Hell Reviews - Supernatural: The Unholy Cause

Synopsis: A Supernatural novel that reveals a previously unseen adventure for the Winchester brothers, from the hit ITV series!Twenty-seven years ago, Sam and Dean Winchester lost their mother to a mysterious and demonic supernatural force. In the years after, their father, John, taught them about the paranormal evil that lives in the dark corners and on the back roads of America…and he taught them how to kill it. Way back in April 1862, Confederate Captain Jubal Beauchamp leads a charge across a Georgia battleground… Fast forward to 2009 and a civil war re-enactment becomes all too real. When Sam and Dean head down south to investigate they find that history has got somewhat out of hand… ar battle re-enactment has gone very badly wrong...


The Unholy Cause was actually a pretty good book, Joe Schreiber made a good addition to the series of novels.
The case is somewhat memorable, not the most memorable of the collection but it's definitely up there with some of the better written books.

As someone who doesn't know much about re-enactments this book really did help give insight into how they work and what takes place, Joe went into great detail to set the scene and it helped a re-enactment newbie like me to picture everything without any prior knowledge.
The great thing is that there's plenty of detail but it never gets to the point of being boing or tedious, nor does it seem to take away from the case or side track to the point where you forget what you're initially reading.

Joe takes the well known characters and does a fantastic job in keeping them as themselves, an issue, as mentioned before, that many people seem to have trouble doing.
Even the professional show writers themselves.
Like the few before him Joe managed to capture the famous banter of the Winchesters and made you feel like you were just along on the ride with them, only this time you're accompanied by resident angel Castiel.
This was before the days where his character got a little tiresome and unneeded, in my opinion, but in the book he is a wonderful addition who helps push the story forward and doesn't over stay his welcome in the novel or become a completely pointlessly added background character.
I'm just counting my blessings that Ruby is only ever mentioned and never actually shows up.

All in all, it's a fun little case to read and it's great to once again see Sam and Dean in their element, it's not the greatest book in the lot but it is up there with one that I would re-read and not skip over if I chose to go through them all again.

Hell Reviews - Supernatural: Bone Key

This is a Supernatural novel that reveals a previously unseen adventure for the Winchester brothers, from the hit "CW" series!Monster hunters Sam and Dean Winchester head to Key West when an old acquaintance of their father calls to say that the coastal town's many ghosts seem to have gone into overdrive. Soon after the brothers meet the ghost of Ernest Hemingway, they discover that a demon couple who escaped from the Devil's Gate are supercharging the local spooks for their own purposes. But things go from bad to worse when the powerful spirits of a long-extinct Native American tribe decides to take its revenge on the "settlers". Join Sam and Dean on an unusual ghost hunt, in this original Supernatural novel.

 

I feel unfair reviewing this one as I honestly can’t remember a bit of it.

It’s the final book in this particular set, as the next moves on to the new cover format, but beyond that I don’t remember much of it to comment on.
Once again the author is Keith R.A. Decandido and I do remember him doing another wonderful job of keeping the book in it’s original Supernatural formula, with Sam and Dean acting in accordance to the shows painted personalities.
However beyond that, I find it hard to remember anything past the fact that I found it readable and didn’t get bored.
It’s worth a read, but not the strongest in the first trilogy, it was rather forgettable to me.
Sorry this one is so short, there's just nothing to say.

Hell Reviews - Supernatural: Witch's Canyon

Synopsis: This is a Supernatural novel that reveals a previously unseen adventure for the Winchester brothers, from the hit "CW" series!Twenty-two years ago, Sam and Dean Winchester lost their mother to a demonic supernatural force, and they have grown up learning how to hunt and kill the paranormal evil that lives in the dark corners and on the back roads of America...Now they are on a road trip around the Grand Canyon - to a stretch of deserted ranchland where mysterious murder sprees occur every forty years. But a new mega-mall is about to open and the brothers must face a horde of vindictive ghosts and animal spirits.Join Sam and Dean on an all-new monster hunt, in this original Supernatural novel.


The second book in the series, while not as memorable as Nevermore, was still a lot of fun to read.
This time the story is told by Jeff Mariotte and he does just as good a job at keeping the brothers in character as Keith does.
I seriously believe these guys should be writers on the show, they’d keep them more in character than some of the show writers themselves at the moment.

The story was one that kept me wanting to read, an issue I’ve had with a few of the later books is that they seemed to drag on and had some moments that were completely nonsensical, as you will discover when I review One Year Gone.

If you’re looking for examples of plot convenience then that book seems to be the one to go to, but I’ll get to that one in a few weeks.

The first three books however flew by and I found myself fairly disappointed when they ended, a feeling I’ve only had with a few of these later ones.
I’m not sure why they count the first three as a separate series, maybe it’s supposed to be pre-angels and then post-angels, I’ve never really looked it up but that’s my assumption.

