Kraken Hunters

Tales of the Crypto-Hunter #3

by Rick Gualtieri

An unstoppable predator, a mystery that could doom us all.
Something has awakened within the Caribbean, staining the once tranquil waters red with blood. Crypto-Hunter Derek Jenner and his team are called in to investigate, but what they find is more shocking than they could have ever imagined.

Not only is a massive beast haunting the Bahamas, but ships and planes across the region are suffering catastrophic equipment failure. Soon, Derek and his friends are among those stranded at sea, waiting for a rescue that isn’t coming.

Now they’re about to discover a secret in the depths, one that should’ve remained buried forever. Faced with an insatiable horror from a forgotten era and a mystery that threatens the very fabric of existence, the Crypto-Hunter is about to set sail on a final voyage bound for terror.

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Journey to the Bermuda Triangle in Kraken Hunters by Rick Gualtieri, the thrilling conclusion to the Crypto-Hunter trilogy.

Genres: Horror, Science Fiction

568 pages, Kindle Edition

First published December 27, 2020

About the author

Rick Gualtieri loves to write adventure, mayhem, and snarky dialogue. His bestselling Tome of Bill series combines all of this into a world of supernatural danger with hard-hitting action and plenty of sharp-tongued geeky humor.

Rick lives alone in a dark, evil place called New Jersey with only his wife, three kids, and countless pets to both keep him company and constantly plot against him. When he's not busy monkey-clicking out words, he can typically be found jealously guarding his collection of vintage Transformers from all who would seek to defile them.

Defilers beware!

Email: rickg.author@gmail.com

Facebook: facebook.com/RickGualtieriAuthor

Reviews

[Susan Tunis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some books suffer from high expectations. This book benefitted from low expectations. I mean, look at the title, the cover, the unknown, self-pubbed author. But, I do love me a good sea monster, so I'm willing to go there.

And guess what? This book wasn't bad at all! Yes, I lept straight to book three of a trilogy, which is always ill-advised, but I didn't have a problem coming up to speed. The writing was clear and well-paced. Characters were well-developed, with distinct personalities and good dialogue. There was both tension and comic relief. The plot veered into unexpected and creative directions.

In short, this b-movie of a novel was as well written as most mainstream thrillers, and better than some. My one complaint is that the book is pretty long. I'm confident there could have been significant cuts made that would only have improved the finished product. A quick Google search shows me that Mr. Gualtieri is the author of more than a dozen novels. I sort of doubt I'll be reading many of them. This one best matched my interests. But, clearly he's had time to hone his craft and find his readership. Thanks to the SFPL for helping me dive into something unknown. It was a pleasant surprise!

[Brad Theado · Rating 3 out of 5]

Way longer than it needed to be

[Ziggy Nixon · Rating 5 out of 5]

This fucking mission was cursed.

A wonderfully written and plotted book that brings a raucous close to this amazing trilogy! As per usual, Rick Gualtieri's mastery of not only smooth-flowing and entertaining prose but also amazing story-telling (no, sadly, those aren't the same) delivered a tale more than worthy of the top-notch stories that led to this point! I know I echo the cries of fans everywhere when I say I hope this group gets another adventure again some day! I am more than just out of breath at this point, I am literally emotionally spent!

Believe me when I say we could be a lot more fucked than we are.

And I say this even honestly admitting (ok, the phase of "giving out of flowers in my reviews" moment has passed) that this last chapter was the only one of the series that didn't register with me as strongly as I was hoping. Look again, those are only 4 1/2 actual stars above! Yes, it was a great story, do not doubt that! Yes, everything I said about Gualtieri's construction and execution was true. But for various reasons, well, I wanted more.

“And then...”
“There’ll be no time to lose, so we’d best get kraken.”
“I so hate you right now.”

There are some perfectly (?) logical (???) reasons for my reaction, where I'm sure most of you will wind up agreeing that I am, in fact, insane. Neverthemore, here there are:
- First and foremost, the first two instalments of this trilogy were "knock your socks off amazeballs", a time-worn yet still valid expression used by many of today's remaining respectable journalists. And furthermore, I have to point out that I thought book 1 - "Crazy Squatch Time in Bonanza Creek" - was great. But book 2 was even better. Like, one of the best truly horrifying, tense, amazing books I've read in many many years better. So naturally, it's tough to not only follow something like that up but do it in a way that satisfies ye olde fan base, too;

This was freaky deaky voodoo shit as far as he was concerned.

- I've had just about enough of the Multiverse Theory. Through no fault of RG's, we as a society, as a culture and even as a species have had our heads filled with Multiverse tales now for several years running. And I know (I assume?) this tale was written well before the Avengers had to go around and ruin everyone's carefully constructed timelines (I mean, who would have wanted to miss the pandemic, am I right?), but I'm talking about my reaction when I read this book in March 2023. So, um, sorry? My bad?

He’d actually murdered himself in cold blood.

