Review: Tradition: An Easter Nightmare by Kyle M. Scott

 Tradition: An Easter Nightmare by Kyle M. Scott

My Rating:


Tradition: An Easter Nightmare starts out innocently enough but soon things quickly take a turn for the worst and before you know it you're cringing as the horror of what's taking place slaps you in the face. I really enjoyed it, it's a quick horror short that really packs a punch.


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Review: Tread Gently Amidst The Barrows by Jack Rollins

Tread Gently Amidst The Barrows by Jack Rollins

My Rating:


Jack Rollins has a unique style that I find very appealing, he paints vivid pictures of lives lived long ago and surrounds me with the sights, sounds and smells of another era. It's like going back in time and experiencing them for yourself.

Tread Gently Amidst The Barrows may only be 31 pages long but those 31 pages contain a great story. You'll find yourself transported back in time to an era where hard work, myth, and superstition are at the forefront, and where there are unimagined dangers lurking just out of sight.



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Review: Where Wolves Run by Jason Parent

Where Wolves Run by Jason Parent

My Rating:


I'm a huge fan of werewolf stories, I'm talking proper werewolves not over-sized puppies playing at being werewolves, so I couldn't resist this one especially as it's written by one of my must read favourite authors.

Where Wolves Run was a unique, interesting and fast read. The pacing of the story kept me on the edge of my seat. I found myself having to resist the urge to peek a little further down the page and having to purposely slow down as I was in a rush to see what happened next. I particularly enjoyed Konrad's character, it was refreshing to have a character who wasn't aware of what was going on and totally unprepared for what was ahead. Konrad having no prior knowledge of what he's dealing with allows the reader to join him on his journey, to learn along with him and to relate to his experience more as a result.

There was one thing that I feel spoiled it a little for me personally and that was how Konrad's father was referred to as Father rather than by his name. It didn't ruin the story but it did make him feel somewhat less of a person. However, it did put more focus onto Konrad so perhaps it was intentional.

I really enjoyed the ending. I usually have an idea of what I want the conclusion to be when reading a book and I love it when things get turned around and an author throws in a twist that takes things in a whole different direction from what I had envisioned. At first I was a little disappointed but as it sunk in I realised that it worked much better than what I had been expecting.

Definitely one I would recommend.



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Review: The Night Parade by Ronald Malfi

The Night Parade by Ronald Malfi

My Rating:


I received a free copy of The Night Parade from the publisher in return for an honest review.

I have had Ronald Malfi recommended to me several times and somehow I have never managed to get around to reading any of his work. Darn have I been missing out!

The Night Parade was not what I was expecting. I think I go into stories set around a virus with preconceptions, I feel very much been there, read that already but not this time. The writing style and the character building in this one drew me in right away. All preconceptions disappeared and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

This isn't an easy light read that you can just sit back and enjoy. The story has a heavy foreboding atmosphere that builds more and more as you read further. You're never quite sure what's ahead for the main characters, you know that whatever is coming can't be good but at the same time you are hoping for that small chance that things will end up ok. I found myself thinking ahead to all the possible outcomes, analyzing all the little details, trying to pick up on any clues that would prepare me for a happy or sad conclussion, while at the same time trying to stop myself from having a quick peek further down the page. I felt like I had to prepare myself because I was so invested in the characters.

The main characters are very well written and easy to relate to. You want them to succeed, to be safe, to get to safety and that happy ever after but there is so much happening and the action and danger just doesn't let up. You are kept on the edge of your seat, anxiously following their story, helpless and unable to help but at the same time eagerly looking forward to the next obstacle in their path. I read it in one sitting. I couldn't put it down, there was no safe place for me to leave the characters.

Definitely one I would recommend.




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The Night Parade, Synopsis
 

• File Size: 1261 KB
• Print Length: 384 pages
• Publisher: Kensington (July 26, 2016)
• Publication Date: July 26, 2016
• Sold by: Penguin Random House Publisher Services

First the birds disappeared.
Then the insects took over.
Then the madness began . . .

