What do you think?
The Boatman
HE WILL FOLLOW YOU TO THE ENDS OF THE EARTH.
Shortly after cruise ship the Maria Calypso embarks on its latest voyage, the passengers and crew notice someone in An elegant figure wearing a white suit who somehow keeps pace in his rowboat.
No matter how hard the crew pushes the engines, they can't escape The Boatman ... and it isn't long before sinister and mysterious events begin to unfold on the Maria Calypso.
What will it cost to learn the true nature of the man who hunts them—and will the price to keep on living prove to be too dear?
Shortly after cruise ship the Maria Calypso embarks on its latest voyage, the passengers and crew notice someone in An elegant figure wearing a white suit who somehow keeps pace in his rowboat.
No matter how hard the crew pushes the engines, they can't escape The Boatman ... and it isn't long before sinister and mysterious events begin to unfold on the Maria Calypso.
What will it cost to learn the true nature of the man who hunts them—and will the price to keep on living prove to be too dear?
150 pages, Paperback
First published April 7, 2026
About the author
Alex Grecian
60 books1,797 followersGrecian is the author of several bestselling novels, including the horror/fantasies RED RABBIT, ROSE OF JERICHO and THE BOATMAN, plus the contemporary thriller THE SAINT OF WOLVES AND BUTCHERS, and five historical thrillers featuring Scotland Yard's Murder Squad: THE YARD, THE BLACK COUNTRY, THE DEVIL'S WORKSHOP, THE HARVEST MAN, and LOST AND GONE FOREVER, plus the original Murder Squad ebook, THE BLUE GIRL.
He also created the six-volume graphic novel series PROOF, and the two-part graphic novel RASPUTIN.
He currently lives in the American Midwest with his wife and son. And a dog. And a tarantula.
He also created the six-volume graphic novel series PROOF, and the two-part graphic novel RASPUTIN.
He currently lives in the American Midwest with his wife and son. And a dog. And a tarantula.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 88 reviews
April 13, 2026
Only someone as talented as Alex Grecian would get away with such an absurd premise as the one of this short book: unlike the two novels of his I’ve read ("Red Rabbit" and "Rose of Jericho"), "The Boatman" dives straightaway (and completely unapologetically) into the weird, the outlandish and the bizarre, figuring a cruise ship whose passengers discover they're being pursued by Charon (the Ancient Greek mythological ferryman to the underworld); the ship has to keep running ahead, in order to evade Death, and, of course, the passengers under these circumstances become practically immortal. Indeed, the story goes decades into the future, starting from the 1980s or thereabouts, and getting more and more complicated, more and more atmopsheric, the cruise ship passengers finding themselves more and more involved in a strange voyage they never planned to undertake.
For some reason, upon finishing I felt this was more grief horror than, let's say, vacation horror, mystery thriller or purely weird fiction. Grecian manages to capture perfectly the passing of time, the waning and waxing sentiments, interests and obsessions of the passengers, without drowning the story in claustrophobia or turning the situation of the characters into one of desperation or imprisonment. There's a very strong vibe of the horrific and the uncanny, though at no point does it take over the story. Rationality, weirdly, prevails.
"The Boatman" excels in the portrayal of life as a kaleidoscope of unpredictable moments of decision, under the most absurd of circumstances. The supernatural aspects are handled with great elegance and charm, even if - and in spite of - the whole situation ultimately not making much practical sense. That said, the ending was priceless, and made the trip (pun intended) a hell of a ride!
For some reason, upon finishing I felt this was more grief horror than, let's say, vacation horror, mystery thriller or purely weird fiction. Grecian manages to capture perfectly the passing of time, the waning and waxing sentiments, interests and obsessions of the passengers, without drowning the story in claustrophobia or turning the situation of the characters into one of desperation or imprisonment. There's a very strong vibe of the horrific and the uncanny, though at no point does it take over the story. Rationality, weirdly, prevails.
"The Boatman" excels in the portrayal of life as a kaleidoscope of unpredictable moments of decision, under the most absurd of circumstances. The supernatural aspects are handled with great elegance and charm, even if - and in spite of - the whole situation ultimately not making much practical sense. That said, the ending was priceless, and made the trip (pun intended) a hell of a ride!
May 21, 2026
The idea of being trapped on a boat endlessly trying to outrun death itself is genuinely terrifying and that atmosphere is what really pulled me into this story.
It’s a short read but it still manages to feel eerie and surprisingly psychological. There’s this constant undercurrent of dread running through the book especially in the way it explores fear of death and what people are willing to do when survival feels uncertain.
I do wish it had been a little longer though. Some of the characters felt underdeveloped and I think more time with them would’ve added extra emotional weight to everything unfolding on the boat.
The ending was also slightly disappointing for me. It wasn’t bad, but I found myself wanting a bit more from the payoff after all the tension that built throughout the story.
The concept itself is really interesting, and Alex Grecian’s writing style kept me engaged the entire time. I’m looking forward to checking out more from this author.
It’s a short read but it still manages to feel eerie and surprisingly psychological. There’s this constant undercurrent of dread running through the book especially in the way it explores fear of death and what people are willing to do when survival feels uncertain.
I do wish it had been a little longer though. Some of the characters felt underdeveloped and I think more time with them would’ve added extra emotional weight to everything unfolding on the boat.
The ending was also slightly disappointing for me. It wasn’t bad, but I found myself wanting a bit more from the payoff after all the tension that built throughout the story.
The concept itself is really interesting, and Alex Grecian’s writing style kept me engaged the entire time. I’m looking forward to checking out more from this author.
March 3, 2026
*This is a mini review. Full coverage soon to come via Ginger Nuts of Horror so keep an eye out!*
Alex Grecian's The Boatman is a lean, eerie novella that wastes no time pulling readers into its strange and unsettling premise. When the guests of the cruise ship Maria Calypso notice a solitary man in a suit rowing behind them, the voyage quickly transforms from leisurely escape to creeping nightmare. The man seems to effortlessly keep pace with the ship no matter its speed. Grecian excels at building dread through atmosphere rather than spectacle. The image of a relentless rowboat trailing a massive ship is simple, yet deeply unnerving. It is a visual that clings and soaks like the spray of the sea, and is truly ominous as the story unfolds. As mysterious and sinister occurrences befall the people on the Maria Calypso, the tension tightens with each page. The passengers and crew are forced to confront an unsettling question: who, or what, is the Boatman and why is he following them? What makes this novella particularly effective is its sense of inevitability. Grecian crafts the story like a slowly encroaching tide and reveals just enough to keep the reader hooked while maintaining the looming dread that fuels the horror. The confined setting of the ship amplifies the eeriness, keeping the characters on a floating stage, waiting for something supernatural and unknowable. Dark, atmospheric, and hauntingly paced, The Boatman is a quick and memorable read that proves Grecian's talent for turning a simple idea into a tension soaked tale. Thank you tremendously Bad Hand Books for mailing me an ARC. You can preorder this book now and if you order direct via Bad Hand, it comes with a signed book plate!
Alex Grecian's The Boatman is a lean, eerie novella that wastes no time pulling readers into its strange and unsettling premise. When the guests of the cruise ship Maria Calypso notice a solitary man in a suit rowing behind them, the voyage quickly transforms from leisurely escape to creeping nightmare. The man seems to effortlessly keep pace with the ship no matter its speed. Grecian excels at building dread through atmosphere rather than spectacle. The image of a relentless rowboat trailing a massive ship is simple, yet deeply unnerving. It is a visual that clings and soaks like the spray of the sea, and is truly ominous as the story unfolds. As mysterious and sinister occurrences befall the people on the Maria Calypso, the tension tightens with each page. The passengers and crew are forced to confront an unsettling question: who, or what, is the Boatman and why is he following them? What makes this novella particularly effective is its sense of inevitability. Grecian crafts the story like a slowly encroaching tide and reveals just enough to keep the reader hooked while maintaining the looming dread that fuels the horror. The confined setting of the ship amplifies the eeriness, keeping the characters on a floating stage, waiting for something supernatural and unknowable. Dark, atmospheric, and hauntingly paced, The Boatman is a quick and memorable read that proves Grecian's talent for turning a simple idea into a tension soaked tale. Thank you tremendously Bad Hand Books for mailing me an ARC. You can preorder this book now and if you order direct via Bad Hand, it comes with a signed book plate!
