Author of adventure/thriller and horror fiction

ASSAULT ON SUNRISE By Michael Shea

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ASSAULT ON SUNRISE is a dystopian novel about an impoverished America that finds entertainment in watching movies in which people, called “extras,” are literally killed by animatronic monsters on live sets. The desperate extras get a big payout if they survive. It’s a great idea.

The novel is set in Sunrise, a California town populated by hardened survivors of various films. When several police officers are shot while pressing a trumped-up charge instigated by a Hollywood director, the entire town is sentenced to death. Their only hope of survival in the new town they built and love is to survive another monster film.

The story takes us through the cat and mouse game between the director and the townspeople, and ultimately the three-day battle between these people and the monsters. Being united, veteran extras and having the contacts to get heavy weaponry, they’re ready. But are they strong enough to withstand the onslaught?

The great idea and promise of action reeled me in, and while the novel delivers, I just couldn’t connect with the characters enough to care what happened to them. While reading it, I did some homework and found out the novel is a sequel, and maybe all the character development happened in the first novel, THE EXTRA. The dust jacket for ASSAULT made no reference that it’s a sequel, so I assume it was intended to be able to be read as a standalone, so I have no choice but to judge it that way as a reader.

Unfortunately, the townspeople are all basically the same. Small town, earnest, loving, shy but formidable. There are many of them, and I found it hard to keep track of who was who. Making things worse is that some passages are written in first person, and I lost track of who that first person was. (I’m now guessing this might be the first-person narrator of THE EXTRA, which I haven’t read.)

In all, ASSAULT ON SUNRISE was fun, particularly once the action got rolling, but I can’t say I’d recommend it. Michael Shea knows how to write, but like the Hollywood the book satirizes, I found ASSAULT entertaining without being moving or affecting. But again, that could be because I’d read a sequel, so check out THE EXTRA for yourself if you like the basic concept, and then be sure to read ASSAULT if you enjoyed it.
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PHOENIX ISLAND By John Dixon

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I had the pleasure to meet John Dixon at the World Horror Convention in New Orleans in 2013. I’d already connected with him on Facebook, exchanging tips and views, and when I met him, I wasn’t surprised to find out we’d become instant friends. Dixon is a cool dude.

I’d read one of his books written for Permuted Press under a pseudonym and enjoyed it, but not his big debut, PHOENIX ISLAND, the novel on which the CBS show INTELLIGENCE was based. I finally did read it, and I’m glad I did.

Carl Freeman is an orphan who’s gotten bounced around to various foster homes because he’s violent. He has a pathological hatred of bullies, and when he sees bullying, he can’t stop himself from getting involved. Very strong and highly skilled at boxing, he dishes out harsh punishments that always land him in trouble and a new foster home. Then he goes one fight too far, landing him in so much trouble he may be sent to juvenile penitentiary. The judge offers him a choice. Jail or Phoenix Island, a boot camp-style rehabilitation camp for troubled youths. Stay there until he’s 18, stay out of trouble, and he’s out with a clean record.

But Phoenix Island isn’t what it’s supposed to be. Carl and the other kids are systematically brutalized by sadistic drill sergeants. Soon, they realize they’re not only outside the United States but also any laws protecting them. There’s a purpose to it all, in which Carl will find his destiny. Phoenix Island, it turns out, is ground zero for the future of combat intelligence.

PHOENIX ISLAND may feature a teen as its main character, and you might find it in the YA section at many bookstores, but it’s a brutal, hard-hitting book with huge appeal for adults as well as teens. F. Paul Wilson, creator of the REPAIRMAN JACK series, called it “LORD OF THE FLIES meets WOLVERINE and COOL HAND LUKE.” Like the novel’s protagonist, Dixon was a Golden Gloves boxer, and it shows in his writing. (He also plays chess like a boxer.) Jab, jab, jab–always keeping the initiative–and then POW. The pacing and crisp style of the book moves things forward, and the protagonist, while flawed, is almost immediately likeable so that you care what happens to him. Dixon keeps things simple, keeps them moving, puts his protagonist in almost impossible situations, and makes you care.

Recommended. The sequel, DEVIL’S POCKET, is coming August 2015.
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HORNBLOWER Series By C.S. Forester

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Every once in a while, a lucky reader encounters a series of books they just can’t read fast enough. These books aren’t read so much as inhaled.

That was the experience I had enjoying the HORNBLOWER series by C.S. Forester. Wow, what a ride. I plowed through the entire series of 11 books in no time.

I was drawn to the books after watching the great miniseries starring Ioan Gruffudd, which were based on three of the novels. The miniseries took a great deal of license with the books, making them quite melodramatic. When I picked up the first book, I expected some Victorian moralizing about how men who adhere to hard work, honor and duty can’t lose, while everybody else is lazy and villainous. Boy, was I surprised.

The books are taut nautical thrillers–very realistic and entirely gripping. The series follows the career of Horatio Hornblower, a man who is so self-effacing and doubting that he continually strives toward perfection, knowing England and its vaunted Navy, in a death grapple with France during the Republican and subsequent Napoleonic Wars, will not abide failure. He starts his career as a midshipman and ends as Admiral of the Fleet. Each book follows him at a different stage of his career, from midshipman to lieutenant to captain to commodore to a lord to admiral. He is at virtually every major event of the wars, minus its big battles such as Trafalgar, as Forester preferred to put Hornblower into situations where he could act on his own.

