Kayak

by Kristal Stittle

For eighteen-year-old Keith—floating alone on a series of lakes and rivers, lost and without supplies—his kayak is his means of survival. Solid ground means certain death at the scissor-claws of vicious invading creatures.

What he needs is to find more people; but terrible guilt anchors him in solitude. A year earlier, when the creatures first appeared, it was Keith's choices that brought disaster to the island community that took him in.

Now, it's time to take responsibility for his actions, heal his scars, and survive.

Told in two alternating timelines, Kayak is a story of family, the strength we draw from others, and the strength we learn to draw from ourselves.

Genres: Horror, Fiction, Science Fiction

336 pages, Paperback

Published February 17, 2026

Reviews

[Books For Decaying Millennials · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thanks to generous comrades at Tenebrous Press, for the early Paperback ARC. All views and opinions are my own.
-
How a person will react in a crisis, an Emergency, and Extreme Situation, is not necessarily cut and dry. Movies and Television will have you believe it's a simple "Fight or Flight" and that a switch will be flipped, unlocking someones deep seeded skills and strengths. If only it were that simple, but it's not. Humans by nature are complex, and messy. Deep seeded traumas may arise, throwing everything askew or the little lizard brain hidden inside you may force to take a adrenaline bath and go full bore. Your person, your sense of self becomes threadbare. It's the time for the shadow-self to rear its head, for ugliness to be laid bare. Indeed, sometimes circumstances force you to truly face what you are capable, be that for good or ill. Readers who have themselves, lived through emergencies, Major Crises etc, will understand what I mean.
Children, meaning through Teenagers, are given both a blessing and a curse. To an extent, they are still forming that broader structure of self, or finding the language and means and navigate it all. Adults are locked into a closed system, Teens and younger, are still able to adjust, craft an open source vision, to use a broad computer OS analogy. Not having all the fancy tools, but also being open to new ideas, making difficult choices.
Shakespeare is quoted as saying "the past is prologue", Kristal Stittle's "Kayak", shows us that the past can be both prologue, as well as a part of the present, driving desire, feeding anxiety and the stoking the flames of terror, even during sleep.
Kayak felt like a return to sub-genre of books I often read, during my own adolescent and tee years. Stories of young folk surviving in some post-apocalytpic landscape, Alien Invasion or some such existential crisis, but from the perspective of youth, people still finding words for who and what they are. Kayak felt like all of that, but so much more. Seeing the past and the present, through Kieth's eyes feels like seeing into the mind of living breathing person. The true scope of what makes people messy, complex creatures, comes through in each and every character in this book.
In Kayak, you feel the isolation, the grief, the desperation, the pain. A testament to the author's craft.
"Day of the Triffids" by John Wyndham, Gary Paulsen's "Hatchet" and Robert C. O'Brien's "Z for Zachariah" , were three books that sprang to mind, periodically throughout my reading of this book. Less for direct thematic or story points, but more for how Kayak made me feel. This is a book I hope to see both Adults and Teenagers reading. It's most definitely a book to watch for, when it drops in Feb of 2026.

[Jamedi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Review originally on JamReads

Kayak is a post-apocalyptic horror novel written by Kristal Stittle, published by Tenebrous Press. A novel that takes the impact of an end-of-the-world situation and reduces it to the scale of one kid and a boat, trying to survive while dealing with his own inner demons, fighting guilt, all told through a dual timeline that not only allows us to understand how the world changed, but also how it affected Keith.

The Earth was invaded by the vicious creatures known as Dirt Devils, intelligent predators that are ground-bound, repealed by water; humanity has been forced to retreat to lakes, islands and boats in an attempt for survival. In this situation is where we find Keith, cramped and alone in his kayak, scavenging for supplies, hoping to find other survivors and avoid falling to the Dirt Devils; but there's more in Keith that it seems, and slowly, we will get to understand how he ended in this situation, and how his own inner demons are devouring him.

