The Squad

by Eric S. Brown

A routine training exercise in the backwoods of North Carolina becomes a desperate battle for survival as a squad of soldiers find themselves stranded with no easy way out. Worse, they aren't alone. Monsters lurk among the trees. Monsters that want to tear them limb from limb.

Genres: Horror

89 pages, Kindle Edition

Published April 22, 2018

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

Reviews

[chucklesthescot · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story initially follows two groups of people. Four teenage boys decide to go on a camping and hunting trip and fall into trouble when they run into an angry Sasquatch on their first night hunt, causing them to flee into the woods to hide. At the same time a military squad playing a war game find one half of their people dead and ripped apart, with more Sasquatches on the loose hunting them down. As both groups run into each other, it becomes a joint bid for survival.

I've read a lot of books by this author and they always deal in lots of monsters and lots of gore, which I generally enjoy. He does a better job than most of fleshing out his characters and making you interested in whether they survive or not, even in these short novellas. I always enjoy a creature feature with deadly Sasquatches as the whole Bigfoot thing has fascinated me since I was a kid and I try to read as many of these books as I can. I did enjoy this book for the most part as it had good tension, solid writing and plenty of gore to enjoy. However I am finding that this author seems to always want to kill all his MCs in pretty much every book of his I read. I don't demand HEA but it does become hard when you invest in the characters in his many books and then they pretty much all just die for the hell of it by the final scenes. The monsters win every time and are just too unbeatable. It becomes a bit predictable and I'm now less keen to read his work which is a shame as he is a good writer. Let the odd human survive or win a small victory occasionally!

[Sherrie Lynn Grimes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good

Like reading Bigfoot stories like this book it goes straight to action instead of lot of character time before story

[CHRISTINE HARDING · Rating 5 out of 5]

very good

[Cheryl Lee · Rating 3 out of 5]

Okay

Once again, the story was good, but it really bugs me that nobody ever survives! At least with this book, the epilogue showed the commander plans to send several copters and coordinate air strikes to kill those beasts!!!! Finally revenge for those who lost their lives.

[Kathy Jackson · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a decent enough Bigfoot book. The few things that bugged me were that the "squad" isn't in it much as an actual squad because of the attacks. I would have liked a bit more with them as they are supposed to be an elite military group. Maybe a few more battles as a group before so many died - or even joining up with the other squad. There just wasn't that many people left for most of the book.

Still, it kept me reading and I thought it was a good creature-feature. Am going to take a break from Brown now for a book or two as I think I compare them too much. I have a few favorites of his so judge all of them against those.

[Logan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Had potential but fell short

The aversion to curse words made some serious moments feel a tad absurd, with all the descriptive gore cursing doesn't seem that big a deal. Ending felt a little pointless as if the last 2 characters were just added for cannon fodder. The concept and action were all done very well however and it was a decently enjoyable read. Just felt like it refused to tap into its true potential for some weird reason.

[Jeff Swystun · Rating 2 out of 5]

I have removed the influence of the formatting from the Kindle version. What earned the two stars is the familiarity of premise and plot, too many tropes to count, stereotypes, and dialogue. For many reasons, there is value for money but expect this to be a comic book without graphics.

[Josh Randell · Rating 3 out of 5]

The characters were good. Decent read.

[Randy · Rating 5 out of 5]

WOW !!!

Looks like the woods is being OVER RUN by fracking ...nasty Nasty NASTY & mean 😈👿😬 big feets !!! Enjoyed reading this book WOW

[Peter Topside · Rating 3 out of 5]

So I've read several Eric Brown books now. I like their brevity and think that his writing quality is spot on. And above all else, they're entertaining. But I struggle with the constant lack of plot and variety though. They've all revolved around faceless military personnel, all set up to just be part of a body count, being terrorized by monsters, mostly Bigfoot creatures. The Squad was no different, as it played out like Dog Soldiers, just with sasquatches running amok. It felt just like a made-for-SyFy channel movie, with extremely limited reasoning for the monsters trying to destroy everything and kill everyone. There was just nonstop action, bloodshed, and gunfire with a very unsatisfactory ending. The thing that bothers me most is with each of these books, I see so much potential from the author, but the focus is just in the wrong places. I'm not saying that each story needs to be some massively intricate and soul shattering novel, but they all just need better development. Why are all these monsters acting out exactly, aside from just someone trespassing on their land? Have less characters, but develop them more with actual purpose and story that evolves and culminates. This way, they wouldn't just feel like ready-to-die placeholders. And this would also open the story up, as you wouldn't have to rush and get so many people slaughtered in such a short period, too. And have less kills, but make the ones that do occur feel memorable and not just like afterthoughts. When you're dealing with something like Bigfoot, there are a myriad of unique and awesome ways for cryptids like that to take out a human. But if Eric S. Brown did those things, with his obvious writing talent, his works would come across much better.

[Andy Herzfeld · Rating 5 out of 5]

Eric Brown sends his Sasquatch after wayward teenagers and supposedly military elite squads. I have a few problems with this but overall love the action, gore etc. Military training exercises do not have live ammo unless they are on a live fire range. So they would be facing a band of murderous squatch with a blank ammo and maybe some pyrotechnics. So not a doubt Big fuzzy will rip them apart. My second thing is the 5.56 military ball cartridge would do a significant amount of damage to a Sasquatch most it has a steel core. It may not stop a charging beast but it will kill it through blood loss eventually. A shotgun is only good within about 20 yards with buckshot, slugs on out a little further. A shotgun would be devastating to a Squatch but only in two or three step range for one of those giants. Other than that, it is an enjoyable read. I have read most of Eric's books and I like the way he delivers the action.

[Michael Collins · Rating 3 out of 5]

A quick action read that's not heavy on plot or originality. It's the book equivalent of a popcorn movie: an entertaining read that doesn't leave you with much to ponder once it's finished. Good rainy night read.