April 27, 2026
I waited 2+ years for this novella to be delivered and overall I was a bit disappointed in the eventual result of the story.
I loved the opening and the set up. A couple on their honeymoon discovers that their ship is being followed by Death, and as long as they keep the boat moving ahead of him, they will live forever. The ship and its crew form a loose democracy designed to keep the ship moving as fast as possible, everyone pools money and resources to keep the ship stocked with drugs and alcohol, and the decades pass.
I thought for sure I could see where this was going. The passengers through selfishness or hedonism begin to destroy themselves or each other as the reality of living forever on a small cruise vessel sets in. Or that The Boatman actually has more sinister designs in mind, which is why he does not haste to catch them. But instead… we got a parenthood story.
A third into the book, when it seems the boat is about to start descending into the anarchy I was hoping for, the main characters save a girl on a raft just off the boat and take her in. The rest of the novel is about raising this kid. And suddenly all the conflict disappears and it becomes a Lifetime movie. None of the “strange happenings” or horror promised by the books description or advertising comes through. It was a perfectly set up first third followed by a sappy finish. Which is a shame, because Red Rabbit is one of my favorite novels of all time. It’s like the author had an idea for this novella, got partway through it and decided to go down a side path instead.
If you’re looking for more of the story that I thought this would be, try a movie called Aniara.
I loved the opening and the set up. A couple on their honeymoon discovers that their ship is being followed by Death, and as long as they keep the boat moving ahead of him, they will live forever. The ship and its crew form a loose democracy designed to keep the ship moving as fast as possible, everyone pools money and resources to keep the ship stocked with drugs and alcohol, and the decades pass.
I thought for sure I could see where this was going. The passengers through selfishness or hedonism begin to destroy themselves or each other as the reality of living forever on a small cruise vessel sets in. Or that The Boatman actually has more sinister designs in mind, which is why he does not haste to catch them. But instead… we got a parenthood story.
A third into the book, when it seems the boat is about to start descending into the anarchy I was hoping for, the main characters save a girl on a raft just off the boat and take her in. The rest of the novel is about raising this kid. And suddenly all the conflict disappears and it becomes a Lifetime movie. None of the “strange happenings” or horror promised by the books description or advertising comes through. It was a perfectly set up first third followed by a sappy finish. Which is a shame, because Red Rabbit is one of my favorite novels of all time. It’s like the author had an idea for this novella, got partway through it and decided to go down a side path instead.
If you’re looking for more of the story that I thought this would be, try a movie called Aniara.
May 29, 2026
I can’t get behind this premise.
The reveal of what the boatman is comes way too quickly, and all the characters believe it too easily. The doctor just knows?
I don’t like how immortality works here. You still get older, and sick, and can get killed. You just can’t die of natural causes.
I liked Ralph’s and Walt’s relationship. On the other hand, June and Walt’s relationship was just boring. The only scene that actually involved the boatman was nice. The ending “reveal” was kind of clever and tied in nicely with the earlier boatman scene.
The reveal of what the boatman is comes way too quickly, and all the characters believe it too easily. The doctor just knows?
I don’t like how immortality works here. You still get older, and sick, and can get killed. You just can’t die of natural causes.
I liked Ralph’s and Walt’s relationship. On the other hand, June and Walt’s relationship was just boring. The only scene that actually involved the boatman was nice. The ending “reveal” was kind of clever and tied in nicely with the earlier boatman scene.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Review of advance copy received from Publisher
Alex Grecian’s The Boatman is a gripping, atmospheric supernatural thriller that hooks you from its first eerie image and refuses to let go.
What begins as a luxurious voyage aboard the Maria Calypso quickly transforms into a tense, slow‑burn nightmare, all centered around one unforgettable figure: the mysterious man in the white suit who rows after the ship no matter how far or fast it travels.
The novel’s central conceit is wonderfully unsettling. A cruise ship, isolated in the vastness of the open sea, becomes the stage for a relentless pursuit by a lone rowboat.
Grecian uses this setup to build a sense of creeping dread, letting the impossibility of the Boatman’s presence gnaw at both the characters and the reader.
The tension escalates naturally, with each strange occurrence aboard the Maria Calypso deepening the mystery and raising the stakes.
The Boatman himself, elegant, enigmatic and terrifying is a standout creation precisely because his motives and nature remain just out of reach.
As the crew and passengers struggle to understand what’s happening, their fear and desperation feel authentic. The ship becomes a pressure cooker, and watching how each person responds to the impossible, adds emotional depth to the suspense.
What makes The Boatman especially satisfying is how it balances supernatural horror with a strong sense of mystery.
It’s both a page‑turner and a story that lingers, inviting reflection long after the final chapter.
A haunting, imaginative thriller that showcases Alex Grecian's ability to create rich atmosphere, sharp tension, and a supernatural mystery that feels both fresh and classic.
'The Boatman', is the kind of book that keeps you reading late into the night and leaves you glancing over your shoulder long after you’ve finished.
What begins as a luxurious voyage aboard the Maria Calypso quickly transforms into a tense, slow‑burn nightmare, all centered around one unforgettable figure: the mysterious man in the white suit who rows after the ship no matter how far or fast it travels.
The novel’s central conceit is wonderfully unsettling. A cruise ship, isolated in the vastness of the open sea, becomes the stage for a relentless pursuit by a lone rowboat.
Grecian uses this setup to build a sense of creeping dread, letting the impossibility of the Boatman’s presence gnaw at both the characters and the reader.
The tension escalates naturally, with each strange occurrence aboard the Maria Calypso deepening the mystery and raising the stakes.
The Boatman himself, elegant, enigmatic and terrifying is a standout creation precisely because his motives and nature remain just out of reach.
As the crew and passengers struggle to understand what’s happening, their fear and desperation feel authentic. The ship becomes a pressure cooker, and watching how each person responds to the impossible, adds emotional depth to the suspense.
What makes The Boatman especially satisfying is how it balances supernatural horror with a strong sense of mystery.
It’s both a page‑turner and a story that lingers, inviting reflection long after the final chapter.
A haunting, imaginative thriller that showcases Alex Grecian's ability to create rich atmosphere, sharp tension, and a supernatural mystery that feels both fresh and classic.
'The Boatman', is the kind of book that keeps you reading late into the night and leaves you glancing over your shoulder long after you’ve finished.
May 5, 2026
2.5
What i took away from this book is that the boatman is like death in a way. He gains on the boat when its that persons turn to die? They disappear. So they think if theyre fast enough they can outrun death? That's what I took away from this read. An ok read not great.
What i took away from this book is that the boatman is like death in a way. He gains on the boat when its that persons turn to die? They disappear. So they think if theyre fast enough they can outrun death? That's what I took away from this read. An ok read not great.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 17, 2026
Story is about passengers on a luxury cruise trying to outrun death, each character having a different reaction as the decades go by with the boatman trailing close behind. Short parable on death, immortality, happiness, and what we go through to prolong our lifespan.
Thought provoking short story by the author of the popular Red Rabbit and The Rose of Jericho novels. My only complaint is wanting it longer to better develop the character and flush out the plot.
Thought provoking short story by the author of the popular Red Rabbit and The Rose of Jericho novels. My only complaint is wanting it longer to better develop the character and flush out the plot.
Review of advance copy received from Publisher
Shortly after the Maria Calypso embarks on her fateful cruise, the crew and passengers find themselves pursued by a white-suited man poling a boat gently along behind them. As they race to keep ahead of The Boatman, the passengers make devastating discoveries about themselves and the nature of the man who pursues them.
