Supernatural - Mythmaker

Supernatural #14

by Tim Waggoner

Teenager Renee Mendez is a talented artist living in a small Illinois town. She loves drawing the strange beings that feature in her dreams, without realizing that when she depicts them on paper, they come to life in the real world. These gods begin to seek worshippers and battle for supremacy, killing humans and each other until only the two strongest remain. Sam and Dean come to town to investigate the murders and “miracles” these new gods perform, slaying some of them in the process. The last two gods standing prepare for their final conflict, which only one will survive. The brothers must find a way to stop the gods’ war before the entire town is destroyed.

Genres: Supernatural, Fantasy, Horror, Fiction, Urban Fantasy, Paranormal, Mystery

Unknown Binding

First published July 26, 2016

About the author

Tim Waggoner's first novel came out in 2001, and since then, he's published over sixty novels and eight collections of short stories. He writes original dark fantasy and horror, as well as media tie-ins. He's written tie-in fiction based on Supernatural, The X-Files, Alien, Doctor Who, Conan the Barbarian, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Grimm, and Transformers, among others, and he's written novelizations for films such as Ti West’s X-Trilogy, Halloween Kills, Terrifier 2 and 3, and Resident Evil: The Final Chapter. He’s also the author of the award-winning guide to horror Writing in the Dark. He’s a four-time winner of the Bram Stoker Award, a one-time winner of the Scribe Award, and he’s been a two-time finalist for the Shirley Jackson Award and a one-time finalist for the Splatterpunk Award. He’s also a full-time tenured professor who teaches creative writing and composition at Sinclair College in Dayton, Ohio.

Reviews

[Rissa]

Sam and Dean go to investigate miracles in this small town and find more then just healing happening.

I wasnt thrilled with the writing style for this book but overall I enjoyed the story and the mystery.

[Lauren Stoolfire]

Mythmaker (Supernatural #14) by Tim Waggoner isn't the best tie-in novel I've read for this series, but it's right up there. It's just good to be back with these brothers, you know. I've missed them and it's nice to see them featured in new stories. Tim Waggoner always does a good job of capturing their tone and style.

[Brian McCullar]

Pushing forward with my reading journey through all of the Supernatural TV tie-in novels with book number fourteen Mythmaker, and I gotta say, it's almost puzzling to me why this one is the lowest rated out of all seventeen books, because were it not for a very small nitpick I have, I could actually consider this, personally, to be the strongest of the bunch so far.

Not because I loved the story more than all the others, don't get me wrong I really did enjoy it quite a lot, just not as much as one or two others I've read, but because it had such a strong story, paired with absolutely PERFECT characterization of Sam and Dean, good pacing and true to the show progression of the story! It really hits a balance that even the best of the other tie-in novels, up to this point, didn't quite hit.

So with all of that praise being said, let me address the elephant in the room, which is why I can't grand this book the number one spot, and it may sound dumb to some of you, but for me, it was something that took me out of the story, when every other section had me ravenously devouring it. And that's the flashbacks. So much of this book was written in a compelling way, with a narrative voice that matches the CW show that it's based on, but when we reach the flashback sequences, which also had a fun story, the storytelling voice changes.

We go from a simple yet compelling prose carrying the narrative, to what almost feels like reading a synopsis of prior events. It was extremely jarring. Because one minute, I'm reading what perfectly feels like a long lost episode script, and the next, I feel like I'm reading info off of the Supernatural fan Wiki. While this may not bother others as much, is really bummed me out and yeah, it pulled me from the story.

However, I want to praise this book for everything that it did right. Despite how I disliked the writing approach to the flashbacks, they provided another look into Sam and Dean's childhoods, which is always appreciated, introduced two different new creatures to the Supernatural mythos, which is always fun, and the big bad of the flashback, was actually very relevant to the plot of the present day events within the book, and our boys, mostly Sam, pieced together strategies from their reflection on how they dealt with that being in order to combat the new threats.

The concept of the main plot itself feels PERFECTLY in line with the story, and despite how it may initially seem to conflict with canon lore we got after this book was released in season 15, it actually doesn't. It's no spoiler to say that in this book, new gods are being born and are being created through a human with special powers, known as a "Mythmaker", another awesome new piece of lore. Season 15 taught us that God (capital G) and humankind both, in their own way, created the lesser "gods". Humans through conception, and God through the actual act of creation. But we know God actively imbues certain people with special powers, to carry out what he believed to be entertaining, or necessary for his narrative, witches, shamans, psychics, prophets, dreamwalkers, etc. Mythmakers can easily be explained as the same kind of special human, one imbued with a special spark to carry out his will in his absence, in this case, the creation of lesser gods. I think it ties in wonderfully and it's SO cool as a mega fan of the show.