They call it Wanderer's Folly--a disease of delusions, of daydreams and nightmares. A plague threatening to wipe out the human race.

After two years of creeping decay, David Arlen woke up one morning thinking that the worst was over. By midnight, he's bleeding and terrified, his wife is dead, and he's on the run in a stolen car with his eight-year-old daughter, who may be the key to a cure.

Ellie is a special girl. Deep. Insightful. And she knows David is lying to her. Lying about her mother. Lying about what they're running from. And lying about what he sees when he takes his eyes off the road . . .

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Ronald Malfi, Biography 

Ronald Malfi is an award-winning author of many novels and novellas in the horror, mystery, and thriller categories from various publishers,  including The Night Parade, this summer’s 2016 release from Kensington.

In 2009, his crime drama, Shamrock Alley, won a Silver IPPY Award. In 2011, his ghost story/mystery novel, Floating Staircase, was a finalist for the Horror Writers Association Bram Stoker Award for best novel, a Gold IPPY Award for best horror novel, and the Vincent Preis International Horror Award. His novel Cradle Lake garnered him the Benjamin Franklin Independent Book Award (silver) in 2014. December Park, his epic childhood story, won the Beverly Hills International Book Award for suspense in 2015.

Most recognized for his haunting, literary style and memorable characters, Malfi’s dark fiction has gained acceptance among readers of all genres.

He was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1977, and eventually relocated to the Chesapeake Bay area, where he currently resides with his wife and two children.

Visit with Ronald Malfi on Facebook, Twitter (@RonaldMalfi), or at http://www.ronmalfi.com.

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Praise for Ronald Malfi

“I thoroughly enjoyed this book. The setting, the words, the ending. Color me impressed.” –Melissa Reads on The Night Parade

“The Night Parade has a creepy vibe and some genuinely terrifying moments. I even teared up a time or two. It's everything I look for in a great read.” – Frank Errington on The Night Parade

“One cannot help but think of writers like Peter Straub and Stephen King.”
—FearNet

“Malfi is a skillful storyteller.”—New York Journal of Books

“A complex and chilling tale….terrifying.”—Robert McCammon

“Malfi’s lyrical prose creates an atmosphere of eerie claustrophobia…haunting.”—Publishers Weekly

“A thrilling, edge-of-your-seat ride that should not be missed.”
—Suspense Magazine

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Review copy provided by the publisher via NetGalley.  

Media, information and graphics provided by Erin Al-Mehairi from Hook of a Book Media & Publicity. 

Follow along the tour with these hashtags: #TheNightParade #WanderersFolly #apocalyptichorror

   

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If you are a blogger, author, or member of the media and you would like to feature The Night Parade or Ronald Malfi in a review or interview, please contact Erin Al-Mehairi, publicist, at hookofabook@hotmail.com. Thanks!

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Review: Fell by Jenn Ashworth

Fell by Jenn Ashworth

My Rating:


I received a free copy of Fell from the publisher in return for an honest review.

Fell is beautifully written and was a pleasure to read. Jenn Ashworth creates many haunting, beautiful and vivid pictures and has a wonderful way with words. I particularly loved how the house was portrayed, the descriptions of the decaying house really brought the place to life. But, I struggled to connect to her characters. The characters were individual enough but I couldn't picture them, I couldn't relate to them or get to know them on the level that I felt was needed. They were, literally, characters on the page, they didn't have enough substance or colour to make them stand out.

The book is narrated by the ghosts of the main characters parents and although I did enjoy them taking me through their lives, I found them rather flat and emotionless at times. The distance between them and what they were watching felt huge, like they weren't a part of what they were reliving, I wanted more emotion from them. It was like they were watching someone else's lives, reliving someone else's memories, not their own.

I am left with many questions. Every page read as though it was floating on the surface of something deeper. The book doesn't tell a full story, nor does it give me enough to fill in the gaps. Who is Tim really? What exactly is this strange power he has? What happened to Annette between then and now to make her the way she is? What was the fortune teller hinting at with Annette and her gifts? Is Annette's gift part of what drew her parents back? What was it that Tim saw in Annette?

