Book Review: "Prime" by Nate Kenyon

Genre:  Science Fiction / Cyberpunk

Rating:  5 WaterTowers

My first Nook e-book.

Since this was a novela by Nate Kenyon (who by the way spurred my interest in horror (with a little help from Bram Stoker) with “The Bone Factory”….see the review under Nate to the right), I will keep this review short..a reviewlet.  :-)

“Prime” is awesome…just plain awesome.  See ya….ha, just kidding, I have to say a bit more.

Will Bellows is a bug hunter.  The best.  In a world where people spend much of their lives in a virtual world, humans are cloned, and corporations control what you think via your alpha brain waves, Bellows is special.

With corneal implants, Bellows can blink into cyberspace, and blink out again…a toggle switch to an alternate virtual life and back.  Cool.

Several people have died recently due to a bug in the software.  Bellows is hired to find that bug and destroy it, by any means possible.

Entering the code at the main server in New London Tower,  Bellows can hear the bits, watch the data streams, see the people using it, and feel the good code versus the bad.

He finds a formidable opponent in the bug, and barely escapes to the real world.

Unfortunately, he also finds trouble in the real world.  Arrrghhh….

To find out more about what happens, pick up the book (e-book version or real….hmmm, there is a parallel there).  If you like technology, science fiction, human nature, love, hate, greed, and hope based sometime in the future….you will love “Prime”.   I could not put it down….(my wife thinks it was the Nook…nope, it was another 4 letter word starting with an N…Nate).

Nate Kenyon is brilliant,  a master,  and is firmly entrenched high on my favorites list.  I thank him for my current love of  the horror genre (see my micro-horror stories under my name to the right) and now “cyberpunk” ?  Is that right?  Oh cool check out WikiPedia on Cyberpunk…

“The Bone Factory” by Nate Kenyon

Rating:  4 WaterTowers (Scary!)

Genre:  Horror

“The Bone Factory” is an ARC given to me (and signed) by Nate Kenyon.  It was delivered to stores in July.

“Joe Thibideau never had a chance to get up.  A shadow fell across his path, followed by a searing pain in his shoulder, moonlight flashing on a silver blade that rose up and plunged down again and again, speckling the pure white snow with his blood.”

With that auspicious start, and the fact that several people have disappeared from the tiny town of St. Boudin including the little girl Joe was looking for,  ”The Bone Factory” takes it’s readers on a horror thrill ride second to none…I’m sure the master, Bram Stoker, would approve.

David Pierce and his family (wife Helen and daughter Jessie) have fallen on hard times. Leaving his last job after a dispute, he figured it would be easy to pick up another. However, the economy and the vindictiveness of his last ex-boss leave him coming up short interview after interview.

He and his marriage are at the end of their rope when an interview with Michael Olmstead at Hydro Development comes up. Hydro Development is building a power plant in remote Canada, a few miles from the U.S.A. border, that uses water flow between different underground levels to produce power. With years of experience in this kind of work, David figures he has a good chance at this job and does well in the interview.

No sooner does David arrive at home in New York than a phone call comes in from Olmstead asking David when he can start.  In an instant, Helen, David and Jessie’s (and Jessies constant toy companion, Johnny Bear) lives turned from bad to good.

Everyone was happy and looking forward to moving north.  Except for one thing.

Jessica is an extremely bright little girl who suffers from increasingly frightful nightmares, and she has a gift that her mother calls PERCEPTIVE. Jessica can see the future.   On the trip up to their new home, Jessica is riding in the back seat when she enters a stupor where her body becomes cold, her lips blue, and she does not respond immediately to her parents frantic pleas.  Eventually, Jessica recovers from this stupor, but, fears the “blue man” who has been increasingly haunting Jessica’s dreams.

Arriving at the new house, everything seems fine.  The house is beautiful, and even though it is in a very remote location, the family tries their best to settle in.  Going to St. Boudin to buy some groceries, Helen learns that that house was recently abandoned because the previous owners little girl had disappeared.  Helen confronts David about this and he admits he knew.

Jessica, in the meantime, decided to take a walk outside of the house while David is working in the study where she sees the real “blue man”.

The town folk are acting strange, and the water around the plant has been tested and shown to be contaminated by a very strong hallucinogen….

From this point on “The Bone Factory” moves at lightning speed.  David goes into town for a meeting, only to realize that Helen and Jessica may be in dire danger.  In the worst winter storm in ten years, David rushes home to find….a broken window, blood, and an empty home.

“He’s coming for us, Mommy,” she said. “The bad man is here.”

I have only read horror from Bram Stoker (yeah…I need to read Stephen King) but, Nate Kenyon is everything I like about Bram Stoker and more.  The horror is not blatant, but, it creeps up on you like a slithering cockroach in a movie theather in Kauai (OK, yes that happened to me).   Suddenly, you feel several moving objects on your arm, but, by then is is too late……the horror is upon you.

If you pick up “The Bone Factory”, beware that sleep may be difficult, you may have nightmares, and if there is blood….