The past timeline was particularly engaging, showing how the world descends into madness and how small survivor groups started to appear around the masses of water; we see how Keith's life is transformed and how this traumatic experience shaped him, especially as the time passes with a world that has radically changed. Each small episode allows us to gain a better understanding of Keith.
It is true that the present timeline is much more atmospheric, especially with how the water setting is used, but it ends being a bit repetitive, because for the first half there's not much progress, just Keith and his kayak, trying to deal with the balls thrown by the situation.

In general, I found Kayak to be an enjoyable post-apocalyptic horror novel that makes its most of fleshing up its main character, showing his journey, and also taking advantage of how unique is the water setting; a well-executed coming of age story after a traumatic event.

[RoseDevoursBooks · Rating 3 out of 5]

Told through two alternating timelines of past and present, Kayak follows a teenage boy named Keith as he struggles to survive after Earth is invaded by vicious creatures known as Dirt Devils. These intelligent predators burst from the ground and devour anything on land, but water repels them. As a result, humanity is forced to retreat to lakes, islands, and boats in a desperate attempt to survive. Cramped and alone in his kayak, Keith scavenges for supplies by looting lakeside cottages during rainstorms, and hoping he’ll encounter other survivors rather than fall prey to the Dirt Devils’ scissor-like claws.

The novel starts off strong. I especially enjoyed the “Then” chapters, which show Keith spending time with his friends, the mounting dread surrounding the meteor, and the panic that ultimately leaves him isolated. The overall world-building is immersive, atmospheric, and at times claustrophobic. Every time Keith leaves the safety of his kayak to scavenge or sneak past the Dirt Devils, the tension is palpable. The creatures themselves are well done and very cool - slightly reminiscent of Tremors, but with limbs.
However, there were a few things that didn’t work for me, like their weakness to water? It just wasn’t the most convincing choice. Why would they invade a planet that’s mostly water? It inevitably brought the movie Signs to mind 😅. Still, this vulnerability is what makes the novel’s water-based survival concept work, so I understood the logic behind it.

Unfortunately, the present-day chapters begin to drag after a while. The pacing becomes repetitive, with several mundane stretches where very little happens. This is very much a slow-burn, and I found myself wishing for more action involving the monsters. I was also hoping for a different ending, the conclusion felt a bit too neatly wrapped up for my taste.

While Kayak wasn’t especially memorable overall, I did enjoy certain aspects, particularly the creature design and atmosphere. I’d recommend this to readers who enjoy slow-building, post-apocalyptic YA horror that focuses on guilt, responsibility, and survival.

Many thank to Tenebrous Press for an ARC of this title.

[Sam · Rating 4 out of 5]

Disclaimer: I received an ebook-copy from the publisher.

Keith was a teenager like any other on the day that a meteorite hit earth. When the dust of its impact settles, new strange alien beings appear and they quickly take their new role in the food chain as top predators, shredding anything that moves on land. With their big claws, fast reflexes and ability to merge into the ground, their only weakness is water, which seems to hurt them. Now the only safe places left are bodies of water and land can only be moved on while it rains. This story follows Keith as he runs for his life, trying to figure out if humanity stands any chance of making it.
I really enjoyed that this story is told in a dual timeline, one set in the days directly after the alien invasion started and the other set after Keith had to flee the small settlement humans had managed to build on an island. I loved how it added to the tension of knowing that in the end Keith would end up drifting alone on a Kayak in a river and have to figure it all out alone. Seeing him in the before times with his friends and family was a really interesting way of adding both worldbuilding and exploring his character in more depth, especially because it added an interesting tension to see how this kid struggling for survival became this way.
Additionally, the storytelling manages to be very atmospheric and is for the most part able to build and hold tension for quite long stretches of time, despite the sometimes monotonous act of paddling along a river with only your own thoughts for company. The dual timeline here was also able to break up the monotony of everyday survival for the most part, so it still made for an interesting reading experience.
I would have loved some more explorations of the alien-life as well as for the Now chapters to maybe be a bit shorter at points, but all in all I really enjoyed this story and find it a very well done addition to the genre of alien-invasion survival stories. If you enjoy melancholic stories, as well as examinations of trauma and survivor’s guilt on someone’s psyche you should check this one out.