I kept reading on expecting to learn more, to have answers to these questions. I set my hopes on there being some big finale that rounded everything off in the end, but the story just kind of fizzled out.

Fell wasn't an awful read, the writing alone was worth the time invested but the story itself felt superficial. Rather than having experienced a journey along with the characters, I feel instead that I was sat on the sidelines, watching their life story through a window.



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Review: Stolen Away by Kristin Dearborn

Stolen Away by Kristin Dearborn

My Rating:


I received a free copy of Stolen Away from Erin at Oh, for the Hook of a Book in return for an honest review and as part of the Hook of a Book Stolen Away publicity blog tour in which my blog Scarlet's Web is taking part.

Stolen Away is a hard one for me to review. I did like the story and I wanted to finish it but when I put it down I wasn't compelled to pick it back up. However, when I did pick it back up I slipped easily back into the story so I'm a bit conflicted.

The premise was interesting and different from most books covering this topic, and the characters, although I didn't particularly like them, were well fleshed out. The two main characters have a history together and we learn throughout the book just how much they have been through as a couple and how that history affects the choices they make during the current storyline. Some of their choices annoyed the heck out of me though and there were little things like how Trisha goes from her breasts being painfully engorged and having to express milk to ease the discomfort, to it not being mentioned at all, like she just turned off a tap. Or the interlude chapter for example, it was good by itself but the character it was referring to hadn't felt a part of the story for some time and it wasn't until I was a good bit through it that I realised it was Cherry, then she just disappears again for another long period of time. It pulled me out of the flow of the story. A similar thing happens with Barlows character, not in such an abrupt way as with Cherry but it has the same affect on the flow of the story.

The whole time I was reading I was very aware of everything going on around me, a good book draws you in and drowns that out, it wasn't holding my attention enough to have that effect. I felt at times like I was reading a nastier paranormal romance rather than a full blown horror story, which it shouldn't have because the demon rapes the main character to get her pregnant in the first place. I think it's because of the whole inner dialogue she had going on when she thought about what happened and how she looked at the time, and also the the fact that she refers to him as her demon lover. He raped her, there was nothing lover like about it. Especially after the event itself. I can understand it from the point of view of him playing with them, seducing them and pulling them in but afterwards, after the event itself, he's an abuser not her demon lover.

There were points in the story that I think stood out and were more what I would expect and hope to find in a story like this. The scene with the dog, the exorcisms and Tabatha's character come to mind, these were for me the better parts of the reading experience. Overall there wasn't the level of fear and terror I would expect. There were some nasty events and the characters had their lives turned upside down but I would have liked to have seen the emotional panic, terror and fear ramped up a bit more.

All in all it was on OK read and I'm glad I picked it up but I much preferred Dearborn's previous book Woman in White .



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Synopsis for Stolen Away

 

• Publication Date: June 24, 2016
• Publisher: Raw Dog Screaming Press
• Publication Length: 220 pages

Trisha will admit she's made a few mistakes in her life but that checkered past is behind her. She loves her kids, even if it's tough being a single mom. But her loyalties are put to the test when her infant son disappears in the middle of the night, and his big sister says a monster took him.

Now Trisha has to face the full truth behind the one-night-stand that produced Brayden in all its scaly torridness – Brayden's father wasn't human and isn't interested in sharing custody. However, even though DEMON has pulled this stunt many times before, he made a mistake when he chose Trisha. The one thing she won't do is give up her son without a fight. Along with her ex-boyfriend, Joel, Trisha is dragged back into the seedy underworld in a desperate fight to reclaim her son, only this time she's got a lot more to lose.

About the Cover

The cover was created by Italian artist Daniele Serra. He is a winner of the British Fantasy Award and has worked with companies such as DC Comics, Image Comics, Cemetery Dance, Weird Tales Magazine and PS Publishing. Recently his work was featured as interior art in a scene of Stephen King’s The Cell, with Samuel Jackson looking it over. Visit his web site to see more of his art: http://www.multigrade.it

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Biography

If it screams, squelches, or bleeds, Kristin Dearborn has probably written about it. Kristin has written books such as Sacrifice Island (DarkFuse), Trinity (DarkFuse), and had fiction published in several magazines and anthologies. Stolen Away was recently a limited edition offered from Thunderstorm Books, which sold out.

