{"id":7149,"date":"2019-12-03T22:20:09","date_gmt":"2019-12-04T02:20:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/?p=7149"},"modified":"2019-12-03T22:20:09","modified_gmt":"2019-12-04T02:20:09","slug":"book-review-scavenger-hunt-by-michaelbrent-collings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/book-review-scavenger-hunt-by-michaelbrent-collings\/","title":{"rendered":"Book Review: Scavenger Hunt by Michaelbrent Collings"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a>\"\"<\/p>\n

Scavenger Hunt <\/em>by Michaelbrent Collings<\/p>\n

Written Insomnia Press, 2019<\/p>\n

ISBN: 978-1-699207-49-9<\/p>\n

Available: Paperback, Kindle edition<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Five strangers wake up in a room, with no memory of how they got there.\u00a0 They find out they are part of a game controlled by a sinister mastermind, who wears a mask and communicates through electronic means.\u00a0 The mastermind expects them to do bad things.\u00a0 That’s the plot of Michaelbrent Collings’s newest thriller, and it’s a plot you’ve seen before, many times.\u00a0 Collings himself used it in his previous novel, Terminal, <\/em>and many authors, from King to Koontz, have also recycled it.\u00a0 Unlike certain purveyors of said plot (example: the SAW and CUBE film franchises) Collings actually knows how to make an old plot seem new and fresh, due to the speed of the writing and the unseen twists that pop up throughout the book.\u00a0 Scavenger Hunt <\/em>is a fast ride through a familiar plot, and is worth the time to read.<\/p>\n

Aside from the basic plot, there are elements that you can guess will show up.\u00a0 The obvious one is that all the strangers were chosen for a reason.\u00a0 Even though they don’t know each other, their lives were all connected at some point in the past.\u00a0 Collings wisely spaces interlude chapters throughout the book, one for each character.\u00a0 Each chapter fills in the backstory of one character, and it helps you see how the plot slowly ties together.\u00a0 Collings also has a variety of chapters detailing police online investigations throughout the book that don’t seem related to the plot, but are, although the reasons don’t become apparent until later.\u00a0 The whole story works this way: the reader gets a clue at a time to figure out the puzzle, but it’s a very difficult one to figure out, as Collings doesn\u2019t give away anything obvious.<\/p>\n

Therein lies the strength of this novel.\u00a0 Not everything is as it seems, and the perception of the characters changes throughout the book, turning the story into a maddeningly elliptical puzzle.<\/p>\n

The protagonists and antagonists flip roles throughout the book, and even what seems like a sick game might be perceived as salvation by the end.\u00a0 Collings does an excellent job confounding expectations with this commonly used plot. \u00a0\u00a0A nice touch was the creative way to keep the game players from simply running away, once they are free to go out on the streets.\u00a0 Each player has a collar and wristwatch fitted with explosives, giving the game’s mastermind the freedom to blow a limb-or head-off of any of the players whenever he sees fit.\u00a0 This is also one of the few stories of this type where some of the players are actually given a chance to leave the game, if they are fine with abandoning the other players to their fate.\u00a0 It’s the little things that make an old plotline seem new and exciting.<\/p>\n

Overall, this is a well-written, fast-paced story that should please fans of horror or thriller novels.\u00a0 It has elements of both, but doesn’t swing too strongly one way or the other.\u00a0 If you want excitement, don’t miss this one.\u00a0 Recommended.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Contains: violence, profanity<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Reviewed by Murray Samuelson<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Scavenger Hunt by Michaelbrent Collings Written Insomnia Press, 2019 ISBN: 978-1-699207-49-9 Available: Paperback, Kindle edition   Five strangers wake up in a room, with no memory of how they got there.\u00a0 They find out they are part of a game controlled by a sinister mastermind, who wears a mask and communicates through electronic means.\u00a0 The<\/p>\n

Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2474,4233,83,2243,4232,3502],"class_list":["post-7149","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-book-review","tag-games","tag-horror-fiction","tag-michaelbrent-collings","tag-scavenger-hunt","tag-thriller-fiction"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7149","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7149"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7149\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7151,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7149\/revisions\/7151"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7149"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}