FICTION

The Hatching

by Ezekiel Boone
Emily Bestler: Atria. Jul. 2016. 320p. ISBN 9781501125041. $26; ebk. ISBN 9781501125065. HORROR
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A nuclear weapon explodes in China. A possible earthquake is detected in India. A guided tour of a national park goes horribly wrong. A billionaire tech genius is killed in a plane crash. Are these seemingly unrelated events connected in some way? An entomologist in Washington, DC, receives an unusual package from an archaeological dig in Peru; it is a calcified egg sac that's thousands of years old; it is also moving. At the same time, an FBI agent investigating the Minneapolis plane crash discovers an unusual type of spider, predatory and carnivorous. Boone carefully builds up the suspense as his plot moves swiftly along to a nail-biting climax in this apocalyptic tale, but the tension and the novel's momentum are occasionally broken by the characters' ill-placed, improbable, and distracting musings.
VERDICT Readers of John Saul (The Homing) or Arthur Herzog (The Swarm) will be intrigued by this debut effort, as will fans of general horror fiction. For arachnophobes, it is the stuff of nightmares.
Reviewed by Elizabeth Masterson, Mecklenburg Cty. Jail Lib., Charlotte, NC , Mar 01, 2016
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