She revels in comments like, “But you look so normal…how do you come up with that stuff?” A life-long New Englander, she aspires to the footsteps of the local masters, Messrs. King and Lovecraft. When not writing or rotting her brain with cheesy horror flicks (preferably creature features!) she can be found scaling rock cliffs or zipping around Vermont on a motorcycle, or gallivanting around the globe. Kristin’s latest DarkFuse release is Woman in White.

Find more about Kristin online at kristindearborn.com or Facebook.

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Praise for Kristin Dearbon

“In Stolen Away, Kristin Dearborn writes with a confidence and ferocity that demands you keep turning pages. Where lesser writers would flinch and look away, Dearborn tells the tale the way it should be, with cruelty and fascination for both her characters and the story. Kristin Dearborn isn’t just a writer to watch, she’s a writer to watch out for. If she’s swinging, you might want to duck, because she hits hard!—Bracken MacLeod, author of Mountain and Stranded

“Kristin Dearborn’s fast-paced horror thriller, Stolen Away, will possess readers as they strap in for a demonic thrill ride of sin and redemption.”—Stephanie M. Wytovich, author of An Exorcism of Angels

“Gripping nonstop suspense and unsettling horror that blazes the pages from start to finish. You’ll swear Stolen Away was written by a seasoned veteran of best-selling novels. Expect to want more after reading the second novel by Kristin Dearborn, an author whose work will shoot her straight to the top of reading lists.”—Rena Mason, Bram Stoker Award-winning author of The Evolutionist

“Kristin Dearborn catapults readers into an intricately layered world that is bleak and terrifying but never so damned as to be without hope or redemption. If the devil, so to speak, is in the details, then this book raises hell, exploring not just demons internal as well as external, but also all the beautiful, heart-wrenching, contradictorily complex, powerful little things that define human experience. This book earns a prominent place of the bookshelf of any fan of demonic fiction.” —Mary SanGiovanni, author of The Hollower trilogy and Chills

“Horror born straight from a nor’easter, Dearborn’s Woman in White is a great read for a winter night—with a monster I’ll never forget.” —Christopher Irvin, author of Federales and Burn Cards

“Kristin Dearborn’s Woman in White is a rip-roaring monster tale with sharp-eyed characterization and something to say about the power dynamics between men and woman. Thought-provoking and entertaining as hell!” —Tim Waggoner, author of Eat the Night

“Great stuff! Suspenseful, quickly paced, unpredictable and wonderfully evil tale. Kristin Dearborn’s best yet!” —Jeff Strand, author of Pressure

“Dearborn has a wonderful sense of the macabre, along with the ability to balance the spookier aspects of her work with well-rendered, solid characterizations…Sacrifice Island is a blazing fast read, with engaging characters and a compelling narrative.” —The Maine Edge

“Sacrifice Island is a fresh and interesting take on a tried and true horror setup.” —Examiner 

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 Media, information and review copy provided as part of the Hook of a Book blog tour by Erin Al-Mehairi from Hook of a Book Media & Publicity. 


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Review: Chasing Ghosts by Glenn Rolfe

Chasing Ghosts by Glenn Rolfe

My Rating:


 I received a free copy of Chasing Ghosts from Erin at Oh, for the Hook of a Book in return for an honest review and as part of the Hook of a Book Chasing Ghost publicity blog tour in which my blog Scarlet's Web is taking part.

If you go down to the woods today...

Chasing Ghosts had me cringing at several points. There is one particular scene, which wasn't particularly gruesome, where just the simple visual description and my imagination was enough to give me the heebie jeebies. Despite the fact that there was plenty gory goings on before and after this one particular event, my mind kept going back to it. I just couldn't get it out of my head. In the whole scheme of things it was such a small event but it gave me the mother of all cringes.

