Friday 14 October 2016

URBAN FANTASY REVIEW: Deadlands 2: Thunder Moon Rising - Jeffrey Mariotte

Release Date: 13/10/16
Publisher: Tor/Forge

SYNOPSIS:

Fear is abroad in the Deadlands as a string of brutal killings and cattle mutilations trouble a frontier town in the Arizona Territory, nestled in the forbidding shadow of the rugged Thunder Mountains. A mule train is massacred, homes and ranches are attacked, and men and women are stalked and butchered by bestial killers who seem to be neither human nor animal. Meanwhile, a ruthless land baron tries to buy up all the surrounding territory and possibly bring about an apocalypse. Once an officer in the Union Army, Tucker Bringloe is now a worthless drunk begging for free drinks at the corner saloon. When he's roped into a posse searching for the nameless killers, Tuck must rediscover the man he once was if he's to halt the bloodshed and stop occult forces from unleashing Hell on Earth ...when the Thunder Moon rises.


REVIEW:

I loved the first book in the series and because I remember playing Deadland's when it originally came out (I'm showing my age here) I've always loved spending time in an Alternate History of the world especially when as a gamer or reader you get to spend time in the saddle emulating your childhood heroes. (All those John Wayne and Clint Eastwood movies I watched with my Dad as a kid.)

What Deadlands does well is bring the supernatural into play and whilst its set in the world of Deadlands, it feels free of commitement utilising just the world and history as background in order to tell its won tale.

The book is delightfully fast paced, action sequences about and when added to a principle archetypal hero to spend time around alongside solid dialogue all round gave me goosebumps as I made my way through the book. Back this up finally with a cracking kick-ass plot and I was a more than happy reader. I wished more books based on roleplay games followed this type of writing.


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