Tw: child death, death, drowning, gore, injury, implied sexual violence, mass panic, murder, violence

[Micah Castle]

An alien invasion story mixed with a kayak voyage with a sixteen-year-old main character with a goal of simply survival. Overall, I enjoyed the book, though there was too much kayaking/sailing/boating/etc. information and know-how for me.

[The Blog Without a Face · Rating 4 out of 5]

BWAF Score: 7/10

TL;DR: A lean, vicious lake-apocalypse coming of age story where a burned out teen in a kayak tries not to die, physically or morally, while dirt-eating monsters own the land. Great survival texture and gnarly set pieces, a little repetitive on the guilt spiral, but it absolutely kills.

Kayak by Kristal Stittle takes the end of the world and shrinks it down to one kid, one boat, and a whole lot of water. A meteorite impact quietly smuggles something awful into the soil, and within months the land belongs to the “dirt devils,” spiky, intelligent predators that erupt from the ground and shred anything that dares to touch dry earth. Humanity retreats to lakes, islands, docks and floating shacks, clinging to shorelines like mold. In the “Now” timeline, sixteen year old Keith is alone in a too-bright green kayak, sore, half sunburnt, half feral, paddling into unknown channels after the winter house community is destroyed. In the “Then” chapters we watch his life collapse: watching the impact on a livestream, the first Russian monster videos, the power outage, the panicked run to the neighbor’s pool, then the slow-building lake settlement that becomes home long enough to really hurt when it goes to hell.

Stittle has a good feel for the kind of middle class, Canadian-ish cottage country kid Keith is at the start, and for how that kid gets ground down into a survivor. He is not a prepper, not a chosen one, just a comics nerd who likes fantasy series and has a decent dad who builds fancy tables. The book sticks close to him in third person and refuses to expand the camera much beyond what he can see from the waterline. That choice gives Kayak a tight, claustrophobic focus. Even when we finally glimpse the larger operation reclaiming islands with military science and electrified monster traps, it still feels small and human, filtered through a kid who is exhausted, guilty as shit, and convinced he deserves whatever punishment is coming.

The plot is simple and sharp. In the present, Keith is trying to survive alone on the lake, scavenging cottages, dodging dirt devils that prowl the shore, and trying not to fall apart in his stupid little boat. In the past, we see how the monsters spread from Russia and Brazil to everywhere, how his neighborhood flees to the lake, how a winter house community forms on an island under the gruff leadership of Mr Steel and the practical guidance of older survivors like Jan. Those chapters do the heavy lifting of building the rules: monsters control land when there is bare dirt, people are safest on water, rain and deep snow change the balance and let humans raid. Event by event, tragedy by tragedy, you feel how they whittle down numbers and hope until Keith finally makes a catastrophic mistake that gets a lot of people killed, and he bails, literally, in that kayak.

The texture of survival is captivating. Stittle is weirdly good at describing gear without turning it into a manual. The opening inventory of the kayak, paddle, lifejacket and emergency bucket is both functional and quietly terrifying, because you know that thin layer of plastic is all that sits between Keith and a monster that can chew through rock. The book is full of these tactile little problems: how to pee without turning your back on the shore, how far away from a dock you need to float to feel safe, how cold you get after hours in wet clothes, how long you can go on shit sleep and lakewater. When the dirt devils do show up on page, they are nasty in a restrained way. The white irises, the cross-shaped pupils, the way they study humans rather than just charging in, all of that makes them feel properly alien without a huge lore dump.

