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Book Review: The Eris Ridge Trail by Larry Hinkle

 

 

Cover art for The Eris Ridge Trail by Larry Hinkle

The Eris Ridge Trail, by Larry Hinkle

Four Winds Bar Publishing, 2025

ISBN: 9798992454215

Available: Paperback, Kindle edition

Buy: Bookshop.org | Amazon.com

 

The trail in The Eris Ridge Trail is not a friendly one for thru-hikers!  Instead of the serenity of nature, the four unfortunates who end up on the trail find themselves in a confusing alternate dimension with frequent landscape shifts.  The setting shifts frequently, with little explanation for the hazards encountered by the characters.  Does it work for this story?  Yes.  Readers who want entertainment and aren’t concerned with a story where all ends are tied up neatly will find this quite enjoyable.

 

The book wastes no time getting down to business, as Wayne, Shelley, Craig, and Erik each get a quick chapter that tosses them right into the other dimension.  This is also the only part of the book that feels like it could have used a bit more fleshing out, to lead into the main story.  Two of the characters simply give a quick recounting of their arrival to their companions later in the book, while the other two protagonists get a very quick narration chapter.  It would have been nice to make all the lead-in to the main plot part of the third person narrative, as it sounded very intriguing.  There’s a car ride with a very odd individual, and a tunnel crawl through the basement of the Stanley Hotel (yes, THAT Stanley Hotel) but little detail is given.  That might have helped build up some anticipation for the main story, which only Shelley’s opening chapter did.

 

That minor quibble aside, the story takes off at a run, as the four of them (and two lovable dogs) find that their new home almost is like an LSD-laced dream.  One minute they can be in a desert, take five steps and PRESTO!, they’re in a desert.  A bit further, and SHAZAM!, it’s a prairie.  It could be confusing, but the author writes well enough that the transitions don’t seem jarring or random:: they flow with the story and are believable.

 

Although this is an adventure story, the real core of the story is the character interactions.  Craig, Shelley, Erik, and Wayne are four strangers tossed into a reality that makes no sense, but they have to survive and maybe find a way out.  That requires teamwork and trust, which develops over the course of the story, and is done very well.  The author clearly has a flair for writing characters, and he does an excellent job having them overcome their foibles and gel together into a cohesive unit.  Their new reality throws all sorts of fun stuff at them: weird skittering sort-of humans, six-legged freak squirrels called Squixells, and DINOSAURS!  (can’t go wrong with those!)  It’s all well-imagined and written in a style that keeps the reader turning pages quickly.  Sure, there is little to no explanation given for why or how these things happen, but who cares?  Much like the classic novel Picnic at Hanging Rock, The Eris Ridge Trail works better leaving explanations to the reader’s imagination.  The ending is excellent.  It doesn’t resolve things, but does wrap the story up perfectly.

 

Bottom line: take a hike along the unique Eris Ridge Trail, it’s a brain-tweaking journey.  Recommended.

 

Reviewed by Murray Samuelson

 

 

Posted on June 6, 2025 by , 1 comment

Book Review: Blood Cypress (Selected Papers from the Consortium for the Study of Anomalous Phenomena #7) by Elizabeth Broadbent

Blood Cypress (Selected Papers from the Consortium of Anomalous Phenomena #7) by Elizabeth Broadbent

Blood Cypress Selected Papers from the Consortium for the Study of Anomalous Phenomena #7) by Elizabeth Broadbent.

Raw Dog Screaming Press, 2025

ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1947879881

Available: Paperback, Kindle edition

Buy:  Bookshop.org. |  Amazon.com

 

The swamp has always been a welcome setting for horror – and why wouldn’t it be? The sucking humidity, the stifling embrace of the flora, the mystery of what’s behind the next shadow as the sun is erased from its world… It’s home to many a southern gothic, and for good reason. Nobody knows what lies within, and those who have experienced it are often too frightened to speak of it.

 

In Lower Congeree, South Carolina, there’s a rule most people are wise enough to follow stay out of the swamp.

 

The Carson family is a reflection of the hard truths in many of our homes. The relationships are strained, although some semblance of love creeps through their the interactions. As a bisexual girl in a backwoods town that is a stronghold of repressed sensibilitiies, Lila struggles to survive in the backwoods town, and aches to break free.

