Hunter SheaBesprekingen

Interesting & fun story. This was especially engaging in 2024 with orca attacking yachts off the coasts of Spain, Portugal, and Australia!

I picked this up with the hindsight that it was going to be a tongue in cheek b-horror kind of story and it certainly was that! But it is a quick entertaining read which kept me steaming through it and it's a perfect Sunday lazy afternoon kind of book.

I doubt it will leave many people scared unless you have a severe phobia of rats! If you do you best avoid this one

I wish I had saved some of the great lines peppered throughout it, my memory is terrible but I do remember one of them had something to do with tails being like satans ariels maybe? I'm going to have to flick back through it to find it as it amused me!

“Possibly a thousand rats were on our tail, their own tails bobbing like Satan’s spaghetti.”

Now that has got to go down as a classic surely?!! :-)

Throughly enjoyed this book and I will be hunting out more of Hunter Shea's books.

Rattus New Yorkus was published yesterday 21st August 2018 and can be purchased for the amazing price of £1.81 now from Amazon

If you are a fan of slasher horror movies then you are in for a treat with this book! It certainly lives up to its title with some blood curdling results with its graphic imagery as someone or something hunts them down, murdering the group one by one.

Five years ago a group of friends broke into the Hayden Resort, a derelict, run down, abandoned hotel to do some urban exploration but only one person left the resort alive. Ashley King, known to the media and fans as 'The Final Girl'. A serial killer murdered all her friends in horrific ways, a killer labeled as 'The Wraith' but was never caught.

Although Ashley made it out alive, she never recovered from that night and never escaped from the Wraith psychologically, resulting in her taking her own life.

Drowning in grief from his Ashleys fiancée, Todd finds a clue left behind by Ashely, one that could identify the Wraith and let Ashely feast in peace. Following the clue, Todd and his friends follow in Ashley's footsteps to the Hayden Resort and what follows is an almost mirror image of what Ashely and her group went through as they come face to face with her murder, the Wraith.

There is enough killing packed with gore to satisfy even the most bloodthirsty readers and even though it reads like an 80's horror movie, this isn't a mindless slasher. It is full of complex characters, powerful imagery and intelligent plot lines and genre crossovers, horror, paranormal, suspense and psychological thriller with a serial killer to rival the likes of Leatherface and Freddy Krueger. I can see it now making its way to the silver screen as a horror movie, the whole novel would be a perfect cross over from page to screen.

With Christmas just around the corner this book would make an ideal present for horror fans, they certainly wouldn't be disappointed!

Slash was published on 24 Oct. 2019, perfect timing for halloween and you can grab a copy of it now from Amazon or Waterstones

Hunter Shea is the product of a misspent childhood watching scary movies, reading forbidden books and wishing Bigfoot would walk past his house. He doesn’t just write about the paranormal – he actively seeks out the things that scare the hell out of people and experiences them for himself. He’s the author of over 25 books, including The Jersey Devil (Pinnacle) and We Are Always Watching (Sinister Grin). Hunter’s novels can even be found on display at the International Cryptozoology Museum.

Thank you to the author Hunter Shea, publishers Flame Tree Press, Anne Carter and NetGalley for my copy of this book in exchange for an honest and independent review as well as including me on the blog tour.

Hunter Shea has done it again, another old school horror at its very best!

Dracula Drive, what a perfect name for a road that leads you into hell and for what later takes place down that dirt road in the belly of the forest!

I remember this era really well and I think that was a major fact of how quickly I got pulled into this book, plus it reads like an old school early Stephen King novel. I’m not sure why but it made me think about Stephen King’s The Tommyknockers. Misfits is definitely a must read for horror fans, this is probably my favourite book so far by Hunter Shea!

As well as being part in the blog tour for this book on Twitter I am also offering you the chance to win your own copy of this book. All you have to do is pop over to my Twitter which is @DebTat2 for more details.

Sorry this review is so short but I am sat in hospital having iv antibiotics for pleurisy and there is no wifi!

Misfits was published on 8 Sept. 2020 so you can grab yourself a copy now

DNF at almost halfway. I found it boring and there were too many plot holes pulling me out of the story. Everyone except for Todd was flat and one dimensional-to the point where I couldn't remember who was who. The few women in the book were described by either how big their boobs were or how nice their ass was (or both!). I read some spoilery reviews and the killer's identity just made me roll my eyes. Um, no.

What do I not see enough of in books? Horror stories full of scares and violence set in the old American West featuring spooky abandoned (or not) gold mines and a climactic fight of Biblical proportions. How do I know I need more of this? Because I just finished Hunter Shea's Ghost Mine and loved every second of it!