At 150 pages, this novella is fast-paced and well-written. The author, Alex Grecian, gives us rounded characters, a solid storyline, and a dash of the fantastical. Despite its novella length, the pace of the writing feels more like a short story. The action begins early and keeps the reader involved throughout.
As the story progressed, the characters began to take on the qualities of various aspects of humanity. Love, loss, desperation, and innocence were all on display through the faces and actions of different characters.
To add more depth to an already amazing short story, the epistolary sections give the reader a breath of eco-horror and describe the changes the earth is experiencing through this decades-long pursuit between life and death.
Overall, this is a great novella that will definitely leave you thinking about it for some time to come.
At 150 pages, this novella is fast-paced and well-written. The author, Alex Grecian, gives us rounded characters, a solid storyline, and a dash of the fantastical. Despite its novella length, the pace of the writing feels more like a short story. The action begins early and keeps the reader involved throughout.
As the story progressed, the characters began to take on the qualities of various aspects of humanity. Love, loss, desperation, and innocence were all on display through the faces and actions of different characters.
To add more depth to an already amazing short story, the epistolary sections give the reader a breath of eco-horror and describe the changes the earth is experiencing through this decades-long pursuit between life and death.
Overall, this is a great novella that will definitely leave you thinking about it for some time to come.
June 29, 2026
The blurb promised me a mix of Stephen King and Italo Calvino - come now, let's not get too excited. This book is nowhere near the level of either of those writers, not to mention a blend of both.
Like countless people before me, I have been taken hostage by the opening line of The Gunslinger, so the premise of The Boatman and its splendid cover immediately grabbed my attention. But the problem here is that The Boatman is not a functioning novella - it's an outline of a novel or a script. It is obvious which scenes Alex Grecian wanted to write, but none of them are supported by anything beyond surface level when it comes to characters, structure, philosophical and thematic weight, or even basic tension and sequencing of events.
The premise is interesting, but I don't think it has been realized here, in a book format. Grecian definitely imagined the central scene between June and The Boatman in great detail and from every possible angle - and it's a wonderful moment, very McCarthy-flavoured. The rest of it is just cool imagery that falls apart the second you start interrogating it in any way. The "twist" ending was... alright. There were also some weird racial dynamics here that left a bad taste in my mouth. Let's just say this novella was on the discount rack of a thrift bookstore for a reason. Love the cover, though.
Like countless people before me, I have been taken hostage by the opening line of The Gunslinger, so the premise of The Boatman and its splendid cover immediately grabbed my attention. But the problem here is that The Boatman is not a functioning novella - it's an outline of a novel or a script. It is obvious which scenes Alex Grecian wanted to write, but none of them are supported by anything beyond surface level when it comes to characters, structure, philosophical and thematic weight, or even basic tension and sequencing of events.
The premise is interesting, but I don't think it has been realized here, in a book format. Grecian definitely imagined the central scene between June and The Boatman in great detail and from every possible angle - and it's a wonderful moment, very McCarthy-flavoured. The rest of it is just cool imagery that falls apart the second you start interrogating it in any way. The "twist" ending was... alright. There were also some weird racial dynamics here that left a bad taste in my mouth. Let's just say this novella was on the discount rack of a thrift bookstore for a reason. Love the cover, though.
April 16, 2026
I did not read the synopsis of the book before reading, and I am glad I didn't because it was a wonderful surprise. An intriguing premise of a strange man chasing down a cruise ship in Michael Myers fashion but in a small vessel of some sort. Yeah, I'm hooked.
It's hard to talk about too much without spoiling the story, but I did get uncomfortably claustrophobic while reading. I happened to be on an airplane and started thinking, "What if I never got off the plane?" Terrifying. Gave me a Groundhog Day feeling.
Read this if you like your stories quick and surreal and bittersweet. This was excellent.
It's hard to talk about too much without spoiling the story, but I did get uncomfortably claustrophobic while reading. I happened to be on an airplane and started thinking, "What if I never got off the plane?" Terrifying. Gave me a Groundhog Day feeling.
Read this if you like your stories quick and surreal and bittersweet. This was excellent.
June 11, 2026
As a massive fan of Alex Grecian, I eagerly devoured "The Yard" series, “Red Rabbit”, and "The Jericho Rose" the moment it dropped. I even regularly read and enjoy his website-exclusive short stories. However, "The Boatman" was a total disappointment. It completely lacked the vivid detail and gripping plotlines that usually define his work. Furthermore, the manuscript felt incredibly short. Given Grecian’s immense talent, this felt less like a thought-out novel and more like a rushed piece written solely to appease a nagging editor and hit a deadline.
May 11, 2026
This book started out with a very interesting premise and i was really curious to see what happens but the moment we find out who the boatman really is , nothing remotely scary goes on, theres no actual tension. When it comes to the characters, well... i just couldn't give a damn about any of them. I'd say the ending saves the book's dignity cause i found it satisfying and original in a sense. If the book was any longer i would've DNF'd it.
April 13, 2026
3.5 stars
A quick and entertaining read. I couldn’t imagine living on a ship for that long, I would go absolutely stir crazy. All in all, it was fairly predictable and the characters felt a bit flat, but I still enjoyed the story.
A quick and entertaining read. I couldn’t imagine living on a ship for that long, I would go absolutely stir crazy. All in all, it was fairly predictable and the characters felt a bit flat, but I still enjoyed the story.
April 30, 2026
Book didn’t really resonate with me, found the plot boring.
Did Not Finish
July 7, 2026I couldn't care less about these characters and I was so bored.
May 17, 2026
3.5 ⭐️ The Boatman by Alex Grecian
𝗤𝗨𝗜𝗖𝗞 𝗣𝗟𝗢𝗧 𝗣𝗘𝗘𝗞
As they disembark, the passengers and crew of the Maria Calypso cruise ship notice someone in pursuit: A man white suit who somehow keeps pace in his rowboat. No matter how hard the crew pushes the engines, they can't escape The Boatman…
𝗔𝗨𝗗𝗜𝗢 𝗧𝗔𝗞𝗘
Patricia Santomasso and Sean Patrick Hopkins’ performances were outstanding and really enhanced the eerie atmosphere while bringing each character to life. It’s narrated almost like a radio play, with “his” lines woven into “her” chapters and vice versa. It’s such a unique format and gave the story an old-fashioned feel that perfectly matched the time period. I thought it was a really clever artistic choice.
𝗦𝗧𝗢𝗥𝗬 𝗧𝗔𝗞𝗘
This is an atmospheric psychological read about the fear of death. The opening was so strong, intriguing, and genuinely creepy.
Even though it's a novella, it felt surprisingly layered. Jane and Walt were standout characters, along with The Boatman himself.
The supporting cast wasn't explored quite as deeply, but for such a short story it still worked well.
For me, it lost a little momentum midway through. I didn't feel as connected to Mai once she became more of the focus, and the pacing slowed quite a bit.
I loved the premise behind the ending, but not the execution. I wanted to actually see more of the outcome rather than imagine it, so the ending left me a little disappointed.
𝗪𝗢𝗥𝗧𝗛 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗥𝗘𝗔𝗗?
This is such a meaty, thought-provoking novella. Even though it's classed as horror, it's much more psychological than gory, which I was very happy about. And I highly recommend the audiobook for its entertaining quirkiness.
Thank you Sean Patrick Hopkins for this gifted audiobook.
🎧 Narrated by Patricia Santomasso, Sean Patrick Hopkins
📖 Release 04•07•26 | 150 pages | 2h 44m
𝗤𝗨𝗜𝗖𝗞 𝗣𝗟𝗢𝗧 𝗣𝗘𝗘𝗞
As they disembark, the passengers and crew of the Maria Calypso cruise ship notice someone in pursuit: A man white suit who somehow keeps pace in his rowboat. No matter how hard the crew pushes the engines, they can't escape The Boatman…
𝗔𝗨𝗗𝗜𝗢 𝗧𝗔𝗞𝗘
Patricia Santomasso and Sean Patrick Hopkins’ performances were outstanding and really enhanced the eerie atmosphere while bringing each character to life. It’s narrated almost like a radio play, with “his” lines woven into “her” chapters and vice versa. It’s such a unique format and gave the story an old-fashioned feel that perfectly matched the time period. I thought it was a really clever artistic choice.