The boys both felt completely in line with their show depictions from this era of the story (season 10), with Dean struggling with the Mark of Cain, Sam worrying about his brother without trying to make it too obvious, etc. The new gods themselves were actually a great deal of fun, and I honestly felt it was all handled in a way that made it really feel like a manuscript for a lost TV episode of the show.

I want to be blunt, were it not for how the author fumbled the flashback scenes, I would actually give this book 5 out of 5 stars, which is a very rare grade for me. If the flashback style had only mildly annoyed me, I still would. But it actively took me out of the experience, and that's a big deal to me. So I think a grade of 4.5 out of 5 is more suitable. I think it sits just behind Carved in Flesh, making it the second best (so far) of the tie-in novels for me.

Wanna check out my other Supernatural book reviews? Check em out below!

Nevermore: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Witch's Canyon: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Bone Key: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Heart of the Dragon: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

The Unholy Cause: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

War of the Sons: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

One Year Gone: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Coyote's Kiss: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Night Terror: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Rite of Passage: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Fresh Meat: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Carved in Flesh: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Cold Fire: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Men of Letters Bestiary: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Alan]

Generally speaking, this was another enjoyable Supernatural book. However, plot-wise it was arguably the weakest. The story was a little too "dude bro" and was a huge ripoff of Highlander.

[Chloe Louise]

It has a star purely for the fact that it was Supernatural, but aside from that I think the main reason I want to rate this so low is the writing, Waggoner actually used "Speeded" in a sentence...

[Hazel West]

This one was okay. Sam and Dean were pretty much in character though I still felt they were a little overwrought and didn't have much life in them as is usually the case in these novels (and yet people can write perfectly awesome canon fan fiction? Come on Titan, start finding better authors). It was still a good read to get me through the mid-season hiatus though.

The concept was interesting, but my main complaints were (1) there seemed to be more page time with the supporting cast than with Sam and Dean, which I find boring. And (2) the author messed up a lot of continuity in this story. For example, it's supposed to be set in Season 10 but Dean tried to pray to Cas to call him for help, and then expected him to just pop up. Um, Cas can't fly anymore, why do you think he's been driving around in that old Continental? Plus, though it hasn't been mentioned, it's implied he can't hear prayers anymore as the boys usually call him with a phone.

Also, I think there should have been more mentions of the Mark of Cain. It was mentioned several times at the beginning of the story, Sam worrying about Dean after he killed a ton of ghouls. But then it's never mentioned again. even when they come in contact with a god of healing. I would have expected Sam to at least consider the idea that the guy might be able to remove the Mark, but it didn't even cross his mind

I've read a couple of Tim Waggoner's SPN books before and this one is my least favorite actually. I think someone really needed to go over this book again for continuity errors and fix of the characterizations. Dean's whole persona is not about eating doughnuts for heaven's sake.

[Francis Delisle]

Took the storyline of Highlander and blended it with Supernatural, with a lot of filler thrown in. You can skip this one!

[Melyssa Winchester]

It took me awhile to get my feelings about this story straight.
This, like a lot of other reviewers have said before me, felt like a Supernatural meets Highlander story. One that was focused a great deal more than other novels on the supernatural being and less on the boys that make the show what it is.
I liked the idea of this, Highlander thing aside. I think in terms of watching something like this as an episode, it wouldn't have been all that bad. Where I sort of ventured off where the writing was concerned was, like I said above. This felt like a story that Sam and Dean were bit part players in and less like something they're knee deep in helping to solve. It didn't read like others I've read by this author and even in this series of spin off novels before it.
It was written very well, and it was indeed very detailed, but in the detail area, it was almost too much so. The Sam and Dean chapters when they did appear were much shorter in comparison to the ones focused solely on the "gods" and their fights and recruiting. Add to that, that there were more instances of flashbacks to an earlier case when they were younger, then current timeline and this book left me more at a loss than I really wanted it too.
I enjoyed it, as I said above, but it definitely wasn't one of the best stories I've ever read.

[Craig]

This is a fun novel set within the framework of the Supernatural television series. I'm not a regular watcher of the show, but don't feel like that caused me to miss anything from this story. Fans of Highlander should like this one, too.