This is very readable, very Tenebrous, and just voicey enough to keep you locked in. The prose is clean, mostly invisible, with occasional sharp images that slice through: snow as a protective blanket trapping monsters underground, a lake turning into a highway of canoes and paddleboats once a big safe zone is reclaimed, a kid screaming into empty water because there is literally no one left to answer. Dialogue feels natural, especially in the early school scenes where everyone is joking about Russian hoaxes right before the world goes to shit. The alternating “Now” and “Then” chapters are handled well, each chunk usually ending on a small hook that makes you want to see both what happens next and how the hell they got here. If there is a downside, it is that Keith’s internal guilt loop gets a bit repetitive in the back half. We absolutely get that he feels like a coward. Sometimes the book hammers that feeling one or two times more than it needs to.

Underneath the monsters and the kayaks, this is a story about guilt, responsibility, and the thin line between self preservation and abandonment. The dirt devils are terrifying, but the thing that really curdles in your gut is the moment Keith realizes he did what he had been told to do, survived exactly the way adults taught him, and still feels like he fucked up beyond repair. That theme continues to be pushed: ice that melts too soon, exposing people caught mid plan; snowmobiles that expand their reach but also expand the radius of risk; a monster that may or may not be clever enough to stalk specific humans. By the time Keith meets May in her paddleboat and sees the island network with electrified monster traps and judges and something like a future, the impact is complicated. There is hope, sure, but also the sick understanding that any rebuilt society is going to need scapegoats, stories about blame, and someone like Keith to stand there and say, yeah, I did this, now what.

Kayak sits comfortably beside other tight, one character survival nightmares. Think Bird Box energy, but filtered through Canadian cottage country and stripped of spectacle in favor of wet clothes, busted shoulders, and a kid who cannot forgive himself. It is not the flashiest end of the world book out there, but it is one that sticks like lake mud.

Strong, well crafted, and distinctive enough that whenever you see a lone kayak on a quiet lake, you are going to think of this shit and feel just a little less safe on shore.

Read if you like small scale apocalypse stories with real logistical brain, if you crave creature horror that feels like it could sit one bad summer away from your actual cottage, if you can handle a protagonist who is a mess and does not get a clean redemption arc.

Skip if you need sweeping global stakes on the page instead of hinted at, if repeating guilt spirals drive you up the wall, if you want your monsters explained down to their fucking mitochondria.

[Steve Stred]

*Huge thanks to Tenebrous Press for the digital ARC of this one!*

One of the things I’ve always enjoyed about Tenebrous Press is the wild variety of books they release. Be it through their Split Scream releases or the novellas and novels, or the collections, they don’t have a singular ‘style’ of book. They like to publish across genre’s. Secondarily, Tenebrous continues to introduce new-to-me authors. I can think of a half dozen authors who I’ve discovered through Tenebrous releases that I actively look forward to seeing new releases from. Hilariously, in this case, though I was thinking Kristal was a new-to-me author, when I started reading the book, I was trying to place where I knew her from. I knew I’d shared one of her books in my 2025 month long celebration of fellow Canadian authors, but it wasn’t until I went to Goodreads where I realized we both had a story in the ‘Dark Canadiana’ anthology in 2025! And I loved her story within.

I wasn’t sure what to expect with this one. I’d briefly scanned the synopsis and knew aliens were involved, and that was about all it took for me to be excited to dive in to this one.

What I liked: The novel hops between present and past as we follow teenager, Keith, trying his best to survive in the new world. He’s wracked with guilt over an incident he believes has resulted in the loss of dozens of lives, and with that weighing him down, he continues to flee further up the river. Why up the river?

Well, an asteroid had landed on earth and while at first it was a celebratory event, the space rock hitting a remote, deserted island, while being live-streamed, soon stories spread of strange alien creatures – huge dog-like things, that have the ability to disappear into the dirt below. Dubbed ‘dirt devils’ an alarm is sent out – get to (and into) the water – as that’s the only safe place.

As the story unfolds, Stittle does a wonderful job of balancing emotions and tension. We see the difficulties faced by the inability to step foot on dry ground. How do you get food? Where is it safe to spend the night and get some rest? And when it rains, how long will the rain last, allowing you the time to go into the various water front cabins that now lay abandoned.