The tale is about two immediately likable rough-and-tough leads, Nat and Teta, who team up to explore a mysteriously abandoned mining town in Wyoming at the behest of President Roosevelt. Nat is an aging ex-soldier/ex-cop, and Teta is his Dominican sidekick who has been with him through thick and thin. Together they have survived insurmountable odds, but this latest assignment is beyond anything they've ever seen.

I absolutely love these two characters, and I was onboard from their very first wisecrack and background story. Their violent tendencies and slight insanity would seem a little much in a normal story, but these are exactly the characteristics that may help them survive the horrors in the mines. Nat in particular is given a lot of depth and complexity in his character, and I found it quite easy to sympathize with him along the way. Teta is very much the sidekick painted in broader strokes, but he's still an integral part of the story and is given moments to shine. Nat needs him, and so do we.

I also love the pacing in the story. Shea does an amazing job of building suspense; slowly peeling back layers of the mystery while also peppering the story with moments of dread or outright fear. It really kept me on my toes trying to guess what would happen next, and I love all of the twists and elements that I did NOT expect (unfortunately I can't discuss them here because they're spoilers, but also because this book works best going in with no expectations). Is the story about ghosts, monsters, creatures, demons, or something else? The answer is yes, and that's all I'll say.

More things I liked? Okay! How about the two characters that were introduced halfway through that made for an intriguing dynamic to the cast, or literally any creepy part set down in the mine shafts (seriously, I'm afraid of the dark and claustrophobic, and Shea's brilliant writing made these scenes all too visceral and terrifying)? How about the blend of mythology, folklore, and the supernatural? Or the way almost every chapter ends in a cliffhanger (I've never seen so many ways to say "and suddenly things got a whole lot worse")? I could go on, but I won't. And things I didn't like? Ummmm I'm going to have to get back to you.

If you wanted to make comparisons you could use The Descent, Bone Tomahawk, Constantine, The Lone Ranger, Scooby Doo, and Indiana Jones - but then throw them away because none of them do this story justice. Instead you need to stop everything, go get this book, and then buckle up because it's a hell of a ride. This is my first time reading Hunter Shea and I'm hooked! Excuse me while I go get everything else he has ever written!

I’ll get straight to what I liked about this book, the time and energy Shea put into building character. Or as some writing gurus will tell you, write what you know. And in Shea's own words, elements of this story are very personal.

It's a slow development of character for a good two thirds of the story. The creature in question doesn’t rear its ugly head until the bitter end, but that's okay. The story isn’t really about the creature itself, but of the creature as a manifestation brought on by the every day horrors of living with a brutal and uncompromising disease. Literally.

Kate is the one who lives in pain every day of her life. Her husband Andrew loves her and just wants her to be well, but her ever constant need for care wears on him as well. So they take a trip to the wilds of Maine hoping to enjoy nature and some alone time for healing.

But the disease isn’t forgiving, and the creature in question is eventually drawn to it.

I’m not going to give away any more spoilers than that. The slow development of the plot to get to the final moments of horror is essential to this story (in my opinion), so stick with it.

I’m glad I did.

Terrible. Almost unreadably dull, with ridiculous dialog and mind-numbingly stupid resolution. The writer uses words without knowing what they mean ("elk tusks"?!) and spends 10% of the book describing a meaningless train ride without any bearing on the story at all.

Garbage.

This was a great read that reminded me so much of the classic 80s horror I grew up with. There's toxic sludge, a cursed family, creepy woods, and of course blood and gore, The action starts right away and almost never lets up. There is so much going on besides the "unholy horde of mutant monstrosities." There's a multitude of complex characters with their own back stories going on.

I received an advance copy for review

This was a quick, creepy read that once again takes my mind back to classic 80s horror, and I loved it. Having previously read The Jersey Devil by the same author I was hopeful that Just Add Water would be a ridiculous amount of fun to read, and I was not disappointed.

I still remember all those ads in comics and magazines for "sea monkeys" (which were total duds by the way) that showed fantastic tiny sea families frolicking in their little cities. Apparently Hunter Shea remembers them too. Here we have not sea monkeys but sea serpents that will hatch with very little care.. just add water. Of course it doesn't work out that way at all and soon the neighborhood is over run with vicious hungry monsters that eat everything in sight.
I received an advance copy for review.

The description provided was a little bit off. Martin didn't punish his son for ordering glasses, it actually wasn't even his son who ordered them.

