Chance's Take on Books

Congratulations to Benjamin Ethridge for Bottled Abyss appearing on the final ballot for the 2012 Bram Stoker Awards.

Bottled Abyss is a novel in the horror genre, so one expects physical and psychological gore, but what I found most interesting and enjoyable was the River Styx folklore brought forward to a modern setting where the mythical cosmology is developed into a fascinating scenario far more frightening than brain spatter. The buildup was restrained in pace, but held my interest enough to keep pages turning when, with all plates on sticks sent spinning, action and wild imagination really kicked in and during the final quarter, a tantalizing discovery brought the entire story into tight focus, at which point I said, "Whew, that was pretty damn cool."