The jumps between past and present works (for the most part) to push the emotional and physical guilt that Keith is dealing with, especially in consideration with being separated from friends and family, and deftly displays the ‘why’ of some of the decisions Keith makes. This also helps heighten the ever-growing anxiety as the chapters get closer to the end.

The ending works – though I’m going to be a bit vague here about it so as to not push anything one way or the other – and dare I say it even offers some hope?

What I didn’t like: There were a few things that struck me and came back to me as I was reading this one. Up first was that I found the back and forth didn’t always work to raise the stakes, if you will. There were a few times when a present chapter would suggest something and when it was then revealed in the past chapter, the impact wasn’t as big as it could’ve been. I know that’ll happen with the time jump stuff – I’ve been in that situation before as well – but in this case, it happened enough times that I noticed it.

The second thing I noticed was there is a lot of ‘tedium’ throughout the chapters. While necessary in some instances, I think those repetitious instances could be enough for folks to find its moving too slow and tap out. It’s something we all deal with, especially if you’re writing about anything set in the wilderness. I just felt like a few times we could’ve done with less of the descriptions of when Keith was bored waiting for it to rain, or when he was paddling to find rocks etc. Though part of the survival element, it also greatly slowed a few of the chapters to a slog.

And lastly, I personally don’t know if the ending fully worked for me. I’m trying to be spoiler free, so what I will say, is that the novel never once really offered a ‘this is what needs to be done for humans to survive/overcome’ aspect. That’s often what folks are drawn to in alien invasion books/movies, right? The idea that if they band together and do [X] they’ll overcome and survive. I suspect a sequel might be on the horizon, as there was an ‘egg’ angle left behind without any further development and the season was changing.

Why you should buy this: A very grand novel in scope, Stittle has delivered a fantastic entry into the alien-invasion/humans try to survive subgenre, but throwing a new wrench into the mix. Much like in the movie ‘Signs,’ we see the aliens dislike/hatred of water and by isolating the surviving humans to the bodies of water around them, it made for an even higher-stakes game of ‘how can we survive.’ By taking the land out of the equation, this novel really thinks outside of the box and had me on the edge of my seat numerous times.

A great Canadian-based speculative novel from a Canadian author, this book was a lot of fun and one that reminded me about why it’s important to push your characters to the very edge and see what happens if they fall over.

[RedReviews4You Susan-Dara · Rating 4 out of 5]

A slow‑burn YA horror novella that understands the scariest part of the apocalypse is what it asks a boy to become.

Kristal Stittle’s Kayak is a haunting, atmospheric coming‑of‑age novella wrapped in quiet horror. It follows a teenage boy who has already survived more than most adults: separation from his parents and friends, the uncertainty of infatuation versus first love, and the collapse of the world he once recognized. All of it unfolding under the shadow of unnamed beings called simply “Dirt Devils,” whose arrival has reshaped the planet and everyone left on it.

The brilliance of this story is how small it feels — one boy, one kayak, one stretch of water — and how enormous it becomes once you understand what he’s carrying and the new limitations of his world. The water isn’t just a setting; it’s a threshold. A place where grief, memory, and fear churn just beneath the surface. Stittle uses the kayak as both literal vessel and emotional metaphor: the fragile thing that keeps him afloat when everything else has sunk.

I read a few excerpts aloud to My Guy, and he was genuinely moved — he saw so much of himself in the way Kevin experiences his altered world and the sense of responsibility he carries on his own shoulders. He said something I found so beautiful: that the ending — the reunion, the accountability, the companionship, and the empathy — felt emotionally aware and exactly right for Kevin’s journey from young teen into young man. That reaction alone speaks to how deeply this story understands the emotional interiority of young men.

There’s also a distinctly Jack London undercurrent here — not just in the survival elements, but in the way Kevin must learn to navigate people with the same wary intuition he uses to navigate the water. The emotional stakes of dealing with others feel as perilous, and as formative, as any physical threat.