[Shawn Remfrey]

This was a really fun episode of Supernatural in book form. Luckily for me, it happens around the same time I stopped watching the show. If you like the show, you'll like the book. Make sure you're at least into season ten though or it'll give you spoilers!

[Dee]

As a big fan of Supernatural, I've gotten my hands on several of the novels based on the series. Most have been fun to read and kept to the canon and mythos of the boys. There's only been one book that I read that didn't exactly sound canon to Sam and Dean's natures, and thankfully, this book is well within the regards of the show! I can totally see this novel happening within the show. The monsters, the setting, the things they have to do to try to make things right, it was all very canon, which makes it more fascinating to read.

Sam and Dean HAVE faced down gods, more than one, and they've gone through a lot of things that have tried their hunting skills, and their very means to survive. The only difference was the fact that the artist in the blurb, Renee, had been the cause of the gods' existence...I thought that was unique, and it was very interesting to see these various gods running around, with different powers and features. It reminded me something of an RPG, lol, with all these different gods running around.

There was a nice blending of the original characters, and of Dean and Sam's MO of how they work a case. We got to see how the boys think on their feet when they're put in a corner, and all in all, it was a very fun read! Of course, it helps that I'm a huge fan of the show, that I could appreciate it more, the telling of the boys' natures, how they think in among them trying to solve the chase, so I might be biased. XD But I think that the author captured the boys' "voices" in a very believable way, that it could've been a script right out of the show. Pleased I picked up this particular Supernatural novel. ^__^

[Sara Kreps]

If you've read this far in the series, you'll probably read them all so this is just a heads up. The story wasn't bad. It also wasn't good. My biggest beef is that, like with so many of the tie-ins, Sam and Dean weren't the focus. This story could've just as easily been a novel for Buffy or The X Files or almost any other supernaturally themed show. Or not a tie in at all since most of the events unfold with the brothers as witnesses at best. As if to prove this point, the author missed a great chance at the end to show the strength of the brothers' love in shaking off the mind control they get put under; instead of one getting through to the other, they each individually decide not to be controlled and it works. Totally lame. And if the author didn't have to worry about including characters that the reader wants to see, he could've used the extra pages to better develop the story. Instead we get there stories: the supernatural events playing the town's citizens, Dean and Sam nosing about to see (mostly uselessly) what's going on and how to stop it, and a flashback story that only reinforces what the brothers have already realized. Definitely don't need to reread this one.

[Julie Provost]

Je lui donnes un 3,5 sur 5!! Ce n'est pas le meilleur livre basé sur la télésérie Supernatural que j'ai lu, mais ce n'est pas le plus pire non plus!! Au début, j'ai eu de la difficulté à accrocher à l'histoire qui valsait de l'apparition des Dieux, aux 2 frères au temps présent et pour finir un souvenir que Sam avait de lui et son frère étant adolescent. C'était un peu confus!! Au fur et à mesure que l'histoire se développait, le tout est devenu plus clair et plus facile à comprendre. Pour ce qui est des personnages de Sam et Dean de la saison 10, ceux-ci ne sont pas si bien développés. En effet, j'aurais préféré que l'auteur parle davantage de la marque de Cain que Dean porte , ainsi que du fardeau de celui-ci, au-lieu de mentionner, à plusieurs reprises, l'amour que l'aîné des Winchester a pour les doughnuts!! Bien sûr, tous les fans de Supernatural savent que Dean adore la nourriture alors... n'empêche que cela est tout de même comique!! Pour finir, je dirais que l'histoire devient de plus en plus intéressante au fur et à mesure qu'elle se déroule. En effet, j'ai donnée la note de 3,5 à cause de la deuxième moitié du livre qui nous tient en haleine jusqu'à la fin!!

[Brianne]

Mythmaker the 14th book in the Supernatural book series, I have to say this book does not belong in the supernatural series. While the storyline had promise it would have done better as it's own stand a lone story. A young college art student paints a bunch strange looking people and yet when she completes a painting the person on it disappears. They become gods who must battle in what is called the Apotheosis to become the last and most powerful god standing. Now bring in Sam and Dean who come to the town of Cornith investigating some strange deaths. It doesn't take long for the boys to realize they are dealing with various gods and figure out how to kill them. The book severally lacked the characters personalities, there was no research done and Sam always does research. The book being set in the Supernatural world made it seem very rushed in telling the story. Everything went down all in one night which never happens and a pointless filler flash back to Sam and Dean's childhood that really doesn't need to be in the story seems to be what Tim Waggoner likes to do with these books. Overall pretty disappointed with Mythmaker.

