This is a fast-paced, supernatural horror adventure laced with film, TV, and literary references. Hannah and her friends are teenagers in a small-town that is abruptly attacked by monsters of every description–zombies, vampires, witches etc. Fortunately, they are assisted by the wizard Merlyn Morningstar and Hannah’s mother Sarah, both of whom have seen a thing or two in their day.

There are violent, bloody battles, punctuated by snappy, sometimes fourth wall-breaking wisecracks. There are sword fights, and wizards’ duels, and at least one extra-dimensional excursion.  I think the overall concept may be an homage to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but having never watched that, I can’t be sure.

One thing I particularly liked about the book was the depiction of Dr. Frankenstein and his monster. Especially the monster: Colonel Karl Hesse, a Prussian soldier in life, before falling into the mad doctor’s clutches. He’s portrayed as a towering, powerful and heavily-armed one-man army. I adore the description of him lumbering up a hill clad in his old cavalry uniform.

In fact, one of my complaints is that he’s not in the book enough. Although, this may be unfair, because I’m not sure I could get enough of him even if he were the protagonist.

The action is, as I said, very violent. Most of it has sort of a cheesy, comic-book or low-budget horror film vibe for most of it, although there is one scene, very close to the end, of true horror that is very disturbing. Indeed, as this book is the first of two, and ends on a real cliff-hanger, I am hopeful that the wrongs done in this scene may be righted in the subsequent volume.

Now, apart from the violence, which was rather more than I typically enjoy but your mileage may vary, there are a few little technical issues. There’s a bit of a formatting oddity on Kindle that makes paragraph breaks appear randomly. This was slightly confusing at first, as I thought a new section was starting when it wasn’t, but I quickly got used to it. There are also a few typos, although by no means a huge number for an indie book. As I always say, that’s the beauty of e-publishing–you can always go back and fix these things.

But don’t let these minor nitpicks dissuade you from reading it. If you’re a fan of supernatural horror, and the zombie genre especially, this is a book you will enjoy. And if you like the story of Dr. Frankenstein and his monster, you definitely shouldn’t miss it, as this tackles the classic story in a very clever way.