𝗦𝗧𝗢𝗥𝗬 𝗧𝗔𝗞𝗘
This is an atmospheric psychological read about the fear of death. The opening was so strong, intriguing, and genuinely creepy.
Even though it's a novella, it felt surprisingly layered. Jane and Walt were standout characters, along with The Boatman himself.
The supporting cast wasn't explored quite as deeply, but for such a short story it still worked well.
For me, it lost a little momentum midway through. I didn't feel as connected to Mai once she became more of the focus, and the pacing slowed quite a bit.
I loved the premise behind the ending, but not the execution. I wanted to actually see more of the outcome rather than imagine it, so the ending left me a little disappointed.
𝗪𝗢𝗥𝗧𝗛 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗥𝗘𝗔𝗗?
This is such a meaty, thought-provoking novella. Even though it's classed as horror, it's much more psychological than gory, which I was very happy about. And I highly recommend the audiobook for its entertaining quirkiness.
Thank you Sean Patrick Hopkins for this gifted audiobook.
🎧 Narrated by Patricia Santomasso, Sean Patrick Hopkins
📖 Release 04•07•26 | 150 pages | 2h 44m
May 24, 2026
this was such a tightly told, expansive story done in 120 pages. i respect the fuck out of concise and expressive stories. i liked the global warming backdrop, i liked the characters, i liked the fact that this guy got us through decades of life in one chapter. me likey a lot.
August 28, 2026
I really enjoyed this 110 page horror novella that really isn’t horror. Yes, it is atmospheric and filled with a sense of dread, but there’s no blood. What there is is a cruise ship that’s being followed by Mr. death who is standing in a rowboat. I saw the book mostly as a philosophical look at the value of death and life. I also enjoyed this authors strange western horror books called. RED RABBIT and its sequel ROSE OF JERICHO.
May 4, 2026
BLURB:
Newlyweds June James, a writer, and Walt Dennison embark on a honeymoon cruise in 1977. It turns unsettling when a man in a white suit—the Boatman—appears behind the ship, always following and tied to repeated attempts to kill people onboard. As decades pass, a small group remains on board enforcing strict rules to keep the ship going while trying to evade him.
REVIEW:
If you love a good horror novella like me, you definitely need to put this one on your radar! It’s more atmospheric psychological horror slow-burn dread rather than anything terrifying—and no major body horror or gore. If you haven’t read Alex Grecian’s work before like I hadn’t, this book will impress you with how much he’s able to pack into a short novella. The writing is great, and the well-developed characters and fully fleshed-out plot almost feel like a full-length novel. And he weaves in some great horror and thriller tropes, including a relentless supernatural chase, isolated setting, existential dread, race against inevitability, and survival under constant psychological pressure—in a narrative that’s likely unlike anything you’ve read before!
The story is mostly told via the 3rd-person POVs of June and Walt but occasionally shifts to other crew members on board, including Captain Billy Prescott, his safety officer Amanda, and Dr. Vincent, all of whom play key roles in evading the Boatman and keeping the passengers on board safe and healthy. But the ship journeys onward for five decades, and while all these characters remain on board, maintaining order and developing a sort of “dystopian found family,” many others leave. And soon they come up with rules—no new passengers and no children. The Boatman is mostly in the background as an unstoppable force of death, but there is one key scene where he makes his presence known, and what he has to say is pretty darn creepy!
The horror is mostly atmospheric. There are some terrifying scenes early on when the man in the white suit first attempts to take the life of the captain, but afterwards the horror mostly comes from the psychological dread of wondering when he’ll catch up with them—as it’s clearly inevitable.
The book has only four chapters, all of which are quite long, but it’s easy to remain engaged as the plot is always moving, and the timeline often jumps years, taking characters to different parts of the world. Each chapter also ends with some fascinating information about the landmark or port the ship is approaching—completely unnecessary but so interesting, and it gives the story more of a creepy real-world feel!
What made this book so effective for me, aside from its highly original plot, is how unpredictable it is. You literally never know what’s going to happen next or what part of the world they’ll be landing in. The second half has some compelling emotional conflicts between the survivors that question their moral compass and highlight the long-term psychological cost of living under constant pursuit. The climax is quick and thrilling and is followed by a final twist that’s both emotional and shocking—and may take you a few moments to wrap your head around! You’ll likely feel unsettled afterwards, but it’s still totally worth a binge read!
Newlyweds June James, a writer, and Walt Dennison embark on a honeymoon cruise in 1977. It turns unsettling when a man in a white suit—the Boatman—appears behind the ship, always following and tied to repeated attempts to kill people onboard. As decades pass, a small group remains on board enforcing strict rules to keep the ship going while trying to evade him.
REVIEW:
If you love a good horror novella like me, you definitely need to put this one on your radar! It’s more atmospheric psychological horror slow-burn dread rather than anything terrifying—and no major body horror or gore. If you haven’t read Alex Grecian’s work before like I hadn’t, this book will impress you with how much he’s able to pack into a short novella. The writing is great, and the well-developed characters and fully fleshed-out plot almost feel like a full-length novel. And he weaves in some great horror and thriller tropes, including a relentless supernatural chase, isolated setting, existential dread, race against inevitability, and survival under constant psychological pressure—in a narrative that’s likely unlike anything you’ve read before!
The story is mostly told via the 3rd-person POVs of June and Walt but occasionally shifts to other crew members on board, including Captain Billy Prescott, his safety officer Amanda, and Dr. Vincent, all of whom play key roles in evading the Boatman and keeping the passengers on board safe and healthy. But the ship journeys onward for five decades, and while all these characters remain on board, maintaining order and developing a sort of “dystopian found family,” many others leave. And soon they come up with rules—no new passengers and no children. The Boatman is mostly in the background as an unstoppable force of death, but there is one key scene where he makes his presence known, and what he has to say is pretty darn creepy!
The horror is mostly atmospheric. There are some terrifying scenes early on when the man in the white suit first attempts to take the life of the captain, but afterwards the horror mostly comes from the psychological dread of wondering when he’ll catch up with them—as it’s clearly inevitable.
The book has only four chapters, all of which are quite long, but it’s easy to remain engaged as the plot is always moving, and the timeline often jumps years, taking characters to different parts of the world. Each chapter also ends with some fascinating information about the landmark or port the ship is approaching—completely unnecessary but so interesting, and it gives the story more of a creepy real-world feel!
What made this book so effective for me, aside from its highly original plot, is how unpredictable it is. You literally never know what’s going to happen next or what part of the world they’ll be landing in. The second half has some compelling emotional conflicts between the survivors that question their moral compass and highlight the long-term psychological cost of living under constant pursuit. The climax is quick and thrilling and is followed by a final twist that’s both emotional and shocking—and may take you a few moments to wrap your head around! You’ll likely feel unsettled afterwards, but it’s still totally worth a binge read!
July 31, 2026
While this was good, I can see myself forgetting that I'd read it in the future.
First and foremost, I don't know if it's due to the ebook edition I read this on, but there were several formatting errors as well as punctuation and grammar errors.
I loved the idea for this story, however the way that the characters initially start making choices was really far-fetched for me. Also, regarding the characters, I really liked them but found them to be underdeveloped. This book does a good job at making things feel eerie with an underlying sense of dread but whenever a character would disappear, I'd only ever feel some sort of creepiness/loss as "Oh someone is gone" rather than feeling some sort of creepiness/loss that that specific person is gone.
