Review: LIQUID FEAR, Scott Nicholson

• Kindle (Amazon)
• File Size: 526 KB
• Print Length: 281 pages
• Page Numbers Source ISBN: 1612182070
• Publisher: Thomas & Mercer (December 20, 2011)
• Sold by: Amazon Digital Services
• Language: English
• ASIN: B005VIA9JS
• Source: I bought it

Synopsis (Amazon)

When Roland Doyle wakes up in an unfamiliar motel room with a strange man’s wallet in his pocket and a woman’s dead body in the bathroom, he fears the worst…and that’s before he finds the vial of pills labeled "take one every 4 hrs or else." Or else what?

Ten years ago, Dr. Sebastian Briggs’s clinical drug trial for a cutting-edge fear-response drug went horribly wrong — or did it? It’s true that one trial participant died and five others were left with no memory of what happened to them. But now several interested parties, including a major pharmaceutical company and an ambitious U.S. senator, are willing to back Briggs’s continued research. All he has to do is recall his five surviving "volunteers," whose addiction to a mysterious drug has left them largely at his disposal. They will do anything necessary to keep the pills coming and to stave off the creeping phobias, intense sexual impulses, and all-consuming madness that lurk on the edges of their minds. It’s easy enough for the good doctor to lure the survivors back to the remote Monkey House, where the original trials took place. But when the pills finally run out…that’s when the real show begins.

My take

This edge-of-the-seat thriller keeps the reader guessing as the author plays with the idea of drugs that can predispose a person to violence when adrenalin is released into the blood stream. And worse than that, the drug can lay dormant for years. The antidote makes the "user" forget what they've done, but once you start taking them, you need to keep them up to keep the demons at bay.

Is this the future path for chemical warfare? Soldiers pop pills to make them violent? The scenario is horrifying and what if it was a gas not a pill?

The author does a good job of imagining possibilities.

My rating: 3.8

I've also reviewed: DISINTEGRATION

Haunted Computer Books: A Mystery to Me

My guest blogger today is Scott Nicholson whose e-book DISINTEGRATION I reviewed a couple of days ago. Scott has been on a non-stop blog tour since the beginning of September.

It is always interesting to find out what makes an author "tick", where the ideas for their books come from.
Please feel free to leave a comment for Scott, or pose a question for him, or to visit his site at http://www.hauntedcomputer.com/blogtour.htm
At the foot of this post you will find instructions about how to try to win a free Kindle as part of the tour.

Scott writes
I cut my teeth on Nancy Drew.
I thought she was pretty cool, with her sweaters and her Ned and her fearless attitude. I also liked the Hardee Boys, and Scooby Doo, and though I somehow bypassed Encyclopedia Brown, I probably would have liked him, too.

My teen self read a lot of the Alfred Hitchcock Presents anthologies, which used to mix horror, psychological thriller, and crime stories in a rich blend, something the namesake magazine got away from in the 1980s and 1990s. They seemed a lot milder, along with Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, and I send both of those editors a stack of submissions in the 1990s. Though I never cracked those pages, I did get some stories published in Blue Murder and Crimewave and a few other projects just a notch below in respectability.

I have enjoyed humorous mysteries by the likes of Charlotte McLeod, Janet Evanovich, Lawrence Block, and Donald Westlake, and Agatha Christie was a little too classist for my taste, but I trend toward the edgier psychological suspense instead of the puzzle-building mystery writers. Patricia Highsmith is one of my favorites, and Ira Levin, and William Goldman, who regrettably seems to have traded in his novelist hat for screenwriting. His style in “Magic” and “Marathon Man” leaves me in awe while simultaneously compelling me to turn the pages. Levin’s most famous for “Rosemary’s Baby,” but “A Kiss Before Dying” is a taut personality study, as is his play “Deathtrap.”

These days I read mostly independent writers like Debbi Mack, Vicki Tyley, and Simon Wood, all talents who will become widely known in the next few years. But I’m also likely to come full circle again and head back for the funny stuff. One of the best crime novels I’ve read recently was Jonathan Lethem’s “Motherless Brooklyn,” and the Dexter series is a riot. And though my “serious” novels like Disintegration and The Skull Ring rely on psychological tension, I’m having a blast plotting Albert Shipway’s evolution from insurance negotiator to claims investigator, complete with black magic, in the Cursed!series.

