Rating: ★★★★★
Genre: Horror/ Folklore
Format: eBook
Pages: 275
Read: 07/18/22
Amazon Synopsis:
Eight miles of mystery. One night of terror.
Residents trapped in a remote neighborhood confront the unimaginable in this horror novel from award-winning author Debra Castaneda.
The salt marsh at Devil’s Landing is home to a terrifying urban legend.
Adam Gray knows the old stories about the Slough Devil, the missing children, and the mutilated animals. But the naturalist and wilderness survival expert doesn’t believe in monsters. Not even when a tourist on his boat sees a strange creature in the tidal channel and captures it on video.
When Adam moves into a controversial housing development next to the marsh, shocking new evidence emerges, and it’s not long before he’s confronted with a series of horrifying and unexplained events.
It takes Christina, his feisty new neighbor, to get him to believe something lurks in the slough. Something disturbed by the new community.
When a massive storm maroons the residents, Adam and Christina find themselves trapped and tested in a fight for their lives.
Content warning: Sexual assault
Review:
“Well, let’s start off with the first sign that anything was amiss at Roy’s Slough. This dates to May 1906, when a ten-year-old boy went missing. Families from around Devil’s Landing searched for him, but his body was never found. His parents said he was prone to wandering, and he disappeared during high tides. It was assumed he’d been swept away by what today we call a sneaker wave.”
Tied to the marsh is an urban legend, a cryptid called the “Slough Devil”. For many long years this creature has haunted the marshes. Children have gone missing, animals have been mutilated and torn bodies have been found. Devil’s Marsh has a new community along the coastal waters of the slough and now that there are many people living along the marshes, it has upset the balance. No one has ever really believed in the monster but when unexplained occurrences begin happening and sightings have been seen, they can no longer deny that the creature is real. A storm surge has trapped the community with no outside communication and they must fight to survive against the elements but their biggest fight will be against the one thing they never believed was real.
What a great cryptid/creature feature/eco-horror.
With the descriptive imagery you can almost feel the effects of the slough. Chilling nights, deep fog, and the sound of the crashing waves. The sense of impending doom as the community is living a nightmare.
Many diverse characters and developed relationships created a sense of real community. Moments of silliness, togetherness, and those angst filled moments of distrust.
The creature is horrifying. Nothing like anything I could have ever imagined. A nasty, nasty and it does things that are downright shocking!
The ending of the story, I felt, was written very well and not at all what I expected. Not all stories are meant for happy endings. This one is not all sad as there is a sweet little surprise. Love and hope shining out of the darkness.
Dark, emotional, tense, and suspenseful.
I enjoyed it very much!
Goodreads Author Page:
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/
Amazon Author Page:
https://www.amazon.com/Debra-Castaneda/
Review Links:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/
https://www.bookbub.com/reviews/
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