[Heidi Steen]

Not one of the best tie-in novels but it does pack plenty of action especially involving the boys which is nice to see.

The overall monsters kept reminding me of Highlander and although much was made of the impending Apotheosis and the recruitment of followers, it was a bit of a damp squib moment especially after the brothers were Bound to the opposing sides. They seemed to shake off the influence incredibly easily and the battle itself was little more than a mildly elevated gang style street fight.

Renee as the mysterious and powerful Mythmaker was another profoundly disappointing aspect. Aside from being an artist, what role did she play? How did she come to posess the power to create gods?

Also the encounter with the Underwoods was incredibly long winded and distracting in its insertion to lead only to the conclusion that killing a god is done by turning their power against them which they already witnessed with Karrion vs Armament. Considering how this is the manner on which they have defeated many monsters it did make this portion little more than filler.

Overall a good read if you like high octane action over storyline.

[Anastasiia Verba]

Божечки, как же я устала от этой книги. Пока худшая история из всей серии (а серия, прямо скажем, не блещет шедеврами).

Вроде, и объем небольшой, и язык довольно простой, можно спокойно читать в оригинале, но скучно невыносимо. Чтоб вы понимали, я - не тот человек, который читает книги перед сном, чтобы заснуть. Я если начинаю читать, то читаю до победного. Но тут даже я засыпала каждый раз, осилив страниц 5.

Что интересно, предыдущая книга автора мне понравилась, что здесь пошло не так- непонятно. Автор выгорел - не иначе.

Сюжет простой как 5 копеек: откуда-то появляются новые боги, начинают меситься друг с другом, ведь в конце должен остаться только один (да, как в "Горце", мне кажется это прямая отсылка), глав герои приходят, побеждают, попутно вспоминая некий случай из детства.

Скучно, нелогично, сопереживать нам здесь некому: все персонажи - картонки картонные. Концовку знаешь уже с первых страниц.

Читать только если вы (как я) устроили себе самый тупой челлендж читателя - прочитать все книги "Сверхъестественного".

[Chazda]

I tried. I've never been one for the horror genre, but I absolutely love the show. So I thought I'd give one of the Supernatural novels a try. This isn't one of the stories written by the character Chuck, it's another adventure outside of that. I don't mind that - it's just worth mentioning. This isn't a novelized episode.

I won't rate this book, because I don't think it would be fair - I'm not the person to be rating this. For me, this was too yuck, too ew.

I felt the concept of the artist creating these demons through her feverish paintings was rather clever and fascinating, but I could tell by the way the artist's experience was described that the author had no idea what it's like to paint. It bothered me, how incorrect it was. I wish he'd done at least a little homework on that, maybe talked with an artist who has experienced Flow. If we'd been really brought into her experience more realistically, it could have been awesome.

No way would she park her easel next to the car. Nope. That part made me laugh out loud.

[Sylvia McIvers]

Fun story. Gods coming to life is the stuff of comic books, and while this story had no pictures, the descriptions were absolutely wonderful.

No Spoiler Story-line: Sam and Dean are 2 brothers who battle the Monster of the Week and win.

Nice story technique: Sam's flashback seems like spacing out and going to a better place in his memory, but it ends up helping in the moment.

Maybe a spoiler but certainly not a surprise: The gods coming to life are not, in fact, here to help humanity. *gasp* They are here to grab power for themselves.

Maybe a spoiler and actually a surprise: Given the facts of the TV show, I was surprised when the opening character, a man of color, survived the first chapter. In TV-land, non-white non-males usually get fridged.

[Kyra Yaroscavitch]

So after 2 years of starting this book after cold fire I finally decided to read the rest and it took me 2 days to finish. And I will say I loved this book. I couldn’t put it down yesterday night and ended up putting it down at around 5am.
The main reason It took me a couple years to fully read this book was cause I tend to have different moods when it comes to reading sometimes I can read book after book in a short time span and other times I don’t feel like reading and it goes on for a certain amount of time. It’s not usually cause I found a book boring.

But my overall rating on this book would be a 10/10. In my opinion I loved the way it was written. It didn’t feel like a book but more felt like an actual episode from the show. The characterization for the shows characters sam and Dean were on point and the book characters were also on point.

