Dog Days was originally released as one of the stories in JournalStone's double down series. Since that release, it has gone on to win the Bram Stoker Award® for Superior Achievement in a YA Novel. A well deserved accolade and a good enough reason to warrant a new release with a brilliant new cover. Plus, there's a bonus story, from Joe McKinney, called "Among Men."
Dog Days begins with a quote from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Hound of the Baskervilles. One of my favorite stories as a kid.
It's 1983 and the Gulf Coast is in the wake of Hurricane Alexis and a shrimp boat has wound up in an old Pecan tree at the end of the road. There are people aboard, dead people, eaten dead people.
Mark's dad, Wes, is a police officer with the Houston K-9 division, his dad's canine partner, Max, lives with the family which also includes his mom, who is a pediatrician.
The best way to describe this story and McKinney's writing style is that it's real. Real people in believable situations and from there the tension just builds.
I also enjoyed how the author made his ten-year old hero a reader. Great line, "But as I read about Tarzan's battles with Kerchak, a real battle, and one far more savage, was raging down the street. The real horror of that summer was just beginning."
Great story with some definite "Oh, Wow!" moments.
This special edition is available now as a hardcover, a paperback, and e-book through Amazon.com.
Highly recommended.
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