And I would be surprised if I caught up on all those Nancy Drews I’ve missed over the years. I wonder if she ever married Ned. I always thought she was too good for him. Or maybe I was just jealous.

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Scott Nicholson is author of 12 novels, including the thrillers Disintegration, As I Die Lying, Speed Dating with the Dead, Drummer Boy, Forever Never Ends, The Skull Ring, Burial to Follow, and They Hunger. He’s also written the YA paranormal romance October Girls and, with J.R. Rain, the urban fantasy Cursed! His revised novels for the U.K. Kindle are Creative Spirit, Troubled, and Solom. He’s also written four comic series, six screenplays, and more than 60 short stories. His story collections include Ashes, Curtains, The First, Murdermouth: Zombie Bits, and Flowers.


To be eligible for the Kindle DX or Kindle 3, simply post a comment below with contact info. Feel free to debate and discuss the topic, but you will only be entered once per blog. I’m also giving away a Kindle 3 through the tour newsletter and a Pandora’s Box of free e-books to a follower of “hauntedcomputer” on Twitter. Thanks for playing. Complete details at http://www.hauntedcomputer.com/blogtour.htm

Review: DISINTEGRATION, Scott Nicholson

• Format: Kindle Edition
• File Size: 360 KB
• Simultaneous Device Usage: Unlimited
• Publisher: Haunted Computer Books (October 22, 2010)
• Sold by: Amazon Digital Services
• Language: English
• ASIN: B0048EL5M6
• Source: purchased from Amazon

Note this novel is available only as an e-book.

This is one of those novels where the Amazon blurb just tells you far too much of the story. Check it out if you want. For my part I'll just tell you about the beginning of the book from my point of view.

It opens with one of the most horrifying "hooks" that I have read this year.
Jacob Wells smelled smoke seventeen seconds before hell opened its door.
Jake and Renee are in their bedroom with the door locked and their 9 year old daughter Mattie is in her room down the passage behind a closed door. Jake manages to wake Renee and opens the door into the passage. He tells Renee to dial 911 and then to get out of the house herself. He will get Mattie. He struggles to crawl to Mattie's room beneath the smoke, and then realises that opening the door to her room will let the fire into it. The image of what happens when Jake opens the door is very graphic and memorable.

After the fire we learn that tragedy has already struck Jake and Renee. They lost a baby girl Christine to SIDS less than a year before.

The fire investigators believe the fire may have been deliberately lit. Joshua is back thinks Jake. Who is Joshua? the reader asks. Davidson, the female fire investigator, says they believe the fire was started downstairs by an intruder who entered through an open sliding glass door.

As we read on in this story, we realise that things are far from normal in the Wells family. Jake and his twin were warped in their upbringing by cruel manipulative parents. And that's not all. I think this story will shock most readers when you finally untangle its strands.

I think that Scott Nicholson has overdone the horror element just a bit. The imagery though is very strong. Towards the end the story resolves with one shock wave after another. For me it is a thriller rather than murder mystery although certainly murder (several actually) is done.

My rating 4.2

I wrote about Scott Nicholson's Kindle giveaway blog tour just a week ago, and he will be a guest on this blog in just 3 days.

Kindle Giveaway Blog Tour

In 10 day's time Scott Nicholson, who writes mainly paranormal fiction, but has recently published a couple of  thrillers, will be a guest on MiP.

Scott has been on a non-stop blog tour since the beginning of September. He is continuing his tour until the end of November and will be posting here on November 26.

You might like to catch the remaining tour stops, so check the schedule out here.
Scott is giving away 3 Kindles as part of his blog tour. 
A Kindle DX and Kindle 3 will be given away through the participating blogs, and a Kindle 3 will be given away through the tour newsletter. A Pandora's Box of free e-books will be given away to a follower of Nicholson's "hauntedcomputer" Twitter account.

Sign up for the newsletter at scottsinnercircle-subscribe@yahoogroups.com to get daily links to the participating blogs. Winners will be selected at the Watauga County (NC) Public Library in December. No purchase necessary, and the contest is international. Co-sponsored by Kindle Nation Daily and Dellaster Design.