[Stacy]

This was a decent story overall, particularly if you enjoy mythological types of stories. But, it just really wasn't a Supernatural story - other than the overall concept. I felt like Sam and Dean were hardly in the story, and honestly, weren't really necessary to help the town. It kinda felt like the author had written this as one of his own original books, and then went back and inserted Sam and Dean to publish it under the Supernatural banner. I read these books between watching the series because I want to discover more adventures with Sam and Dean, and this book just didn't really do that.

[Mariam]

Supernatural was my most favourite tv show ever,and it still is though I think They overdid things with 14 seasons and all that.It was totally kickass up until the 9-10 season.
But anyways I’ve read all the previous books in this series and loved some and didn’t like some at all.This book was somewhere between that.I liked it better than ‘The Usual Sacrifices’ but I liked Coldfire a lot more.
(Yep,I’d read that one already ;p)

In this book I absolutely loved the ghoul hunting and the flashback about the sheepsquatch hunt but this whole plot about gods and stuff,I was not a fan of.
So I think a three star rating is very reasonable because I didn’t enjoy the story on the whole.

[Lori]

⭐️⭐️⭐️ — It was okay

This book got better as I kept reading. At first, I felt like there was a lot of explanations that didn’t really need to be in there. (The boys were hunting ghouls, and it was explained that Dean was carrying a machete because ghouls can only be killed by decapitation.) This among other things that I feel the people reading this book (most likely fans of the show) would already know.

But I liked the adventure of seeing different gods fight over followers and defeating gods using their unique powers.

I would recommend this book to anyone looking for a medium-paced, dark, adventurous, and tense read!

Trigger warning for violence.

[Mrs.M.Williams]

Disappointing

Have loved every one of the SPN novels however this one was so much basically Highlander with the boys occasionally dropped into it that it was very disappointing. The fact that the Winchesters always give a tip of the hat to pop culture especially Dean with his love of action movies made for the Highlander films to become the very obvious elephant in the room whenever someone repeated 'There can be only one in the end.' It was such an obvious direct storyline that to not mention it made it all the more obvious.

[Jack Smith]

Good story

The story flows pretty good, but like almost every other SN book it’s nothing close to the show. That’s not saying this book or the others aren’t good because they mostly are, but none seem to grasp the show. Hunters are supposed to work in secret yet most every book has 100s of people injured and dozens killed, yet I don’t recall but a few episodes where more than the initial victim and the bad guy/monster dieing. Someone please write a story where they have to actually investigate and search for the monster.

[Crow NoYami]

As always Tim Waggoner outdid himself with this one. I love how he manages to get little side stories that flow seamlessly in with the main novel, making this book not just one story but a collaboration of points of view. Two hunts, two main 'gods', two priests a Mythmaker and two hunters trying to -once again- save the world. I can't wait to read more of what Tim's mind has to offer in Children of Anubis, I'm sure it's going to be just as fantastic as this novel was!

[Sohxpie]

From the title and synopsis of the book, I was expecting something good and I was not disappointed. I liked how it covered lesser known god's rather than the same ones you tend to get in novels. The idea of paintings/drawings coming to life is a little overdone but it does work well in this context. It was nice to have the Winchester banter back, it has definitely been missing in the last few novels.

[sam]

it was a good read and it kept you waiting to know for what happened next.
probably not one of the best novels in the collection but it's close, the plot was interesting even if some parts were kinda boring, I would have spared so many details on the new-gods life and their followers, but overall the author has once again showed he can write spot on the personalities of sam and dean, their tone and style.

it would be a 3.5 stars for me but rounded up I do think it deserves the 4 starts

[hannah pachet]

This book got fairly slow for my quite often, just because it had so many storylines I wasn't interested in. There were about four that were present time and one in the past; I think it would have been a lot better if there were about three total. But I do always enjoy reading about Sam and Dean, so this satisfied that at least.

[Abbie]

A fairly decent book. I try to avoid tie-ins as much as possible, because they never do live up to their source material and whilst this book was no exception, the plot was well thought out and I could definitely see the story being written as an episode of Supernatural. Enjoyable, if not ground-breaking.

[Karlee]

DNF. Not the book I expected unfortunately. Thought it would be more filled with Dean and Sam back and forth dialogue, being brothers, but has perspectives that I didn't really want to read from. Got only 5 chapters (80 pages) in and I just don't see myself being able to finish it. Sad to say :(