SEAN COSTELLO - SQUALL (2015)

Synopsis/blurb…

MAYHEM. MURDER. RETRIBUTION. (THIS BOOK is RATED-R FOR LANGUAGE by the publisher.)

Bush pilot and family man Tom Stokes is about to face the worst day of his life. On a clear winter morning, he sets out in his Cessna 180 to do some repairs on a remote hunt camp, leaving his five-year-old son and very pregnant wife snug in their beds.

On the return trip, a squall forces him into an emergency landing and he winds up—quite literally—in the lap of petty criminal Dale Knight. Dale, now a fugitive from the law—and worse, from a merciless drug lord who just happens to be his brother—draws Tom into a web of mayhem and treachery that puts not only his life at risk, but the lives of his wife, son . . . and unborn child.

SQUALL is a fast-paced, darkly-comic tale of murder and gang-style retribution that grabs the reader on page one and simply does not let go.

PRAISE FOR COSTELLO’S PREVIOUS NOVELS:

HERE AFTER

“Costello…keeps the action moving and the suspense ratcheted up tight.”

—Margaret Cannon, The Globe and Mail

EDEN’S EYES

“The best horror novel I’ve read since Stephen King’s own Pet Sematary. …Costello knows how to tantalize his readers, priming them for the horrors to come…”

—Rave Reviews

“A fast-paced, darkly comic tale of murder and gang-style retribution” – my kind of book then.

Dale is an unwitting accomplice when his ambitious and crazy girlfriend, Ronnie spoils a drug deal by shooting dead the buyers and stealing both drugs and cash. The pair flee from Dale’s brother with a couple of psychopathic Indians; henchmen of his brother soon on their trail.  

Pilot and family man Tom is flying in the area. Anxious to check on his cabin, and get back home safely to his heavily pregnant wife and celebrate both his own and his young son’s birthday. A squall forces him into a crash landing and straight into the heart of Dale Knight’s nightmare.

I turned to this when I was struggling with a slow-ish read that I wasn’t warming to and after a fantastic opening when the rip-off went down, stuck with it – finishing the following day.

Great characters, great action, an interesting plot with more than a few twists and a resolution that was maybe a little bit too schmaltzy for my liking – just a wee stretch too far, but not enough to mar my enjoyment.

4.5 from 5

Squall was a Freebie I downloaded during February after a Riffle books e-mail alert. A lot of the recommendations I receive twice weekly, I typically resist but was happy to succumb to this one.

Sean Costello seems to have mastered the art of cross-genre writing with a fair few horror books to his name. New-to-me this month, I’ll be reading more from him in the future, especially as Last Call was offered as a freebie on his website as a sign-up incentive.

Costello is a Canadian author and you can check out his books at his website here.

An Amazon download.