And that’s something rare. I haven’t read many stories written exclusively from a male perspective that allow this level of vulnerability, fear, tenderness, and self‑reckoning. I think getting this book into the hands of mothers, wives, girlfriends, and librarians could spark meaningful conversations about being seen — especially for young men who don’t often encounter this kind of emotional nuance in fiction.

The horror here is quiet, but it’s relentless. This book isn’t about jump scares — it’s about the dread of being young in a world that no longer makes sense, the terror of realizing you’re the last witness to the life you used to have, and the muddled, aching task of facing tomorrow alone.

If you’re drawn to stories that blend:

atmospheric horror

emotional interiority

post‑apocalyptic tension

and the raw ache of adolescence

…Kayak delivers something quietly devastating.

This is a story about a boy trying to stay afloat — literally and emotionally — in a world that has already taken too much from him.

[Leo Otherland · Rating 5 out of 5]

Special thanks to Tenebrous Press for the ARC copy they provided.

I had a feeling I would like this one from the moment I heard the concept. Aliens brought to Earth, clinging to the dust of a meteor. And when that dust carries on the air currents to settle on the land, the aliens emerge.

And ultimately wreak havoc.

As any apocalyptic tale, death and destruction follow, and the main characters struggle to survive. And reading Kayak, for most of the book you’re tempted to think that is the whole of the story: a lost and terrified protagonist, doing his best to survive alone, against nearly insurmountable odds.

But as with any truly great tale, there is more tucked into the nooks and crannies of Kristal Stittle’s book than meets the eye. You have to wait for the dust to settle and the seeds within to grow. Because at its core, Kayak is about grief and loss and the ways we find ourselves through them. Kayak is above all a story about the battles we fight inside, not aliens or the horrors we may face in the day to day of life.

Reading this book is like slowly, gradually being guided back to the instinctual understanding that while what we face in our fragile reality may shape and affect what we experience inside ourselves, if we can’t overcome self and our inner darknesses, we can’t adequately fight the horrors raging around us.

What I find to be the best part of Kayak is this gradual realization. Stittle writes the narrative in a duo storyline that splits between the Then and the Now, and these alternating chapters deliver plot in small sips that tantalize with the promise of more you always have to wait for. Yet as these timelines converge, Stittle’s theme unfolds like a scissor clawed dirt devil from the earth beneath your feet. The subtleness is superb.

But also, let’s talk about the emotion this book evokes. Because… excuse me, but this gave me anxiety attacks in the best possible way. As the years have gone on, my anxiety appears to be triggered much more frequently, while doing common tasks.

Like reading.

Still, not just any book can send my heart racing and my flight instinct racing. Only the most well-crafted books manage to do that, and Kayak DEFINITELY made my heart thump and my chest tighten. Every. Single Time Keith had to set foot on shore to gather supplies, I had an anxiety attack on his behalf.

Well done Kristal Stittle, I won’t be forgetting your book anytime soon.

And if you dare to dive into its pages, it might just pull you under too. Take the plunge. You won’t regret it.

[Lori · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really wanted to like this one. The premise had me hooked: a meteor crash-lands on Earth, scattering dust filled with alien seeds. As the wind carries this dust across continents, the seeds take root, and what grows from them is monstrous. These creatures are brutal, relentless, and hungry for human flesh.

Like any good alien invasion tale, there’s a weakness. Water. Once that’s discovered, humanity scrambles toward the nearest lakes, rivers, oceans — anything that might offer safety. In the chaos, Keith loses his parents at the beach, and the story follows his fight for survival as he searches for his friends and family out on the Canadian lakes, alone in his little kayak.

I was really excited to read this one. It should have been gripping. The setup was eerie and cinematic, and I was ready to be swept into the horror. But the execution just didn’t deliver. The pacing felt flat, the writing was somewhat stilted, and the narrative voice never quite settled. If I didn’t know better, I’d have assumed this was a debut. It reads like Stittle was trying too hard to channel what she imagined a sixteen-year-old boy might sound like, and the result felt forced and awkward.