Martin came home from his factory job just wanting to knock back a few beers, (never a full six pack on a week night or else it made the weekends less special) and watch Charlie's Angels. He's annoyed that his son Brian and his best friend Noel are making so much racket upstairs. When Martin goes up to tell Noel he's going to walk him home, Noel shows him the x-ray glasses. He's ordered a pair for himself and a pair for Brian from an ad in a comic book. He tries them on even though Brian tells him all they do is give you a headache, and at first that seems to be true, but the more Martin wears them the more he sees. He soon becomes addicted to ogling women through their clothing, but eventually he begins to see something more sinister. By the time he decides to stop wearing them, it's already too late.
This was a quick, fun read, reminiscent of the stories you would find in the horror comics back in the day. A crazy silly good time.

I received an advance copy for review.

Not to nitpick but my obsessive compulsive nature requires that I state that the money back guarantee was for 5 dollars, not $1.99

Having previously read Optical Delusion and Just Add Water by Hunter Shea I was anxiously awaiting this third installment, and as much as I enjoyed both of those, this is by far my favorite adventure into the horrors of mail order shopping.

Set in the 1980s and steeped in all it's glorious culture of Tupperware parties this fast paced horror takes what should be a mundane ordinary experience and turns it into something horrifying.
Against her better judgment, Rosemary allows herself to be talked into purchasing a toy from an advertisement in the back of a comic book for her son Dwight. Naturally, when it finally arrives it's a piece of junk. When Dwight and his friend nearly drown while playing, Rosemary has quite literally a hell of time trying to track down the elusive "AdventureCo" manufacturer that nobody has ever heard of. Unfortunately for Rosemary, AdventureCO has heard of her, and they do not like complaints.

I received an advance copy for review.

When I saw this cover and read the description I was hoping it would be along the lines of Hunter Shea's Mail Order Massacre trilogy. (which I loved) This one was just not as fun for me. Even though I just this minute finished reading it I can not even remember the name of a single character. I think of them as the old man, the teenage mayor, the family, and the gardening lesbian couple. This was just an ok read for me. It lacked the humor and the terror I was expecting.
3 out of 5 stars

I received an advance copy for review.

This was another creepy creature feature from Hunter Shea, this time in the form of a parasitic fungus that attaches itself (quite literally) to some friends that are camping in the woods of Washington. What was meant to be a scattering of ashes turns into a horrific discovery of a foul smelling growth that begins to infect the group. This was a quick read and a gross out good time.

I received an advance copy for review.

Holy cow! or should I say Unholy moly! This is a gut wrenching story that swept me away from the start. A man of the cloth with a dark past is nervously navigating his way home in a rain storm. He's always been uneasy driving in the rain but this downpour is worse than usual. He calls his wife, hoping that it will help calm his nerves. Hearing her voice, and his children in the background is just what he needs. Suddenly the playful voices of his children turn to shrieks of terror. He is utterly helpless to do anything but listen to the brutal murders of his family. Their loss and his grief turn him into a shell of his former self and he locks himself away from anyone wanting to offer sympathy or help.
This is a step away from Hunter Shea's usual light hearted creature feature horror. although he has done it before with the equally serious novel Creature which I highly recommended to you a while back. Raul's grief is palpable and my heart was heavy with his pain. Felix, the former best friend with the criminal past and fierce loyal streak helped propel the story towards it's shocking climax. As the murders go unsolved by the police, Felix sets out to bring the killers to his own brand of justice, but what he uncovers is more horrifying than I could have imagined.

I received an advance copy for review.

A newlywed suffering a deadly infection is rushed to the hospital from her wedding reception. The prognosis is looking pretty bleak and the husband decides that if she has any chance of recovery it will be in their new home instead of the cold sterile hospital.
He brings her home, where he and her mother attempt to care for her along with a visiting nurse.
What he doesn't know, is the history of his new home or why a ghostly apparition of a boy begins to appear.
This was a quick read, more sad than scary, more emotional than chilling, until suddenly the ending gave me a solid case of the heebie jeebies.

4 out of 5 stars

I received a complimentary copy from the publisher under no obligation to write a review.

I usually shy away from comparing one author to another but what is most on my mind is that this has some similarities to a few Edward Lee books I've read, except that Misfits is 100 times more terrifying and 100 times less nauseating than those. It also has realistic characters that I actually cared about. I mean seriously I want these people to be OK! I loved everything about this book, from the time period, to the deep and abiding friendships among these 5 high school age kids who would literally lay down their lives for each other if necessary. I suppose that is exactly why they find themselves on a ghastly collision course with horror on Dracula Drive.

"Dare to walk down Dracula Drive,
In day or night, you won't survive.
They wait in trees and hide below,
Hungry for people too blind to know."

