Book Review: The Haunted Forest Tour

 As part of my Halloween themed readathon this October, I read James A. Moore and Jeff Strand's entertaining and madcap collaboration, The Haunted Forest Tour. Despite actually taking place on Halloween, this doesn't have much of a Halloween or autumnal feel to it, but that's a small complaint when a book is as fast paced and fun as this one.

A slightly bigger complaint would be the objectification of women; it seemed like every single male character has lascivious thoughts about one of the female characters at least once, often at inappropriate times, and every time, it took me out of the book. I have no objection to sex or sexy characters in my books, but in Haunted Forest's case, it came across as juvenile and distracting.

If that complaint makes it sound like I disliked the book, I apologize, because that's simply untrue. I read the 350+ pages in one sitting. I could not put it down. I loved the descriptions of the various monsters that populated the "Haunted Forest;" every creature is vividly described, and they vary from scary to gross to somewhat amusing. Plus, the book is damned funny. Our main characters are likable, and I find myself really rooting for all of them to make it out of the forest safely. Plus, gorehounds rejoice! This book is full of blood and guts and slime.

Honestly I'd love to see this one turned into a movie. I think these creatures would look awesome on the big screen, and the book already has a really cinematic feel to it that would translate well into an action/horror movie. The Haunted Forest Tour is great fun, and I highly recommend it, at least to less squeamish readers.