Caddis Initiative - Phase One: Infection [Novella Review]

Caddis Initiative - Phase One: Infection

Genre: Horror (tentacle/body horror/medical thriller)/Novella
Year Published: 2017
Published by Bloody Whisper Books
Length - 124 (digital) pages
Written by Cassie Carnage​

Tagline: "Don't drink the water!"

Rating: 5 Skulls

Plot Summary:
There’s something in the water. It’s making people sick. Everything is changing. Everyone is changing. The whole world is becoming something else. Something alien. 
Something terrifying. Something deadly.

The infection is spreading and altering everything it comes into contact with; people, animals, plants - nothing is safe from its invisible grasp.

Becca Espinoza’s entire life changes overnight. The whole world is becoming something beyond her wildest imagination and worse than her darkest nightmares. 

Tentacled slime spewing horrors from beneath the sea are heaving upon the shores of New Jersey. They’re spreading a deadly infection, a contagion that kills the strong and mutates the weak into mind numbing monstrosities. 

It starts with sores that are filled with black thread-like worms. Headaches, vomiting, and fever follow. Shortly after, your body is completely infested with parasites, and you die. Those who survive this infection find themselves swiftly turning into something more than human and utterly alien to the world as we know it. 

Will Becca survive long enough to find her girlfriend and get her to safety? Or is everyone living in their coastal town doomed?

In this brutal, gore filled, fast paced, mutant creature feature novella, a butch lesbian plumber faces off with monsters created by science run amok. Inspired by old school horror and medical thriller movies like The Thing and Outbreak.

Review:
The most amazing thing to me about this story is that Cassie Carnage was asked to write it! (Thank you, Kelsea, for asking Cassie to write you a story. You must be thrilled at this outcome. I know that I am!)

I will start off by saying that Cassie immediately connects you with her characters which, with this kind of "tension-filled" story, pays off in full, as you will be concerned for each character's welfare.

Another aspect worth mentioning are Cassie's creatures - they are truly the stuff of nightmares! (If I ever hear of a fish-to-human disease, I am staying far, far away!)

With all of that said, I am definitely looking forward to Phase Two: Invasion which can't come soon enough!

Before I go, I do want to point out the $5 price tag on this one, for those who may be hesitant. That price seemed a little steep to me, for a 100+ pages novella, but I will say that you do get your money's worth!

Jason

Hex-Rated

A contender for Best Book of the Year!

"Brown bags littered the gutters like the corpses of squashed rats. The air fluttered with the launching of a dozen different burger wrappers that danced in and out of traffic like kamikaze birds."

The above are just random sentences from the book. You can pretty much open the book to any random page, and find other sentences just as superbly written.

I am not really sure why this book is classified as Fantasy. (because of the magic?) I found it to be more in the vein of a crime/noir/pulp novel, so if you enjoy any of those, then you will definitely enjoy this book!

This book is a page-turner in every sense of the word. It is difficult to put down and will keep you reading late into the night. I am so glad that this is the first in a series. The next book cannot come fast enough! Thank you, Jason Ridler​, for sharing James Brimstone with us!

Jason

Dark Designs: Tales of Mad Science [Book Review]

Genre - Horror/Anthology Collection
Year Published - 2017
Published by ShadowWork Publishing
Length - 330 (digital) pages
Written by Multiple Authors

Rating: 4 Skulls

Plot Summary:
Twilight Zone. The Outer Limits. Fringe.

Science without limits. Madness without end.

All proceeds from the purchase of this ebook will be donated to Doctors Without Borders.

This is a warning. What you are about to read violates the boundaries of imagination, in a world where science breeds and breathes without restraint. A world very much like our own.

Within these shadowy corridors you will discover characters seeking retribution, understanding, power, a second chance at life—human stories of undiscovered species, government secrets, the horrors of parenthood, adolescence and bullying, envisioned through a warped lens of megalomania, suffering, and blind hubris. Curious inventors dabble with portals to alternate worlds, overzealous scientists and precocious children toy with living beings, offer medical marvels, and pick away at the thin veil of reality.

You can run. You can look away. But don’t say we didn’t warn you.

Witness our Dark Designs.

Review:
As stated in the summary, this is a "Charity Anthology" - with all of the proceeds going to Doctors Without Borders. This is a good book with a great cause, so purchase your copy now (currently only $4).

This book is edited by both Thomas S Flowers​ and Duncan Ralston​, both of whom not only contribute their own stories, they also both offer their personal thoughts on the "mad science" genre.

This book was immediately a must-read for me, not only because of the genre, but also because it includes stories from Thomas S Flowers​, Chad Lutzke​, and Ken Preston​ (three authors who I totally enjoy!).

Rather than break down every individual story (of which there are 16 total), I am just going to tell you my favorites:

The stand-out story, for me, in this collection is, without a doubt, T. N. Kaylor​'s Death Ray Potato Bake. This story is worth the $4 alone! (I definitely plan on reading more of Kaylor's work!

Other superb stories were Jeffery X Martin​'s Underneath the Foam, Chad Lutzke​'s Discerning the Adversary (which is the shortest story in this collection), Ken Preston​'s Looking After the Parents, and Thomas S Flowers​' The Ascension of Henry Porter.

Other enjoyable stories were Daniel Marc Chant's How They Met Themselves, Chad Clark​'s Through the Slip, G. H. Finn's The Hidden War on Terror, and Duncan Ralston​'s The Burden.

The other stories are good as well - there isn't a bad one in the bunch - the above we're just my favorites.

Jason