I do not scare easily, but from the first mere glimpse of Dracula Drive at the beginning of the book I had the most eerie feeling like someone just walked over my grave. As the story went on I was almost afraid to turn the page, but before I knew it I was reading faster and faster almost like I needed to escape the book before the melon heads could get me.

I received an advance copy for review.

We already know from the book description that Poor Ashley King was the only one to survive the first killing spree, though she lost all of her friends and most of the memories of that awful night. For 5 years she tried to live a normal life though all the "final girl" fans didn't make it easy for her. When she learns the abandoned resort where her friends had been brutally murdered is about to be demolished it triggers memories that make her take her own life. Devastated and outraged, her fiancée taunts the killer and heads out to the resort to lie in wait, hoping to lure him out and finish him off. I was hooked on this story from the start, but by the time I was halfway through it was like a breathless race to make it to the finish and see who (if anyone) survived.
Highly recommended for all horror fans and contrary to the title it is not your typical slasher story.
5 out of 5 stars.
I received an advance copy for review.

I have been a fan of Hunter Shea for a few years now. I believe I have read most if not all of his work. I can usually count on his books to remind me of lazy Saturdays as a kid reading through my horror comics or watching the creature double feature on my old TV that got 3 channels back in the 80s. I've often described his books as "a fun read."
Creature is a whole other level of horror than I was expecting. It's much more dark and serious. It feels real. If you have ever suffered chronic pain you are going to find an instant kinship with Kate. It will take you back to your darkest days. If you have not known this kind of pain you will at least feel sympathy for her and her husband Andrew, who due to her debilitating illnesses has had to become her caretaker yet somehow remained a real husband. Kate and Andrew despite everything have remained madly in love. Not that fake romance novel type love either, I mean the real kind where you sometimes get on each other's nerves to the point that you can't stand to be in the same room together but before you walk out you still make damned sure they have everything they need, and you know you're coming back. Andrew would do anything for Kate, and it is in that spirit that he takes her to a lake house for the summer where he hopes she can find some relief and some happiness before her next horrible round of doctor appointments in the fall. This was a 5 star read for me.

I received an advance copy for review.

Wow this book was a fun creature feature bloody romp!



Setting: Montauk, New York

Police officer, Gray Dalton gets a call that bodies have been found on one of the beaches in the county. When Officer Dalton gets there and sees the remains of the bodies, he wonders what has invaded his domain. In the meantime, in other parts of the county, people are having problems with what they think are "wild dogs" that are causing a nuisance in the neighborhoods.

When neighbors go outside of their homes to investigate, the "wild dogs" are anything but friendly as they go into attack mode. As people start getting scratched or hurt from the attacks they don't think nothing of it so they don't go to the doctor which turns out to be a deadly mistake.

When Officer Dalton hears about the "wild dogs" and he finds out they have been attacking people he puts two and two together as he begins to wonder if the "dogs" are responsible for the corpses on the beach. As he gathers his police force together to go in search of these animals, he finds out quickly that these "dogs" are not normal as they are beyond his imagination.

Officer Dalton along with his officers find out that there is a government research facility not too far from Montauk called Plum Island and the dog creatures are coming from the island. When Officer Dalton and one of his police officers, Meredith goes to check out the island, he is not a happy camper when he finds out what they have created there.

As the bodies start piling up, Dalton and Meredith race against time to see if they can stop the creatures from causing any more destruction and death. When word gets out that the creatures have invaded the county, everyone descends on the community including the CDC as not only are the creatures attacking people as they are also spreading a deadly disease.

I was hooked from the first chapter as bodies and gore started flying!

The more I got into the book the more bodies started turning up. There is quite a bit to take in at first as there are lots of characters in this book, but don't get attached to anyone as they might end up dead!

Everyone is expendable in this book as no one is a favorite here!

If you are even a bit squeamish when it comes to gore and body parts, then you might not want to read this book as there is lots of graphic detail of the gore which abounds in this book! But for you readers that like extreme blood and gore mixed with lots of graphic descriptions then by all means pick up this book as you will not be disappointed!

It is a wonder my kindle wasn't bleeding as the whole book is a blood soaked gory mess!

Author, Hunter Shea, really took this book for a gory romp as I think it is one of the bloodiest books I have read by him! Giving it five gory stars for one horrific ride into terror!

Jessica Backman is a paranormal investigator and along with her sidekick Eddie who is a physic they investigate a house that is supposedly haunted. The house is harboring a doppelganger that looks the daughter of the Leighs. Jessica brings all her ghost equipment to help her with finding out what is really going on in the house and she brings Eddie along hoping that he can sense what is happening in the house.