I kept hoping it would find its rhythm, that that the tension would build, that Keith’s journey would pull me in. But instead, I found myself wanting to DNF more than once — and regretting that I didn’t. Cool concept, but disappointing follow-through. Which is upsetting, because I really like what Tenebrous has been putting out lately!

[unstable.books · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kristal Stittle's Kayak is a tension-soaked survival story that pairs creature horror with a deeply personal reckoning. Keith drifts across interconnected bodies of water, with his kayak as the only barrier between himself and the violent "dirt devil" entities that have overtaken land. In his stark new reality, water means staying alive and solid ground promises death. The simplicity of this premise gives the novel a relentless edge. Told in alternating timelines, the narrative gradually reveals the choices Keith made when the invasion first began, some of which caused devastation. The dual structure works beautifully, layering present-day desperation with past trauma and guilt until the emotional stakes feel as sharp as the monsters claws. Stittle doesn't just explore physical survival. She casts a lens upon what it means to survive your own mistakes. At its heart, Kayak is about absolution. Keith's isolation is both circumstantial and perhaps, subconsciously, a bit self imposed, and his journey becomes one of learning what redemption looks like for him. Taut, reflective, and tender, Kayak proves strength often comes from within and from the village we surround ourselves with. Thank you Tenebrous Press for sending me an ARC. You can pick this up when it publishes February 17th, 2026!

[Phillip Keeling · Rating 3 out of 5]

One part The Walking Dead, one part Alone, this might be the most mainstream piece of horror fiction I’ve seen from Tenebrous Press. There’s a lot of great stuff here: some genuinely horrifying moments, excellent world-building, and moments where the reader can catch their breath that are downright cozy. Definitely something worth reading for people interested in YA-style survival horror.

I think what sets Kayak apart is its level of detail. This can be very interesting in a survivalist/dungeon crawl sort of way. However, it can also get tedious at times. And for all that detail, I’m pretty disappointed with how abruptly and neatly the whole thing ended. It felt like there was as a whole lot more to get into that was just dropped by the end in favor of a neat bow of a happy ending.

Having said that, there’s plenty here that horror fans can enjoy. Hell, I didn’t even mind the teenage crushery that filled our protagonist’s thoughts half the time. Well-written characters, interesting monsters, nicely executed settings.

I received a complementary ARC from the publisher for the purpose of a review. I promise that my opinion hasn’t been adulterated by earthwalking predators or the horny teenagers they’re hunting.

[Shrike · Rating 4 out of 5]

Stittle transforms what could be a comical premise into a sobering survival story. I picked this book up relatively blind and can't say I expected a teen processing grief for the first time while fleeing a dirt monster apocalypse and pining for an unrequited crush.

Kayak's structure is unconventional: Stittle fore(aft?)shadows past events by revealing their consequences. The dual timelines took some getting used to but I loved how they build suspense.

Thanks to Tenebrous Press for sending an advance copy my way. I'm leaving this review of my own accord.

[Melissa81 · Rating 3 out of 5]

I know it says Kayak is not yet published, but I had access to read it here in Ontario, via Kindle.

Definitely a strong 3.5 star read for me. Lots of edge of your seat waiting to see what would happen, scarily believable enough to be realistic. I did guess a couple of the twists, a couple I didn't see coming. Normally I refuse to read back and forth time lines, but this was done very well and I really enjoyed it.

Will definitely check out other books by the same author.

[James Stittle · Rating 5 out of 5]

I bought this book at Little Ghosts. A bookstore in Toronto. It had plenty of copies available. I found it engrossing from the opening confusion and mob panic to the many twists and turns that the main character takes in order to survive.

[B K · Rating 5 out of 5]

A survival story first, a coming of age story (finally one that's also good for teenaged boys) and a bit of a thriller in a speculative fiction setting. Alternating between "Now" and "Then" was a clever way to tell the story and added to the suspense. I'm a granny but I enjoyed this book about a teenaged boy immensely.