I surprisingly found this one in the thrift store, they typically have not a single horror novel amongst their books (when they have anything good it's usually mystery/thriller, sci-fi, or western). I was also fascinated by the fact that the story occurs in the San Bernardino mountains, which I am familiar with. So, I picked it up.
It became obvious about the first third through that the book is aping a Stephen King novel, particularly Salem’s Lot, the character and place names (of the fictional town) are dead giveaways (esp. Barlowe). Fortunately, it doesn’t go overboard with overwriting minor characters however it also doesn’t have a decently fleshed-out character save for the self-professed mountain-man. Everybody else is pale, thin archetypes and story functionaries. But, this being 1980s pulp horror, I was expecting that, and the aping of King, of whose work outside his biography and book about writing I am not a fan of (I do follow him on social media though, seems a decent fellow), was not wholly unexpected. I felt this was another weakness, however.
I was disappointed in the choice of monster, parasitic crystals that burrow under your skin into your brain and drive you mad. The gore was plentiful, and I did enjoy that expected dimension of this sort of story. But even in that, there are a couple of unnecessary shock moments, a sexually assaulted little girl’s corpse, a pre-crystal insanity instance of necrophilia, and a crystal-infected boy scout wearing the scalps and severed genitalia of men and women on his belt. That last one did make me laugh tho’ and might be a high point in the shock value. So, the story was uneven in that respect. However, I did like it when an infected central character transformed into a crystal monster and went stomping around slaughtering people and stalking them in the dark. There just was not enough of that sort of thing. Another wasted idea was that of the underworld, a couple of characters, a fat old man and of course, a kid, fall into the black well and discover a strange world of alien creatures lit by the crystals and cave phosphorescence. But it is just scene dressing, that’s it. It is never expanded upon and never plays any kind of role in the story.
Overall, I’m not mad I read it, it is 1980s pulp horror after all, I knew what I was getting into, but I can only really recommend this one if you’re hard-up for some 80s small-town horror Stephen King-style. Otherwise, you can probably skip this one. ( )