Well, if there’s one thing Nina R. Blakeman, author of Envy Rots the Bones does well, it’s knowing how to combine all the key elements needed for a psychological thriller. Blakeman has tossed everything into this witch’s cauldron: evil mothers, messed up sons and twisted daughters; blood, guts and gore; drugs and satanic rituals with goats and humans on dark nights deep in the woods…more than enough to make readers leery of turning out the light after they bookmark a page in Envy Rots the Bones.

Meet Emma and Ella, twins so different that you wonder how they were born of the same mother, Annette Dolce, a slut who liked carving out people’s innards. Emma, the sexy and loose kid on the school block, and their half-brother, Tito, are as evil as Annette was. Yes, past tense: Annette was secretly and justifiably knocked off by Faye Davis, wife of the twins’ father, Todd, before Envy Rots the Bones opens. Ella, like Faye and her dad, is sweet and gentle, the total opposite of Emma. But it’s Ella who gets herself knocked up in her desire to be as popular as Emma. Readers see envy rotting bones in chapter after chapter, and the pervasive sense of something putrid in the town of Evansville dominates this suspenseful thriller from start to finish.

Thankfully, there are good people in Envy Rots the Bones, though at times one sees why someone once said, “nice guys always finish last.” Todd, Faye, Ella and Margaret Carson, who takes Ella under her wing while she’s pregnant, are all nice guys. But Emma and her warped teenage cohorts do their best to bring them all down. Does Emma succeed? The old good versus evil theme keeps readers turning pages to the very end to find out. Blakeman also goes into a lot of detail with chemical formulae and medical terminology that might have some readers skipping pages. Fortunately, she doesn’t do it so much that readers lose interest altogether…not possible, really since Envy Rots the Bones is one engrossing read.

Twisted and brilliant, Envy Rots the Bones is the follow-up novel to Nina Blakeman’s The Blow-up Man. Faye Davis is the stepmother of teenage twins, whose mother she killed, and the wife of Todd Davis, a man who is much older than her. Both of them pharmaceutical scientists of Cullen State University, their marriage hadn’t been good. Emma, one of the twins, has a lot of resentment towards Faye. Todd, who had to abandon his research of a new drug because of its toxic effects, hasn’t been treating Faye like a loving husband should. Husband problems aside, Faye is about to get a hefty dose of pure hate, courtesy of Emma, a stepdaughter from hell or a place just like it.

I have not had the pleasure of meeting Annette Dolce in The Blow-up Man, but I did have the pleasure of meeting Emma, one of her twin daughters who gradually transforms from teenage girl with a crush on the most sought after boy in school to someone who can manipulate her peers into doing horrible things. Ella, meanwhile, plays the innocent twin, but her time to go bad does come around. Readers who’ve enjoyed the previous book will better enjoy all the interesting characters that this book has to offer. Blakeman truly made all of her characters come to life. I wonder if the author has her heart set on giving all stepparents out there several nightmares because they simply can’t read this book and expect to sleep peacefully afterwards.