Clifton Falls, L. A. Taylor

Publishers: CreateSpace Independent Publishing

Pages: 440

Main Characters:

Mike, Blake, Chris,

Clifton Falls in a small rural town in Yorkshire where nothing much happens. The economy of the town is based on farming and one of the town’s most well-known farmers is Blake. Farming is not an easy game and Blake needs to find a new way to increase his yearly yield and protect his crops from a menacing insect that is poised to destroy them. Blake comes across a new fertiliser that is designed to kill these bugs and help his crops grow. He manages to secure the first batch of fertiliser that is released for public use and spreads it on his vast crops and fields. Blake even gives some of the fertiliser to his wife’s boss Vincent, so he can use it on his garden.  Vincent has been putting off doing the gardening. His mother died recently and her final wish was to be buried in the garden of the house that she had lived in (the house in which Vincent now owns!). Even now after a few months, Vincent is still freaked out that his mother is buried in the garden! Nevertheless, Vincent finally plucks up the courage and uses the fertiliser to try and reinvigorate the plants he has recently being neglecting. Unluckily for Vincent, his hard work does not pay off as a storm washes away most of the fertiliser whilst the rest just soaks into the soil.

What Blake and Vincent don’t realise is that the fertiliser contains a dangerous chemical called Moltovenium. When this new chemical comes into contact (with the help of the storm) with dead cells, it reanimates them causing the corpse to come back to life! What’s even worse is that the newly revived bodies come back to life with a hunger for human flesh and will do anything to get it! One of the first zombies to rise is Vincent’s mother and unfortunately for Vincent and his wife, the reunion is not a happy one.

With the zombie epidemic in full flow, the local police force is tasked with keeping the virus inside Clifton Falls and preventing it from spreading to the local city. But when the fertiliser washes down to the local cemetery, the task is made much, much harder as a dozen new ghouls are brought back to life. The fate of human kind is held in the hands of the local Police Chief Mike, but this fate does not look good with these cunning and devious zombies out on the hunt!

I really enjoyed reading Clifton Falls! I have never really read a horror book before but have always wanted to. I think that is because there are so many good horror books out there and I never knew where to start. I’m glad I waited and luckily read Clifton Falls because it was such a good read! I really liked how the novel was set in a small town, which I thought made the book and the reactions of the characters much more believable. I also liked the fact that the book wasn’t over gory on the zombie killing front. I think, especially in films and games, the zombie genre sometimes ends up more about the killing and violence instead of actually sticking to the story of the epidemic and the characters. I think Taylor did a great job of telling the story with some gory scenes, which made the book really interesting and thrilling to read. There was also some humour in the novel. This further made it exciting to read and helped balance the book from it just been a horror novel and again made it much more believable.

However, I did have one little issue with the book and that was when the characters (especially the police officers) came across a zombie. They would nearly always be sneaked up on, go to get their gun out, fail to shot and then be attacked. It sort of made me think ‘Just shoot it!’ but instead they’d stand there looking at it! I just thought that if I was in that situation I’d either run or shoot, whereas most of the officers just stood there!

Nevertheless, this was just a small issue and all in all I really enjoyed the book! I would like to say a massive thank you to Lee Taylor for getting in touch and being patient with my review! I’d suggest this book to anyone who enjoys reading horror novels or to anyone who is a fan of movies like Dawn of the Dead or Resident Evil.

For author’s website click here.

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