At one dream sequence point in this book, the titular monster holds a baseball and catchers mitt in its clawed hands and growls menacingly, "Anyone for baseball?"

Crota. You're hard to love and kinda easy to strongly dislike.

Up until a few hours before writing this review, I was planning on maybe being generous and giving this book three stars and calling it a day. That was before I discovered the Tribal Alliance Against Frauds and found that Owl Goingback very likely has absolutely zero Native American ancestry and is a fraud. This fact recontextualizes the entire book for me.

While I was reading it, I felt like such an asshole for the amount of eyerolling and cringing I was doing at all the stereotypical "Native" things. Peace pipes, sweat lodges, vision quests, great spirits, etc. Despite knowing that the book was written by a Native American author, something just felt so hokey and pulpy about the whole thing. To say that I felt vindicated upon learning that Goingback is a fraud would be a hell of an understatement.

But, enough about that and onto the book itself. It's just ok. Very predictable with fairly flat characters. There's a wife and son who may as well not exist for how little they give to the story. Honestly, it does feel a bit Jaws like at times, what with a sheriff investigating brutal killings in his rural community.

The two things that save this story from being absolute bottom tier trash for me is that it has some really gnarly kills, and the underground sections legitimately feel creepy with their claustrophobia.

Will not be revisiting this or seeking out any other Owl Goingback books. I suggest you do the same.