The story overall felt tame considering what I felt like it set itself up for. Even with the short length, it never felt like we were pulling all of the punches, so a lot of things that happened either felt, like I said, tame or honestly silly. This makes the underdevelopment of the overall plight of the characters seem dodgy, too. The captain has a heart attack but can't actually die because Death is chasing them, but he is technically dead. So does his body not rot or decay or anything? Also, do the passengers age or not? Their birthdays pass, but do they themselves age? None of these topics are even talked about, let alone expanded upon so we get no horror or conflict tat could've come from them. What's still tame is the idea of people being stuck on a boat for so long and yet no chaos or discord either happens or builds up. While this story is dreadful and slightly eerie, there are so many things we could've done more of or just better and that's a real shame.
The characters' decisions don't really make much sense to me either. Maybe this is because we get so little development from any of them, but no they just make the most far-fetched decisions. There's a whole revelation about what they could've done that honestly baffled me when I read it. It had me thinking, "What do you mean you didn't know this? We literally established this at the beginning. Or did I hallucinate that?"
I don't know. It wasn't bad but it also wasn't amazing. I wish it had more substance, which maybe would've helped the overall feeling of underdevelopment as well as that haphazardly placed theme of global warming that suddenly appears towards the last third of the book.
First and foremost, I don't know if it's due to the ebook edition I read this on, but there were several formatting errors as well as punctuation and grammar errors.
I loved the idea for this story, however the way that the characters initially start making choices was really far-fetched for me. Also, regarding the characters, I really liked them but found them to be underdeveloped. This book does a good job at making things feel eerie with an underlying sense of dread but whenever a character would disappear, I'd only ever feel some sort of creepiness/loss as "Oh someone is gone" rather than feeling some sort of creepiness/loss that that specific person is gone.
The story overall felt tame considering what I felt like it set itself up for. Even with the short length, it never felt like we were pulling all of the punches, so a lot of things that happened either felt, like I said, tame or honestly silly. This makes the underdevelopment of the overall plight of the characters seem dodgy, too. The captain has a heart attack but can't actually die because Death is chasing them, but he is technically dead. So does his body not rot or decay or anything? Also, do the passengers age or not? Their birthdays pass, but do they themselves age? None of these topics are even talked about, let alone expanded upon so we get no horror or conflict tat could've come from them. What's still tame is the idea of people being stuck on a boat for so long and yet no chaos or discord either happens or builds up. While this story is dreadful and slightly eerie, there are so many things we could've done more of or just better and that's a real shame.
The characters' decisions don't really make much sense to me either. Maybe this is because we get so little development from any of them, but no they just make the most far-fetched decisions. There's a whole revelation about what they could've done that honestly baffled me when I read it. It had me thinking, "What do you mean you didn't know this? We literally established this at the beginning. Or did I hallucinate that?"
I don't know. It wasn't bad but it also wasn't amazing. I wish it had more substance, which maybe would've helped the overall feeling of underdevelopment as well as that haphazardly placed theme of global warming that suddenly appears towards the last third of the book.
May 20, 2026
An eerie psychological horror novella with a unique premise and atmospheric setting. A group of people running away from death who end up running away from truly living. Grecian packs a lot into this compelling novella with psychological horror unfolding under sunny skies. It's claustrophobic and unsettling.
It is 1977, and a group of cruise ship passengers notices a man in a rowboat keeping pace with them on the open sea. They soon realize he is a grim reaper type figure. As they try to outrun and outsmart death, they circle the globe for years in an attempt to evade him. The ship is their safe place that slowly becomes a prison. The characters may be surviving physically, but psychological deterioration sets in, leading to desperation, paranoia, and cruelty. There is a creeping sense of doom and isolation, but the tension and fright come from psychological unease rather than gore.
The audiobook features a stellar duet performance by Patricia Santomasso and Sean Patrick Hopkins. Their narration enhances the story, bringing to life the sights, sounds, and emotions as well as the dread and suspense. The two sound great together and are easy to listen to, which is nice because this one is bingeable. Hopkins voices several male POVs, including The Boatman, a calm, courteous, and elegantly menacing character. Hopkins really nails the character, making his polite manner sound chilling. This audiobook kept me entertained during an afternoon of errands and is perfect for summer reading. If you want something immersive that is also a quick listen, this is one to add to your
It is 1977, and a group of cruise ship passengers notices a man in a rowboat keeping pace with them on the open sea. They soon realize he is a grim reaper type figure. As they try to outrun and outsmart death, they circle the globe for years in an attempt to evade him. The ship is their safe place that slowly becomes a prison. The characters may be surviving physically, but psychological deterioration sets in, leading to desperation, paranoia, and cruelty. There is a creeping sense of doom and isolation, but the tension and fright come from psychological unease rather than gore.
The audiobook features a stellar duet performance by Patricia Santomasso and Sean Patrick Hopkins. Their narration enhances the story, bringing to life the sights, sounds, and emotions as well as the dread and suspense. The two sound great together and are easy to listen to, which is nice because this one is bingeable. Hopkins voices several male POVs, including The Boatman, a calm, courteous, and elegantly menacing character. Hopkins really nails the character, making his polite manner sound chilling. This audiobook kept me entertained during an afternoon of errands and is perfect for summer reading. If you want something immersive that is also a quick listen, this is one to add to your
July 18, 2026
In between reading more highfalutin books, I have a tendency to pick up slim horror novels for a dose of silliness before my next grandiose literary adventure. Thus The Boatman.
Alex Grecian's short novel starts with an interesting premise: a cruise ship finds itself pursued by a lone figure that may be Charon, the ferryman of Greek fable. As long as the ship doesn't drop its speed, the Boatman never quite catches up, and the passengers believe that they may attain immortality.
The first half of the novel examines the strange rituals and legends that the passengers and crew of the Maria Calypso begin to create for themselves, as they try to maintain their precarious emancipation from death. I enjoyed this exploration of how a collection of random individuals try to understand their unique situation.
Unfortunately, the second half of the book turns sentimental, as two of the passengers adopt an orphan found drifting near the Maria Calypso. At this point, the story loses all interest and the author never resolves the interesting ideas that he developed so well in the early pages.
Alex Grecian's short novel starts with an interesting premise: a cruise ship finds itself pursued by a lone figure that may be Charon, the ferryman of Greek fable. As long as the ship doesn't drop its speed, the Boatman never quite catches up, and the passengers believe that they may attain immortality.
The first half of the novel examines the strange rituals and legends that the passengers and crew of the Maria Calypso begin to create for themselves, as they try to maintain their precarious emancipation from death. I enjoyed this exploration of how a collection of random individuals try to understand their unique situation.
Unfortunately, the second half of the book turns sentimental, as two of the passengers adopt an orphan found drifting near the Maria Calypso. At this point, the story loses all interest and the author never resolves the interesting ideas that he developed so well in the early pages.
June 7, 2026
You couldn’t pay me to vacation on a cruise ship, let alone convince me to start living on one.
July 7, 2026
Big fan, loved all three books I've read by the author. Can't wait to read more.
May 8, 2026
I listened to the audiobook (narrated excellently by Sean Patrick Hopkins and Patricia Santomasso) earlier this month and I really enjoyed this short, eerie supernatural tale.
The concept of The Boatman is so simple on the surface: a strange man in a white suit is paddling along in a boat behind a cruise ship. This then went in directions I was not expecting. I won’t spoil any of the plot so you can discover it for yourself.
There is something very eerie and Twilight Zone-esque with this novella. A slow creeping dread that is ever present throughout. Because this book is so short, you aren’t able to spend as much time with the characters as you would in a longer work and this is actually an example where I think this would have been even better with some more pages to flesh out the characters.
This is such a minor gripe though because I still felt the emotional resonance of The Boatman deep in my soul. This is one of those stories I’ll be thinking about for a while. I recommend you check this one out and I highly recommend the audiobook!
Thanks to Sean Patrick Hopkins for sending me the audiobook for this one, as well as Bad Hand Books for sending me the ebook!