I didn't find no chills and thrills here unfortunately. For some reason, to me it wasn't as good as some of the other ones I have read by Hunter Shea and I thought it would be more "leave the light on" spooky, but it I didn't find no spooks within these pages.

This was still a good book, but I just wasn't scared when I was reading it and I never really connected to the characters. Nothing to deter other readers from reading it, but I just wasn't as spooked as I was hoping to be. Three stars for this one.

Shark infested waters swimming in blood and gore!



A small backstory:

Suzanne Merriweather is a climatologist and she studies climate changes within the ocean, but when her and her crew discover a fissure on the ocean floor that is releasing methane - they also realize that the fissure is releasing chimaera sharks. The size of them is what has her worried as they are bigger than normal and they are out for blood.

The only man that can help her figure out what is going on is her ex-husband (Whit) and as much as she doesn't want to get him involved, she has to pull him back into her life as he is the only one that has studied the chimaera sharks and knows them better than anyone.

When her and her ex-husband team back up they do not realize that they will be in a fight for survival as the chimaera sharks have infested the ocean and they are hungry for blood. Nothing will stop them tearing apart whatever lies in their path!

Thoughts:

This was a great shark story and as always with books by this author, it was a blood and guts feeding fest!

The last half of the book I read within 24 hours as I just could not put it down! There is tons of action throughout most of the book, but the last half of the book was a bloodfest!

It is a good thing I had my gore suit on as I needed it for this book! Giving this book five "Shark Infested" stars!

For more thoughts on this review, please see my blog:
https://booknookretreat.blogspot.com/2021/07/they-rise-by-hunter-shea.html

There is nothing more interesting to read than a book that brings the famous Loch Ness monster to life!

Natalie and Austin McQueen (the twins) were young when they saw their parents eaten by the Loch Ness Monster. Now that they are older and have the financial means to do what they want, they decide to go on a hunting trip back to the area where their parents died.

They find more than they bargained for as during their hunt, they not only find one, but a few monsters. Austin decides to enlist his friend, Henrick, to help with the hunt as Henrick's family also perished from the monsters.

There is action and nail-biting suspense from the beginning to the end with a mix of gore added in giving this book one heck of a page turner!

Four stars for this one.

Wow! What a fun action packed gory ride!

When you were a kid any kind of pets would make you happy, right? Maybe even "sea serpents" for pets?

A little backstory:

David and Patrick saw an advertisement on the back of a comic book where they could order sea serpents along with a tank and have them as pets. So they ordered it and waited for the package to arrive. They did not tell their parents as they knew their parents would not approve, so they kept it a secret.

When the package arrives the boys were disappointed as it wasn't what they thought and when they opened it they realized it was too much trouble as they had to not only water the sea serpents to make them grow they were also going to have to feed them. The boys found out that it was a waste of money, so they decided to throw the whole thing down in the sewer outside on the street to get rid of it.

What they didn't know was throwing it in the sewer was the worst thing they could have done as since the sea serpents thrived in water it became the perfect breeding ground for them. When the sea serpents became hungry they wanted more than what was running around in the sewer system and they decided to venture out of the sewer in search of better food: Humans. The town topside is full of them and that becomes their buffet.

This book was a wild ride of horror, blood, and gore!

No one is safe from these creatures as they run rampant through the town! Even though this was a short story it packs a bloody punch and as with any Hunter Shea book, you are going to be captivated by the action within as the author lets the creatures in his mind run free and lets them cause destruction within the story! I read this book within a day and I couldn't hardly put it down! Five stars for entertaining action and bloody fun!

WOW!!! This was a great book and it is loaded with so much action, I thought I was in the middle of a movie!

Small town of Polo Springs, Florida, have endured all kinds of things together. When an oil rig out in the Gulf of Mexico is shut down from some earth eco activists, the town of Polo Springs becomes a sight seeing place for little green lizards. Not just a few lizards, but a plague of lizards that start spewing up from the earth itself.

The citizens of the town try to get the lizards under control, but when Hurricane Ramona comes barreling through, tiny green lizards is the least of their worries. Giant lizards start showing up and all hell breaks loose.

The focus of the book is also centered around certain families that try to make it through the craziness of the lizard invasion. It is very easy to get attached to all the characters in this book as they try to control the situation.

I was pleasantly surprised by all the action throughout the whole book and I could not put the book down to the point of reading it within a 24 hour period!

This book introduced me to the work of author, Hunter Shea and everything that I have read by him since has been great! Five "action packed" stars for this one!