Dead Thing by Andrew Hawnt (2011)

“Painting The Town Red!”

 Cover art by Richard Woollatt

The story centers around the actions of an otherworldly entity, a demon which survives and grows by inhabiting human hosts. Our major protagonist is Kevin, a young man whose days are numbered by Cystic Fibrosis. After a short encounter with the fiend he finds himself assisting a team of paranormal investigators in a desperate race to save his estranged lover Julie from becoming the creature’s final host.

While the supernatural action is incredibly graphic and extreme the brief episodes of normality are amazingly true to life. Andrew Hawnt clearly has a good grasp of his characters in their everyday lives with their pet hates, daily routines and waking thoughts. These scenes of the mundane serve to make the scenes of the macabre surprisingly believable. The main characters are realistic, intelligent and sympathetic people whose world is torn apart by a foe that you genuinely want them to defeat. In true Tech-Noir fashion much of the action takes place in the seedy world of clubland, where violence and panic are easier to camouflage into a backdrop of leisurely excess.

All in all Dead Thing is a fairly short read but it’s impact is hard. At Kindle price it is certainly worth buying just to try something a little different. I look forward to reading (and hopefully reviewing) the sequel.

Buy it at Amazon

Follow the author:
http://andrewhawnt.blogspot.co.uk/