The concept of The Boatman is so simple on the surface: a strange man in a white suit is paddling along in a boat behind a cruise ship. This then went in directions I was not expecting. I won’t spoil any of the plot so you can discover it for yourself.
There is something very eerie and Twilight Zone-esque with this novella. A slow creeping dread that is ever present throughout. Because this book is so short, you aren’t able to spend as much time with the characters as you would in a longer work and this is actually an example where I think this would have been even better with some more pages to flesh out the characters.
This is such a minor gripe though because I still felt the emotional resonance of The Boatman deep in my soul. This is one of those stories I’ll be thinking about for a while. I recommend you check this one out and I highly recommend the audiobook!
Thanks to Sean Patrick Hopkins for sending me the audiobook for this one, as well as Bad Hand Books for sending me the ebook!
April 20, 2026
The Man in the White Suit Is in No Hurry
BWAF Score: 6/10
TL;DR: A single unforgettable image, a rowboat keeping pace with a cruise ship across decades, carries Grecian’s slim novella most of the way on its own. The Boatman himself, when he finally comes ashore, is a small marvel of courteous menace. A late pirate detour softens the dread, but the closing pages still land.
The image is clean. A rowboat keeps pace with a cruise ship. The man in the rowboat wears a white suit, a green tie, a white Panama hat with a green band. He stands and poles his little craft like a gondolier. The ship is the Maria Calypso, out of PortMiami in May of 1977. The captain has a heart attack at the wheel the day the Boatman appears in the wake, which tells the passengers what they need to know. As long as the ship keeps moving, the captain does not die. Neither does anyone else. They buy the ship. They keep moving. Decades pass.
(The premise is enough for a while, which is another way of saying it is not enough for all of it.)
What the book is good at is objects. A plastic honeymoon lei, purple and pink, traded between two men as the stakes of small bets for fifty years, its purple petals fading to gray, its pink petals fading to white. A Nambu pistol from a stall in a bazaar, carried across three acts in the waistband of a pair of capris. A stuffed purple rabbit a child hugs in her sleep forty years after she is too old to. A cardboard cigarette carton with the lei coiled inside, left with a boy at a graveyard with instructions to wait. The catalogue is where the book lives. The catalogue is where most of the book’s dread lives, too, when it is working.
The book is interrupted four times by Wikipedia pages. Advent Island. Port of the Everglades. Vallvidrera. Fake citations, deadpan tone, geographies reshaped by rising water. The pages do not say what year it is. They are how the book tells you what year it is without making the characters have to notice. Miami is raised three times and then drowned. Barcelona goes under and Vallvidrera becomes the coast. The American alligator goes extinct, the Florida panther goes extinct, the West Indian manatee goes extinct, and then later a young woman on a rice farm built on submerged land hears a panther at night. (She is the adopted daughter of the couple on the ship. The rice farm is in what used to be Florida.)
The Boatman eventually comes ashore and has a cup of coffee with the protagonist and a child in a courtyard on Advent Island. This is the best scene in the book. He is slightly built. He wears gold hoops in his ears. He orders kopi tubruk for all three of them and tells a story about a beautiful boy whom he let live, once, decades ago, and what the boy did afterward. He says he was a doughboy in the Great War. He says his rifle went off by accident and that was how he inherited the job. He says he lacks ambition. He is courteous. He is reluctant. He is the book’s best invention, and the book is not quite what it would have been without him.
(It should not work. A chatty Death at a café, ordering coffee, telling a parable. In most hands it would collapse. It does not collapse.)
The book could have been a slow rout. A ship emptying itself out across decades. Passengers choosing their own exits, or not choosing them, or being chosen for. That book exists inside this book, in flashes. Kaye Vega in an airport in Sydney, sitting with a plane ticket stuck in an unread paperback, calculating how long the flight would take, calculating how long until the ship weighed anchor without her, choosing the ship. Larry Reeves lowering himself into a dinghy and rowing out to meet the Boatman because he had been dying of cancer for fifty years and would like to stop. A woman on the lido deck with a ham sandwich and a bottle of Blue Moon and a mustard stain on her blouse, watching her friend jump from the deck above her. These are the pages where the book is what it is supposed to be.
Halfway through, the captain and the safety officer decide to throw three passengers off the ship to slow Death down. They discuss this with the doctor in the captain’s office. There is a bottle of Scotch. The doctor picks up the bottle, sniffs it, sets it back down. Later in the scene, the doctor picks up the bottle and drinks from it. Later still, the doctor takes a second swig and slams the bottle down. The captain proposes a toast to a long life and one hell of a cruise and they agree to be friends again. Three people are dead. The book moves on. (This is where you are supposed to feel the horror, presumably.)
The supporting cast is cataloged by function. Pete the lawyer does lawyer things. Betty the web designer does web designer things. Amanda the safety officer carries the gun. A sentence, or a role, or both.
The author is Alex Grecian. He is in his mid-fifties, based in the American Midwest, lives (according to his author bios) with his wife, his son, a dog, and a tarantula named Rosie. He spent the 2010s on a five-book Victorian series set around Scotland Yard’s Murder Squad, starting at Putnam’s in 2012. He pivoted to horror proper in 2023 with Red Rabbit at Tor Nightfire, a supernatural western, then a loose sequel in 2025. The Boatman is a side project, 110 pages, from Bad Hand Books, the small press run by the Bram Stoker Award-winning editor Doug Murano. Interior layout by Todd Keisling under his Dullington design imprint. Grecian has also written graphic novels for fifteen years (Proof, Rasputin). The graphic novel habit shows. The Wikipedia interludes have the load-bearing brevity of captions. The pirate attack in the final act is structured like a sequence of panels, and not a very long sequence.
The pirate attack arrives in the last act. A freighter. Two Sunseeker yachts. Grenades. A long-range acoustic device bolted to the deck. A water cannon. A woman on one deck with a rifle, a man on another strapped into a cannon’s swivel chair. A different book starts here, briefer than the book it is interrupting, and then it is over. The Boatman is not in the pirate scene, which is the scene’s tell. The book’s central threat has been, for most of the book, a man in a small boat who never closes the distance, and now the threat is something else, and then it is not the threat anymore.
It is a good slim book. It is not a scary book. It works on a reader the way a long Sunday works on a person who is avoiding a phone call. Somewhere out there, at the same distance as ever, a man in a white suit stands in a rowboat and poles it steadily through the water. He is not in a hurry. He has all the time in the world.
BWAF Score: 6/10
TL;DR: A single unforgettable image, a rowboat keeping pace with a cruise ship across decades, carries Grecian’s slim novella most of the way on its own. The Boatman himself, when he finally comes ashore, is a small marvel of courteous menace. A late pirate detour softens the dread, but the closing pages still land.
The image is clean. A rowboat keeps pace with a cruise ship. The man in the rowboat wears a white suit, a green tie, a white Panama hat with a green band. He stands and poles his little craft like a gondolier. The ship is the Maria Calypso, out of PortMiami in May of 1977. The captain has a heart attack at the wheel the day the Boatman appears in the wake, which tells the passengers what they need to know. As long as the ship keeps moving, the captain does not die. Neither does anyone else. They buy the ship. They keep moving. Decades pass.
(The premise is enough for a while, which is another way of saying it is not enough for all of it.)
What the book is good at is objects. A plastic honeymoon lei, purple and pink, traded between two men as the stakes of small bets for fifty years, its purple petals fading to gray, its pink petals fading to white. A Nambu pistol from a stall in a bazaar, carried across three acts in the waistband of a pair of capris. A stuffed purple rabbit a child hugs in her sleep forty years after she is too old to. A cardboard cigarette carton with the lei coiled inside, left with a boy at a graveyard with instructions to wait. The catalogue is where the book lives. The catalogue is where most of the book’s dread lives, too, when it is working.