 

Lila’s world twists like the tangled roots that grow in the swamp when her ten-year-old brother, Beau, vanishes. Nobody cares much about a neurodivergent boy who many believe is useless, especially a Carson. Lila is reminded quickly that ignorance in the town has more in common with the society of a hundred years ago than in the current day, from the sheriff to her delinquent mom to the townsfolk, and realizes that her journey will be a solo endeavor. She will have to break that cardinal rule if she is to find Beau alive.

 

Broadbent entered the horror fray with Ink Vine, a stunning entry into what hopefully will be a long career.  Her greatest strength is the ability to breathe life into the setting and listen to how it speaks to the characters and readers. She harnesses the dark magic of the swamp and lets it become a major character, one that is ambiguous, untrustworthy, and dangerous. Its embrace is sought by some but feared by most.

 

As a journalist, her words hit the mark. In the novella form, this works perfectly. Everything matters and she is able to succinctly capture the flavor of this rotted southern town with apparent ease.

 

At this length, Broadbent shines. It gives her just enough space to explore and resolve the multiple conflicts within the story: the inner family tension, the dynamics of small-town life, and the apathetic darkness of the swamp, and allows the misfit Carson family and their secrets to grow. It’s a claustrophobic but intriguing read.

 

Comparisons have been made to Flannery O’ Connor, but Elizabeth Broadbent has her own style. Think Darcy Coates by way of Crista Carmen and Michael McDowell.

 

Raw Dog Screaming Press always produces quality products that sidestep the typical trappings of genre. As the seventh installment in the Selected Papers from the Consortium for the Study of Anomalous Phenomena series, this is a highly recommended reading, and their decision to bring Broadbent into the stable works just right.

 

 

Reviewed by David Simms

 

Posted on May 19, 2025 by , Reply

Book Review: Ghost Girls and Rabbits by Cassondra Windwalker

Ghost Girls and Rabbits by Cassondra Windwalker

Polymath Press, 2025

ISBN: 9781961827097

Available: ebook, paperback

Buy: Bookshop.org | Amazon.com

 

 

Noni Begay, a young Athabascan woman, has just been elected as the United States senator for Alaska when she disappears. Her campaign manager, Mary Nelson, has a daughter, Ryska, who has been missing for 10 years, and thinks Noni’s disappearance, as a beautiful, popular politician from the powerful Athabascan tribe, can be used to bring renewed attention to Ryska’s case. She is certain Ryska is still alive, and as Noni’s campaign manager and friend she is able to keep media attention on them. But keeping Ryska’s story in the public eye means Noni can’t reappear until Ryska is found. Alaska’s a big state, though, and Mary has a cabin in the woods that is off the beaten track.

 

Mary tortures Noni, starting with burial alive, to prevent her from attempting escape, and dehumanizes her by thinking of her only as “the seal pup”.. Mary is compartmentalizing, still publicly playing the part of  Noni’s grieving friend and campaign manager and working as a political operative, but that can’t last forever, and slowly she crumbles inside, with only the “seal pup” and life in the cabin to comfort her. I’m not sure why Mary wasn’t questioned more after Noni’s disappearance or how she could have gone back and forth so frequently without notice. But maybe the lack of treatment for mental illness or support for grieving parents, and even the lack of notice of her trips back and forth, illustrate the invisibility of indigenous women.

 

Noni’s struggle to preserve her identity and sanity, and even plan for the future in the midst of isolation, uncertainty, terror, and Mary’s erratic behavior, plays with storytelling, imagination, language, and mythology. Windwalker’s poetic writing flows here.

 

Windwalker approached the issue of missing and murdered indigenous women and girls from an unexpected angle, with one indigenous woman kidnapping and tormenting another to draw attention, as typically the crimes against these women are committed by white men. :This is not an easy read– unreliable narrators force the reader to question what’s going on, and it does get very dark at times– but it has moments of magic as well.  Highly recommended.

 

 

Reviewed by Kirsten Kowalewski

 

Posted on May 5, 2025 by , Reply
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