Book Reviews

Your creeping and crumbling old TombKeeper is always on the lookout for fresh and exciting fiction for beady-eyed TombRats to read, and tonight I have a pair of outstanding genre hybrids that will delight practically everyone! Enjoy!

DEMON REVOLVER AND OTHER TALES OF TERROR by Jason Gehlert

The year is 1895 and the outpost town of Dry Gulch, Arizona has been invaded by demon gunslingers. What to do? Why, you enlist the services of Sheriff Clay Obsidian, a broken-down drunk with a legendary past who just happens to be the owner of a demon revolver. With the help of a lowly newspaper writer who is chronicling the sheriff's life, it's time for a bloody showdown in the dusty streets of Dry Gulch in this white-knuckle tale of horror in the Old West, "Demon Revolver". In "The Woodsman, Part II", Mr. Gehlert follows up his popular Amazon Shorts story, "The Woodsman", with a stark tale of a sheriff and a Vietnam vet who join forces to destroy a child-mauling monster that hails from the 19th century. In "The Ghost Bride", ghastly horror imperils courtly romance when a pair of lovers finds themselves in a fight for their lives against a demon that threatens to destroy them both. Finally, Tammy Gehlert offers a heartfelt ode to her husband's QUIVER werewolf series with her own story titled "Quivering Dreams" featuring characters from Lupine Valley, where anything can happen and does, as Mrs. Gehlert ably demonstrates with surprising twist ending. DEMON REVOLVER AND OTHER TALES OF TERROR is a shuddersome collection of fast paced, innovative and entertaining tales of horror.

EUROPA: RISE OF THE CARNELIANS by Jason S. Gehlert

I'm a big fan of multi-genre novels, and Mr. Gehlert sweeps the genres I enjoy most with his horror/space opera/disaster thriller/action novel EUROPA: RISE OF THE CARNELIANS. And who wouldn't love a tale that opens with this line: For the past ten years, Nolan Drake was a constant bug in the government's ass. I liked Nolan Drake from the get-go. Drake is a volcano expert whose warnings that the Yellowstone super volcano is preparing to explode prompts the President of the United States to organize a make-or-break mission to the sixth moon of Jupiter, Europa, to shelter the future of humanity. Europa has an iron core, an oxygen-based atmosphere, and colonization is already in progress when Commander Thaddeus Kasper is selected to head the urgent mission to Europa that has been undertaken to save the human race when Yellowstone erupts. But there's something unexpected occurring on Jupiter's sixth moon; a dormant alien race is waking beneath the icy surface of Europa, and Commander Kasper is leading a fleet of ships owned by a shifty billionaire with a secret agenda that might compromise the entire mission. And the aliens beneath the ice--the Carnelians--aren't friendly. Behind Kasper's ship, the Abagail, Earth's days are numbered as Yellowstone's super volcano rumbles and roils. Looming before the Abagail is a last-ditch battle for the survival of mankind on Jupiter's moon, Europa. EUROPA: RISE OF THE CARNELIANS is a rousing kick-off to a trilogy featuring the swashbuckling space adventures of Commander Thaddeus Kasper and his memorable crew. Get in on the action and order the first novel in what promises to be another killer series by Jason Gehlert.