Ravenous-Ray Garton

Ravenous
Ray Garton
Dorchester, Apr 2008, $7.99
ISBN 9780843958201

Big Rock, California is a small quiet town where violent crime never occurs as everyone knows everyone else. However, that was before; now Sheriff Hurley struggles with a apprehending a serial rapist whose last victim works in his office. He feels overwhelmed but keeps searching for clues.

Fargo arrives in Big Rock claiming to be a werewolf hunter and that the town is infested with them, Hurley has enough on his plate with the rapist so he ignores the lunatic’s ramblings although he keeps an eye on him. However, Hurley reassesses his belief when reports of assaults by large animals begin and torn up mutilated bodies surface.

Ray Garton turns lycanthropy into a sexually transmitted disease; thus a vicious epidemic cycle occurs in which those victims who survive the sexual assault become unrepentant nasty RAVENOUS werewolves on the prowl needing to rape someone. With a nod to Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs the werewolves are motivated by Physiological Needs making them seem real and more terrifying. Hurley is terrific as the beleaguered small-town sheriff initially struggling to accept the evidence, but it is the widening werewolf epidemic that turns this into a fabulous horror thriller.

Harriet Klausner