Lily used a pair of vice grips to pry her fingernail up, showing him the bleeding gore underneath. "That's so much better," she said. "Now I can breathe. It's easier once you let it out." When Steven and Roy agree to help a woman who accidentally animates a collection of antique dolls, they find themselves in a much deeper haunting than either expected. At a house near Deadwood, South Dakota, they uncover a room full of dead people. Each has a strange metal tube sticking out of one ear.Deem joins Steven and Roy along with Terrell and a cast of new characters, all trying to unravel the mystery of the corpses and the tubes, exposing a deadly conspiracy within the town. In the process, they confront uncomfortable questions about death: How long does it really take to die? At what point are we really gone? Node is a fast-paced ghostly adventure, and the fifteenth book of The River series."Node is mysterious, twisted, gross, and completely compelling " - Advance reviewer