Hornblower’s successes are the result of continually paying attention, experience, innovative thinking and just plain luck, but as his second wife puts it, a fortunate man makes his own luck by optimizing his chances. He isn’t a superhero. In fact, he continually doubts himself and, being a melancholy sort and a bit of a pessimist, isolates himself from the company of others. His only real friend, Bush, with whom he serves through most of the series, is kept at arm’s length while they’re on duty.

The nautical aspects of the series are thoroughly enjoyable. I appreciate being treated as an adult by a novel, without every single thing explained to me. The books are packed with nautical terms and maneuvering to the extent they at times read like procedurals for wood sailing ships of the time. In my view, this only makes the storytelling that much richer. When the action occurs, it is completely realistic and therefore twice as gripping. The naval battles are edge-of-the-seat reading.

Published between 1938 and 1962, the series did very well–so well, there was a story circulating during Forester’s day that whenever his publishing company was showing poor profits, they sent a representative down to beg him for another HORNBLOWER tale.

Goodreads.com lists the entire series in chronological order here, which can be helpful to find out what’s next in line.

I’ve recommended HORNBLOWER to several friends, who all told me they already read it, so maybe (probably) I was the last to know. But if you haven’t read them yet, and you enjoy historical thrillers, definitely check them out. You’ll be glad you did.
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THE DESCENT By Jeff Long

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the descent by jeff longTHE DESCENT by Jeff Long is one of my favorite horror novels. Part horror, part grand adventure, and thoroughly imaginative and penetrating, it’s an amazing read.

First, this book should not be confused with the film of the same title, though the film borrows some of the same elements. I enjoyed the film for what it was, but the book is amazing. If you like horror–hell, if you like books at all and can stomach something tense and frightening–you should read it.

The novel begins with separate stories that suggest there is a predatory race of creatures among us that come out when it’s dark. It’s discovered they live in the ground under our feet. Exploration leads to discovery–the crust of the planet is laced with a vast labyrinth. After the creatures that live there seemingly vanish over the years, nations and corporations spill into the interior to exploit its rich resources. One corporation recruits a scientific expedition to march across a vast tunnel under the Pacific Ocean and claim it for itself. The scientists are being used but go anyway to reveal the underworld’s scientific secrets.

Then things go wrong.

THE DESCENT is a work of soaring imagination bordering on genius. The underworld Long creates is breathtaking in its scope, detail and dangers. The creatures that live there, possibly descendants of an underground civilization who regard humans as slaves and meat, are truly terrifying. The characters are interesting and we come to deeply care about them. The story combines the best of horror, survival fiction and a science fiction thriller in the vein of Jules Verne and H.G. Wells.

Highly recommended.
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THE BIRD BOX By Josh Malerman

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THE BIRD BOX by Josh MalermanTHE BIRD BOX by Josh Malerman tells the story of a mother who must get her two children to sanctuary down a river while blindfolded. Because there are creatures out there, and to see them is to become violently insane … Concurrently, the book tells the story of what happened in the house where she hid with other survivors.

This was an interesting read. Malerman, whom I had the pleasure of meeting at the World Horror Convention, writes with sparse, simple prose that had me turning pages. This apocalyptic story is compelling because you want to learn more about the creatures and, of course, what happens during the journey and to the survivors at the house.

Based on the Amazon reviews, readers are responding to the book in a big way, though they may find some oddities in the plot. For example, a string of murder-suicides leads to a rumor they saw something, but how could anybody know that? Suddenly, strangely, people everywhere are boarding up their houses and walking around with their eyes closed. There’s a hint at what people are actually seeing–and it’s cool and Lovecraftian–but again, how could anybody know that? You just have to go with it. The woman’s children, whom she strangely calls Boy and Girl, don’t seem to have personalities. The ending wraps things up but not quite with a bang.

Despite these reactions from this reader, I greatly enjoyed the story and read it in just a few nights. The story grabs you and is compelling, it’s original, and the prose tight. It’s an impressive debut novel from Malerman, and I’ll be reading his stuff in the future.
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SATI By Christopher Pike

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SATI by Christopher PikeIn SATI, a trucker picks up a beautiful young hitchhiker. She says her name is Sati. She claims to be God.

She soon gathers a steady following that starts with the trucker’s friends and slowly builds to a large congregation. She counsels them to let go of their baggage and embrace life, which was her gift to them. The God she portrays is all powerful but also loving of play. Her preaching invigorates her followers to find inner peace and live their lives in a new, more meaningful way.

It’s a great concept, and Christopher Pike writes beautifully with a great rhythm built upon simple, forceful sentences. The plot unfolds pretty much as you’d expect, but the writing and the spiritual content keeps you interested. I was attracted to the book hoping it would be as challenging to me as Richard Bach’s ILLUSIONS was when I read it back in high school.

Unfortunately, nobody challenges Sati to answer the big questions many people would have of a Creator, me at least. Why did God make evil? If God wants us to be happy, why is the world so challenging? How is knowledge of God the key to happiness if God does not intercede on behalf of the good and therefore offers nothing? Why do people die, and when they die, where do they go? Is there an overarching moral code with penalties for noncompliance? Pike sticks to safe spiritual material and presents it as provocative even though it is designed to be as inoffensive as possible.

In short, I enjoyed the book for the writing if not the spirituality. You may feel differently; based on the Amazon reviews, a lot of people found it meaningful.