Chasing Ghosts isn't a huge read, it's around 100 pages long but there is a lot happening in those pages. Because of this it's kind of a hard one to review without giving a lot away. It launches right into the action from the first page and continues at full throttle throughout. It certainly kept me on the edge of my seat.

There was a great predatory atmosphere going on. The anticipation of something being just around the corner but never quite sure just when, where or who was going to be next made it a very enjoyable read. There was a nice balance of detail and visuals with just enough given to allow you to picture the scene but at the time allowing the imagination to fill in the gaps, and boy was my imagination happy to oblige. I'll be steering clear of the woods for a while.

One thing that I did notice (it's not a big deal, it's just a personal irk - when I say irk what I really mean is it irritates the heck outta me lol) was the use of "could give a shit". Surely if you 'could' give a shit it means that you do give a shit to an extent, and as a result it is possible for you to give less of a shit than you do now. Whereas if you 'couldn't' give a shit (which is the right way, just saying!) then you give so little of a shit about something that it would be impossible for you to give less of a shit than you do now. Forgive me, I'm typing this explanation at 5am in the morning on only two hours sleep from the previous night and I think my brain just exploded! I really hope it's legible. Must remember to take out all the shits when posting to Amazon cause they give a lot of shits about the shit you put in your reviews. Ok I'll stop, lol. Like I said it's just a personal thing but get it right next time! :P



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Chasing Ghosts, Synopsis

• File Size: 340 KB
• Print Length: 102 pages
• Simultaneous Device Usage: Unlimited
• Publisher: Sinister Grin Press (August 1, 2016)
• Publication Date: August 1, 2016

 

The Cobbs were ignorant woods-people that died off and left nothing to fear. Locals in Naples, Maine think they know this story. But are they wrong? 

Luke Howard and his mom move to Naples and Luke’s eager to make new friends. When Jason and Davey invite him out to the abandoned Cobb place for a game they call “chasing ghosts,” he’s ready and willing. However, the boys will come to discover that some vacant houses are better left to die alone.

Meanwhile, a punk band set to play in a rented cabin out of town feel eyes upon them. Somebody’s watching, but not their usual audience. When their lead singer strays too far from the group and disappears, his band mates set out in the darkness to find him.

Police Chief Walt Henderson is about to discover that there’s more going on out in the woods of his town than he ever imagined.

Chasing ghosts is more than just some children’s game.

 

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Biography

Glenn Rolfe is an author, singer, songwriter and all around fun loving guy from the haunted woods of New England. He has studied Creative Writing at Southern New Hampshire University, and continues his education in the world of horror by devouring the novels of Stephen King, Jack Ketchum, Hunter Shea, Brian Moreland and many others. He and his wife, Meghan, have three children, Ruby, Ramona, and Axl. He is grateful to be loved despite his weirdness.

He is the author the novellas, Abram's Bridge, Boom Town, Things We Fear, and the forthcoming, Chasing Ghosts; the short fiction collection, Slush; and the novels, The Haunted Halls and Blood and Rain.

His first novella collection, Where Nightmares Begin, was released in March 2016.

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Praise for Glenn Rolfe

 

“Things We Fear is a compulsively readable tale of obsession and dark suspense, with one of the creepiest villains I’ve encountered in recent years.” — Tim Waggoner, author of The Way of All Flesh

“Glenn Rolfe’s new thriller is addictive. A quick, compelling read. Rolfe creates tension with a minimal amount of words. His characters are so well-drawn they come alive (before they die).” — Duncan Ralston, author of Salvage

“Fast paced and tense, with one of the most interesting monsters I’ve read about in recent times.” — Patrick Lacey, author of A Debt to Be Paid

“Glenn Rolfe is quickly establishing a name for himself as one of a number of excellent new writers to ensure the horror genre is kept alive and well.” — Catherine Cavendish, author of Dark Avenging Angel

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Media, information and review copy provided as part of the Hook of a Book blog tour by Erin Al-Mehairi from Hook of a Book Media & Publicity. 

Follow along the tour with these hashtags: #ChasingGhosts #Rolfed #WoodsPeople