Nine-Mile Bridge by Jason A. Meuschke

Nine-Mile Bridge is the debut novel of author Jason Meuschke. I would classify it as a supernatural thriller based on an urban legend of a bridge in the middle of nowhere Missouri where if you dangle your feet over the bridge, the souls of children killed by being thrown over the bridge will reach for your feet. Later, child handprints appear on your car on the bridge, and the car becomes immobile. There is also a hellhound who will kill you. If you’re lucky to escape the hellhound, but had the misfortune of looking it in the eyes, you will die three days later. It had all of the elements of what makes a great urban legend: one character heard something; another character heard something else. Rumors of the urban legend swirl but the story is never the same.



In this novel, the main protagonist is a high school girl named Holli, whose father had an encounter on the bridge in his youth and a clash with the cultists who were performing a ritual. Given that her father barely survived the incident, one might think that Holli would strongly discourage her friends from going to the bridge and sure as hell wouldn’t go there herself, but alas, the young and foolish often make costly mistakes.



The writing in this novel was strong for a debut author. The story was compelling. The characters were well sketched out. There was a buildup to the novel, which led to a fiery conclusion. All in all, there was a lot to like about it. My one complaint was that the book can use a good copy editor since there were some grammatical and spelling type mistakes that would be easily correctable by someone with an eye for such things. This is a novel worth reading. Get your copy on Amazon.