'Castaways' – Brian Keene (Deadite Press)

Page Count: 220 Pages.

Content Warning: This review will make mention of rape scenes that take place in the book.

I know, it's not Monday and Brian Keene's books are always featured on a Monday... Monday was a complete write off (although I did get a lot of work done), Tuesday saw me wondering whether to quit blogging entirely and the largest chunk of yesterday was spent in bed, trying to get over the latest illness that my kids brought home from school. The sooner this week is done the better ;o)

We're here today though, better late than never and all that. I realised that I wasn't quite ready to start another series (so the 'Bastard' books have to wait a little while longer) so opted to make 'Castaways' my next read, a stand-alone book that I hadn't read for a long time, years in fact. Let me tell you about it...

They came to the deserted island to compete on a popular reality television show. Each one hoped to be the last to leave. Now they're just hoping to stay alive, because the island isn't deserted after all. Contestants are disappearing, but they aren't being eliminated by the game. They're being taken by the monstrous, half-human creatures that live deep in the jungle. The men will be slaughtered. The women will be kept alive as captives. Night is falling, the creatures are coming, and rescue is so far away... 

'Castaways' is one of those books that I can polish off in an afternoon but it lives in my head for a lot longer than that, popping out at any moment to remind me what an unrelentingly dark and vicious read it is. And the largest part of that is down to the instances of rape so, lets talk about that first. If this isn't for you, skip the next paragraph.

I can see why Keene (reluctantly) felt that these moments had to go into the book; they're an unfortunate result of certain demands of the plot. The tribe need to breed but there is no way that the women are going to sign up for that willingly so they are taken by force. And it's horrible, it really is. Keene doesn't pull any punches and maybe that's the way it should be? If you're going to have that in your book then it should never make for easy reading. I certainly didn't find it an easy read and fair play to Keene for approaching it with his usual honesty and bluntness.

Moving on to the book as a whole, it struck me as really ironic that a reality TV show designed to pit people against each other was more than likely the direct cause of most of the deaths here. Romero taught the likes of you and I that if you can't work together as a team, you're going to get picked off and eaten. The 'Castaways' show encourages contestants to go for the prize, while stamping on everyone else and by the time the real danger is known a lot of the players don't stand a chance. It's no surprise that the survivors are the people who went for safety in numbers and well, just being decent people really.

'Castaways' does fall victim to what I'm calling 'Red Shirt Syndrome', where the deaths of lesser characters are signposted perhaps a little too clearly, but Keene does show us how good he is at drawing out the tension and then underlining a character's end with their own innards... It's still very much worth the read ;o) And it's not just those moments either... There's one moment where two contestants realise that, while they were fishing, something came out of the jungle, checked them out and then disappeared back into the undergrowth... That's just chilling anyway but it's also that moment where you fully realise that the contestants have no idea what's coming their way and even if they did, it's far too late...

I've avoided the Richard Laymon comparisons because I'll be honest, I haven't read the books that 'Castaways' is a homage to. It says something about 'Castaways' though that the first thing I did after putting the book down was to order a copy of 'The Cellar' so I can go straight to the source ;o) Seeing how much fun 'Castaways' was, I think I'm in for a treat.

In the meantime, do give 'Castaways' a shot if you haven't already., it is very much worth your time.