Due to my lack of memory and re-reads, it seems unfair of me to try and make a comment on the content that I simply can’t remember, that’s not to say it isn’t a good book as it is, and I do vaguely remember Sam getting some good action moments but it was ultimately forgettable.
Usually I’d chalk this down to it being almost ten years since I’ve read it, but I have books I remember reading long before this one where I can remember specific details.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that it’s a fun ride whilst it lasts, but it’s not the best ride in the theme park, which is a shame as I know Jeff did a wonderful job with it and I never had moments where I was laughing because something was so out of character or shifted drastically away from the canon TV series.

From what I can recall there’s a nice, cohesive story behind what’s going on and everything is a nice build up to the final act of Sam and Dean saving the day. It’s just bit of a slow burner, but once it gets going boy does it get going.

I do wish they made a better cover for it, I personally cringe seeing this one. Now Jared and Jensen are handsome men, there’s no doubt about that, but this isn’t the most flattering photo shoot they could have used for the cover.

It’s my least favourite from this specific series, the original three.

In the end, it’s a good book and it’s worth a read if you’re a fan, just don’t expect to get too much from it.

Though it is adorable to see Dean get oddly excited over the Grand Canyon.

Belated Movie Monday Review - Hell Reviews Fingerprints.

Synopsis: In this terrifying supernatural thriller, a troubled teenager sets out on a grisly path to discover the disturbing truth behind a well-known urban legend. Haunted for fifty years by the horrifying tale of a train colliding with a school bus, killing all the children aboard, the small town left behind continues to suffer as a stomach-churning chain of murders claims victim after victim. Brought to life by a stand-out cast including Kristin Cavallari (Laguna Beach: The Real Orange County), Leah Pipes (Malcolm In The Middle), Josh Henderson (Desperate Housewives) and Lou Diamond Phillips (Courage Under Fire), Fingerprints will leave its mark on your nightmares!

 

The old legend of the children pushing the car across the tracks is one of my favourites out there, it’s so sad yet so endearing at the same time.

In retrospect it could have been such a good film idea in the hands of competent writers, but unfortunately we weren’t gifted with talented screen writers.

What a terrible film this was.

Not only was it a cliché mess of a film, but the story just had nothing to it that was worth watching.

The characters were bland and offered nothing, aside from the mother of the main character being a totally unlikeable bitch.

We have a main character who is interchangeable with any other person in the film and the impact would be the same, the actress is just barely watchable at times and is a complete non-entity.

It’s such a bad film that there’s just nothing to say about it except don’t watch it, it’s up there on my list of worst films along with Krampus: The Christmas Devil.

Avoid it.

Tek Tek by Hell.R.

She was beautiful, undeniably beautiful.

Her hair cascaded down her back as her eyes sparkled with a smile with unexplained joy as she looked at me, she was like a siren. Calling me in with her smile.

Something about her had me rooted to the spot, unable to move despite my will to continue home and rest for the night. It wasn’t like I had the urge to investigate this mysterious beauty further I just genuinely could move no further, like my legs were frozen solid.

A strange feeling began crawling through me, a feeling of unease. The hair on the back of my neck prickled and my blood ran cold as I saw her move, an unexplained feeling.
This woman had never done anything to me in the past in fact I had never met her before, so why did a single movement from her make me shudder?

I glanced around in hope of finding something else that would peak my interest, anything that could take my mind off the mystery woman and perhaps let me move again. Sadly there was nothing apart from buildings that were hidden behind rows of trees.

When I looked back towards the wall where the woman was leaning I was surprised to find that she was gone but that I still couldn’t move and the feeling of dread was still rushing over me. My hands were shaking and my stomach was full of butterflies.

A movement across the floor caught my attention, making me jump in shock. Considering its size I didn’t know how I had managed to over look the figure crawling across the floor, part of me wished I hadn’t noticed it just now.

My heart instantly faltered with a few beats and the lump got bigger causing my breath to catch in my chest, my shivering turned into full blown shakes as I surveyed the figure on the floor.

It was the woman, she was skeletally thin and her skin was deathly grey, her lips had turned blue whilst her once blonde hair had become more of a grey colour, matted with dirt and blood. There was no denying that she looked a lot healthier and…alive…when she was leaning against the wall a few feet away.

My eyes slowly scanned down her body which was led out on the concrete, nausea hit me in a second and I felt the colour drain from my face as I saw the trail of blood where her legs should be.

How was this woman still moving?

Her dead eyes looked up at me as she slowly reached out to me, her cold lips parting slowly and strange strangled noises left her throat.

My own throat went dry as I stared into her eyes and my body continued to betray my mind which was still crying out
for me to move, run away and not to look back.

It started screaming for me to move as I watched her reach down to where her legs should have been and pulled out a scythe that was covered in dried blood, where that had come from I couldn’t tell and it was the last thing I was capable of thinking about right now.

With the fear of death looming upon me my mind went blank; no life flashed before my eyes, no last wishes for friends and family….just fear.

She was going to make me like her, take my legs and let me bleed to death where I stood and it all started with a simple look her way.