I devoured in a few hours that inhabits the gray spaces between dark fantasy and psychological thriller. Hilton James has felt since childhood that he needs to make his life count, because his grandmother lost her life saving him from drowning. Now his family is in danger; they've been getting death threats from a dangerous racist touched off by his wife's election making her the only black female judge in Miami--and Hilton seems to be losing it, caught up in disturbing nightmares. The style is clean, the story well-paced, and I liked the portrait of Miami and the way it handles difficult topics (homelessness, racism, drug addiction, AIDS, marital problems) with...ease is the best word. I wouldn't call it a light touch exactly, there's little humor here, but it's hard not to root for Hilton and his family, which both helps alleviate some of the darkness but also ups the suspense since you care what happens to them.

[whitewavedarling · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Haunting and powerful--this book might be labeled as horror, but I hesitate to call it that. Yes, it contains a supernatural element, but nothing like a ghost or haunted house. I suppose it comes down to whether you'd consider the television show Medium a horror show, or just suspense. As is, I'd call this strong suspense that is both haunting and striking. At moments, yes, it may even seem like horror, but in the end, I think it's simply a novel about fears and about family, in love and in struggle. I'm still trying to put my feelings on this one completely together, as you may already be able to tell. For now, I do recommend it if you're interested in horror, or if you're a fan of Toni Morrison's Beloved or Song of Solomon certainly. I still feel it's more of a suspense than a horror, but I do need to think on it some more.

[the_hag · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is my second experience with Due...I started with The Good House (which I quite enjoyed)! In The Between: A Novel Due sets out to explore what could happen if you chanted your fate...if you cheated death as did the lead character, Hilton James did as a boy. James is haunted by memories of his near fatal accident as a child...and by visions of his grandmother which are both confusing and frightening and which seem to hint at alternate timelines. Hilton grows up with nightmares of his grandmother and becomes a successful social worker, saving lives of his charges along the way...with a wife and two lively children of his own. He even manages to rid himself of the nightmares for years by seeking help from Raul, his psychiatrist and later close friend. Then..."it" happens...that little thing that starts the collapse of his tidy, happy little world...he's in another accident and from there it's a downhill slide as he attempts to salvage his fragile mind while trying to figure out the mystery of the racist stalker. Due weaves an interesting tale where, through "dreams" we see Hilton change the events of his life in subtle but telling ways and where he has memories of things that never happened and doesn't remember things that did and where Hilton slowly unravels from the loving, caring, deeply devoted man to one who is on the verge of mental and physical exhaustion...slowly going crazy and driving away everyone who ever cared about him. The Between builds up to the point where you wonder if what he is experiencing is real or if he's just going nuts...it gives you a great deal to think about with the parallel worlds, doorways and travelers that is at times confusing, but also interesting and creepy. In the end we are left, along with Hilton to decide if he can continue to cheat death of if he's run out of doorways...The Between is an interesting novel and the premise ultimately seems to be that we all choose our own reality...in this moment with this choice (doorway), but that not all of us are aware, not all of us are travelers in the sense that on some level he KNOWS he's cheated death and actively works to cling to the life he no longer has a right to. Overall it's well written, interesting, psychologically creepy, and well worth reading! I give it four stars instead of five simply because the secondary characters aren't very well developed, so I never really engaged or identified with them to the extent I felt I should have. I would definitely recommend this!