The book is interrupted four times by Wikipedia pages. Advent Island. Port of the Everglades. Vallvidrera. Fake citations, deadpan tone, geographies reshaped by rising water. The pages do not say what year it is. They are how the book tells you what year it is without making the characters have to notice. Miami is raised three times and then drowned. Barcelona goes under and Vallvidrera becomes the coast. The American alligator goes extinct, the Florida panther goes extinct, the West Indian manatee goes extinct, and then later a young woman on a rice farm built on submerged land hears a panther at night. (She is the adopted daughter of the couple on the ship. The rice farm is in what used to be Florida.)
The Boatman eventually comes ashore and has a cup of coffee with the protagonist and a child in a courtyard on Advent Island. This is the best scene in the book. He is slightly built. He wears gold hoops in his ears. He orders kopi tubruk for all three of them and tells a story about a beautiful boy whom he let live, once, decades ago, and what the boy did afterward. He says he was a doughboy in the Great War. He says his rifle went off by accident and that was how he inherited the job. He says he lacks ambition. He is courteous. He is reluctant. He is the book’s best invention, and the book is not quite what it would have been without him.
(It should not work. A chatty Death at a café, ordering coffee, telling a parable. In most hands it would collapse. It does not collapse.)
The book could have been a slow rout. A ship emptying itself out across decades. Passengers choosing their own exits, or not choosing them, or being chosen for. That book exists inside this book, in flashes. Kaye Vega in an airport in Sydney, sitting with a plane ticket stuck in an unread paperback, calculating how long the flight would take, calculating how long until the ship weighed anchor without her, choosing the ship. Larry Reeves lowering himself into a dinghy and rowing out to meet the Boatman because he had been dying of cancer for fifty years and would like to stop. A woman on the lido deck with a ham sandwich and a bottle of Blue Moon and a mustard stain on her blouse, watching her friend jump from the deck above her. These are the pages where the book is what it is supposed to be.
Halfway through, the captain and the safety officer decide to throw three passengers off the ship to slow Death down. They discuss this with the doctor in the captain’s office. There is a bottle of Scotch. The doctor picks up the bottle, sniffs it, sets it back down. Later in the scene, the doctor picks up the bottle and drinks from it. Later still, the doctor takes a second swig and slams the bottle down. The captain proposes a toast to a long life and one hell of a cruise and they agree to be friends again. Three people are dead. The book moves on. (This is where you are supposed to feel the horror, presumably.)
The supporting cast is cataloged by function. Pete the lawyer does lawyer things. Betty the web designer does web designer things. Amanda the safety officer carries the gun. A sentence, or a role, or both.
The author is Alex Grecian. He is in his mid-fifties, based in the American Midwest, lives (according to his author bios) with his wife, his son, a dog, and a tarantula named Rosie. He spent the 2010s on a five-book Victorian series set around Scotland Yard’s Murder Squad, starting at Putnam’s in 2012. He pivoted to horror proper in 2023 with Red Rabbit at Tor Nightfire, a supernatural western, then a loose sequel in 2025. The Boatman is a side project, 110 pages, from Bad Hand Books, the small press run by the Bram Stoker Award-winning editor Doug Murano. Interior layout by Todd Keisling under his Dullington design imprint. Grecian has also written graphic novels for fifteen years (Proof, Rasputin). The graphic novel habit shows. The Wikipedia interludes have the load-bearing brevity of captions. The pirate attack in the final act is structured like a sequence of panels, and not a very long sequence.
The pirate attack arrives in the last act. A freighter. Two Sunseeker yachts. Grenades. A long-range acoustic device bolted to the deck. A water cannon. A woman on one deck with a rifle, a man on another strapped into a cannon’s swivel chair. A different book starts here, briefer than the book it is interrupting, and then it is over. The Boatman is not in the pirate scene, which is the scene’s tell. The book’s central threat has been, for most of the book, a man in a small boat who never closes the distance, and now the threat is something else, and then it is not the threat anymore.
It is a good slim book. It is not a scary book. It works on a reader the way a long Sunday works on a person who is avoiding a phone call. Somewhere out there, at the same distance as ever, a man in a white suit stands in a rowboat and poles it steadily through the water. He is not in a hurry. He has all the time in the world.
September 4, 2026
I started taking rant notes on page three and never stopped. Wow did I not like this. I have no idea how people are giving this 5 stars. Here are the reasons I will not be:
-17 pages in, June is dreadful, waking up in the middle of the night sure the Boatman is closer - I know this is a novella but there’s no buildup: all tell, no show
-the Boatman is described as gaining on the ship, but somehow can never catch them at port; I don’t care if they have a perfect planned schedule to get back to the cruise ship, it’s just not believable.
-though very limited character development, I laughed when the captain said “can we be friends again” bc even drunk, there’s no way he talks like that
-the blurb on the back talks about the true nature of man - I thought at least it would get gritty after mentioning they found ways to cope with monotony: cigarettes, alcohol, even heroin that’s “readily available”. But literally the next sentence says “There was a yoga group and a book club, a knitting circle, a dance troupe.” The drugs were never mentioned again. Barely scratched the surface of profound acts these individuals might stoop to when they believe they can outrun death, while at the same time suffering from tedious, repetitive sameness! Instead it’s mostly about becoming a family?
-the lack of logic as well: Mai and her family found a raft. Sure it takes on water but Mai’s fingers and toes eaten up by fish…why? And then, one of the first things June does on the island is buy Mai a dress to change into so she can get out of her salt-ridden dirty clothes from sea….you’re telling me no one on the ship thought to let her change of soaking clothes during the two additional days it took to get to the island? AND THEN, It’s like 2027 (or even later?) and June can’t look on the internet for how to say birthday in Vietnamese, when she has a laptop and that’s how she been turning in her manuscripts via internet while at sea!
-eco-horror where? Obviously in the strange articles between the chapters, it talks about how animals are extinct; cities have been flooded, submerged from memory; armed and prominent gangs everywhere….but that’s how we get the info. Just an article. Yes that’s scary but it hasn’t been tied into the story at all to where we see the true impact on the characters. Felt like an afterthought.
-Finally June. Was her flawed character intentional? I mean her final act at the end doesn’t even seem like character growth bc she clearly didn’t talk to Walt about her plans. I just don’t understand the thought logic with Mai’s family and Mai’s condition - there seemed to be racist conclusions on June’s part. Like just because they were Vietnamese…there’s no way that they had family to go back to? No way they knew about Mai’s condition and had the means to take care of it if they had just used a phone when they got to an island?! And I’m hoping the author was trying to show us her flaws bc otherwise when she is talking to the Boatman and he’s telling this grand story, all she’s thinking about is when what Walt will think when she’s dead. Like you telling me this ominous figure has been chasing you for years and when he’s finally speaking with you, you don’t sit in rapt attention but zone out?
There was so much potential. The sit down with the Boatman was v interesting. I think the real problem was making this a novella. So many good ideas with not one fully executed.
-17 pages in, June is dreadful, waking up in the middle of the night sure the Boatman is closer - I know this is a novella but there’s no buildup: all tell, no show
-the Boatman is described as gaining on the ship, but somehow can never catch them at port; I don’t care if they have a perfect planned schedule to get back to the cruise ship, it’s just not believable.
-though very limited character development, I laughed when the captain said “can we be friends again” bc even drunk, there’s no way he talks like that
-the blurb on the back talks about the true nature of man - I thought at least it would get gritty after mentioning they found ways to cope with monotony: cigarettes, alcohol, even heroin that’s “readily available”. But literally the next sentence says “There was a yoga group and a book club, a knitting circle, a dance troupe.” The drugs were never mentioned again. Barely scratched the surface of profound acts these individuals might stoop to when they believe they can outrun death, while at the same time suffering from tedious, repetitive sameness! Instead it’s mostly about becoming a family?
-the lack of logic as well: Mai and her family found a raft. Sure it takes on water but Mai’s fingers and toes eaten up by fish…why? And then, one of the first things June does on the island is buy Mai a dress to change into so she can get out of her salt-ridden dirty clothes from sea….you’re telling me no one on the ship thought to let her change of soaking clothes during the two additional days it took to get to the island? AND THEN, It’s like 2027 (or even later?) and June can’t look on the internet for how to say birthday in Vietnamese, when she has a laptop and that’s how she been turning in her manuscripts via internet while at sea!
-eco-horror where? Obviously in the strange articles between the chapters, it talks about how animals are extinct; cities have been flooded, submerged from memory; armed and prominent gangs everywhere….but that’s how we get the info. Just an article. Yes that’s scary but it hasn’t been tied into the story at all to where we see the true impact on the characters. Felt like an afterthought.
-Finally June. Was her flawed character intentional? I mean her final act at the end doesn’t even seem like character growth bc she clearly didn’t talk to Walt about her plans. I just don’t understand the thought logic with Mai’s family and Mai’s condition - there seemed to be racist conclusions on June’s part. Like just because they were Vietnamese…there’s no way that they had family to go back to? No way they knew about Mai’s condition and had the means to take care of it if they had just used a phone when they got to an island?! And I’m hoping the author was trying to show us her flaws bc otherwise when she is talking to the Boatman and he’s telling this grand story, all she’s thinking about is when what Walt will think when she’s dead. Like you telling me this ominous figure has been chasing you for years and when he’s finally speaking with you, you don’t sit in rapt attention but zone out?
There was so much potential. The sit down with the Boatman was v interesting. I think the real problem was making this a novella. So many good ideas with not one fully executed.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 4, 2026
This is a classic example of a great idea for a story that was ruined by bad execution. I loved the premise of this book and I had high hopes going in, but there were 2 major things that really kept me from enjoying this book as much as I thought I would:
1. The characters in this novella simply do not behave how actual people would in their situation. For example, when the boatman starts following the ship, everyone is way too quick to accept the idea that he is a supernatural threat. Captain Billy literally orders the safety officer to shoot the boatman immediately after he learns that the ship is being followed. He literally says “shoot that thing out of the water” without any information other than a man in a suit is following the cruise ship in a rowboat. Why, given so little information, is the captain immediately convinced that the boatman is a) not human and b) should be shot at? We do later learn that the boatman is actually death personified, but how does the captain know the boatman isn’t human this early on? There’s just no way he can know that. You can almost write that off as oh, he’s a superstitious sailor, but then the ship’s DOCTOR, Vincent, also immediately agrees with the captain, grabs the gun from the safety officer, and takes a shot at the boatman himself.
This is a running theme in the early portion of the book. Everyone on the cruise ship is way too quick to accept a supernatural explanation what’s going on. Hardly anyone questions the logic of this. The only character to ever question it is the safety officer, yet she questions it only once, right before rapidly accepting the supernatural explanation like everyone else. People simply do not behave this way. There should have been some dissent among the passengers and crew about what was going on to make them more believable as people, which brings me to my 2nd gripe…
2. This book is simply too short for its own good and as a result, character development was largely non-existent. There should have been more time spent on getting to know the characters as individuals and probably some more conflicts between them as a result of those differing personalities. Without that, the characters gradually stopped feeling like people and more like cardboard cut-outs. This makes them harder to root for/be invested in.
Again, I wanted to like this story and it has good bones, but character development is important and my suspension of disbelief only goes so far.
1. The characters in this novella simply do not behave how actual people would in their situation. For example, when the boatman starts following the ship, everyone is way too quick to accept the idea that he is a supernatural threat. Captain Billy literally orders the safety officer to shoot the boatman immediately after he learns that the ship is being followed. He literally says “shoot that thing out of the water” without any information other than a man in a suit is following the cruise ship in a rowboat. Why, given so little information, is the captain immediately convinced that the boatman is a) not human and b) should be shot at? We do later learn that the boatman is actually death personified, but how does the captain know the boatman isn’t human this early on? There’s just no way he can know that. You can almost write that off as oh, he’s a superstitious sailor, but then the ship’s DOCTOR, Vincent, also immediately agrees with the captain, grabs the gun from the safety officer, and takes a shot at the boatman himself.
This is a running theme in the early portion of the book. Everyone on the cruise ship is way too quick to accept a supernatural explanation what’s going on. Hardly anyone questions the logic of this. The only character to ever question it is the safety officer, yet she questions it only once, right before rapidly accepting the supernatural explanation like everyone else. People simply do not behave this way. There should have been some dissent among the passengers and crew about what was going on to make them more believable as people, which brings me to my 2nd gripe…
2. This book is simply too short for its own good and as a result, character development was largely non-existent. There should have been more time spent on getting to know the characters as individuals and probably some more conflicts between them as a result of those differing personalities. Without that, the characters gradually stopped feeling like people and more like cardboard cut-outs. This makes them harder to root for/be invested in.
Again, I wanted to like this story and it has good bones, but character development is important and my suspension of disbelief only goes so far.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Review of advance copy received from Publisher
When I saw Bad Hand Books was releasing a new Alex Grecian, I didn’t even pretend to play it cool and rushed to their DMs to beg for a copy. Having previously adored Red Rabbit and its sequel‑of‑sorts Rose of Jericho, The Boatman was an instant must‑have.
This time Grecian trades the weird west for the open ocean. June and Walt Dennison board the cruise ship Maria Calypso for their honeymoon in what they believe will be a quick break from the demands of their daily lives. But two days in, June steps out on deck, lost in thoughts of all the responsibilities waiting back home — the thank‑you cards, the unopened gifts, the novel she’s supposed to be writing — when she spots something impossible: a man in a white suit, standing in a tiny boat, rowing it like a gondola… and somehow keeping perfect pace with the massive ship.
Storms don’t shake him. Speed changes don’t matter. He never falls behind, never draws closer. Just rows. And waits.
Speculation spreads fast, but it’s the ship’s doctor, Vincent, who finally says the quiet part out loud: he believes the figure is Death itself, come to collect. And the timing is suspicious — the very day June saw the boatman, the Captain suffered a heart attack he absolutely should not have survived. Vincent urges everyone to stay aboard, even when the ship docks for supplies. Some crew and passengers bail anyway. But June, Walt, and a handful of others stay put, terrified that stepping off the ship might be the very thing that seals their fate.
This is a dark, eerie, wonderfully unsettling read. Grecian expertly plays with the unknown — what we fear about death, what we’d sacrifice to outrun it, and how long a person could live in a floating purgatory before the waiting becomes its own kind of doom.
Dark, tense, and deeply enjoyable — a four‑star voyage into the unknown. This one should be on all of your wishlists this April.
This time Grecian trades the weird west for the open ocean. June and Walt Dennison board the cruise ship Maria Calypso for their honeymoon in what they believe will be a quick break from the demands of their daily lives. But two days in, June steps out on deck, lost in thoughts of all the responsibilities waiting back home — the thank‑you cards, the unopened gifts, the novel she’s supposed to be writing — when she spots something impossible: a man in a white suit, standing in a tiny boat, rowing it like a gondola… and somehow keeping perfect pace with the massive ship.
Storms don’t shake him. Speed changes don’t matter. He never falls behind, never draws closer. Just rows. And waits.
Speculation spreads fast, but it’s the ship’s doctor, Vincent, who finally says the quiet part out loud: he believes the figure is Death itself, come to collect. And the timing is suspicious — the very day June saw the boatman, the Captain suffered a heart attack he absolutely should not have survived. Vincent urges everyone to stay aboard, even when the ship docks for supplies. Some crew and passengers bail anyway. But June, Walt, and a handful of others stay put, terrified that stepping off the ship might be the very thing that seals their fate.
This is a dark, eerie, wonderfully unsettling read. Grecian expertly plays with the unknown — what we fear about death, what we’d sacrifice to outrun it, and how long a person could live in a floating purgatory before the waiting becomes its own kind of doom.
Dark, tense, and deeply enjoyable — a four‑star voyage into the unknown. This one should be on all of your wishlists this April.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 88 reviews