- Finally, for one of the first - maybe even only - times I can remember from a Gualtieri book, some of the thoughts and what-not of our secondary characters - heck even primary if you include the constant thought processes we "heard" from the kraken(s) [krakeni? kraki?] - didn't work out. There were a few side stories in here that I just didn't "get", including the one with the ladies' honeymoon (what role did that play?) and a few others, too. And I just never warmed up to the relatively constant "me big creature, need to eat squirmy squishy things" approach for the hulked up Squidward gang. Huge distantly related apemen? No worries! Horribly deformed rejects from Jersey Shore? Bring 'em! But big ol' tentacly dudes? Hmm...

Sorry. I tend to ramble whenever I’m fighting things capable of tearing me into bite sized chunks.

But these are minor points at best, probably even points that others won't even react to or give a fudge about. None of them equated to me not liking the book or regretting reading it. Far from it. They were just aspects that made me have more trouble finding a decent foothold in this tale. That's all. Because let's be even more honest: it's a great story and an even better trilogy. And yes, I'm glad I picked them up and have come that much closer to meeting one of my main reading goals for this year, namely, finishing Gualtieri's current catalogue. Because he is that good! The man can flat out write and I've yet to step away from my Kindle and even begin to think a story wasn't amazing. Trust me, you will, too!

[Calvin · Rating 1 out of 5]

What a colossal waste

This book could have and should have been so good. Instead it was an overly long bloated mess. The author tried to put too many different things into this book and ruined it. What starts out as a straight forward killer giant octopus story soon devolves into aliens, the Bermuda Triangle, government agencies, and different dimensions/multiverse. This book took about 5 hours to finish and should have been done in 2. There's so much unnecessary filler. The team investigates a killer octopus and finds an alien ship underneath the ocean, which is sending out a pulse that affects the ocean life, water density, weather, and time. Where did the ship come from? Don't know. Where are the inhabitants of the ship? Don't know. How/why is the ship causing chaos up above? Don't know. But hey it's okay we get a super long side story about a lecherous studio photographer who goes full Jack Nicholson in The Shining for no apparent reason. Throughout the three novels, I've noticed the author likes to end chapters on overly dramatic jumps and events that are quickly discarded or explained in the next chapter. By far my biggest complaint of the novel is its ending. The book "ends" with a massive explosion, and then enough prologues to rival Lord of the Rings happen. One of the prologues is the actual ending of the book, where it actually ties up the main characters storylines. Prologues are additional bonus pages that enhance the story, or tease the next book, not the actual ending. Imagine the Titanic movie ending when the ship hits the iceberg, but then the rest of the movie is the prologue. It makes no sense. Danni is given control of the team despite having zero leadership skills and ability. Mitch is his usual self. Derek is seemingly killed in an explosion, but everyone says he had a heroic death saving them. He was locked in a room and they thought he drowned. Very heroic indeed. It's eventually revealed he's been transported to a different universe with no way home. If this novel had been better, it would have just stuck with the killer octopus angle and done away with everything else. I really could care less about if Derek makes it back. It was just a poorly written book from start to finish. I know I'm missing some other points I meant to bring up but the ending made me so mad I can't remember them all

[Gilbert Stack · Rating 4 out of 5]

The third volume of the Cryptid Hunter series takes on the Bermuda Triangle with an explanation consciously influenced by Michael Crichton's novel, Sphere. While I think this was the weakest of the three books this far, I was impressed by what Gualtieri attempted to accomplish. It's undeniable that he has been laying the groundwork of this tale in the first two books, and to the extent that it succeeds, it does so because Gaultieri created such interesting characters in the first two.

And I did really like the novel. It has a lot of tension emanating from two massive external threats complicated by the human dimension he showed us so well in the earlier books. He also plays with some classic tropes of science fiction. He also continues to be willing to kill off his cast--something we can both love and hate about him.

It will be interesting to see how he handles some of the loose ends he dangles in front of the reader at the end of the novel.

[Solace Winter · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved all of the books in this series, but this one might have been my favorite. No, not might have been, it was, easily. The flow is perfect, the balance between characters, and Gualtieri does something that no one else seems to get perfectly: *minor spoiler* when you kill off a character you must do it for the right reasons, and in the right way. Gualtieri doesn't scare away from killing off characters, but they aren't killed off for shock value alone.

Pros:
- Well told
- The characters continue to develop
- The action is even better
- Bigger and better than before

Cons:
- None. If you liked the first two, you will enjoy this one. If you didn't, why are you even reading this one?

[Kilgallen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well, I wasn't expecting that!!! A creature feature that took a few really wild twists and went to places that I really hadn't seen coming. This, the third book in the series, was my least favorite. It felt a lot more science fiction than horror and while this is not a bad thing it was not what I was expecting based on the previous books in the series. This, like the other books in the series is a quick read with the pacing of a movie script. I liked that the characters seem to get a little more developed in each book. Ultimately, I wish there would be further installments in the Crypto-Hunter series, but the ending of this one makes me think they wouldn't go in a direction that I would want them to.

[Margaret · Rating 3 out of 5]

The overall story was good. But this book could have been cut down by 25% and been much better. All the endless quippy, irrelevant conversation along with the characters every reminiscent though being done over and over and over and over.... UGH! They will take a 50 second scene of 2 people walking through a doorway and make it into 10 minutes of quippy dialog, along with 20 minutes of thoughts, worries, and regrets. Also, a bunch of unnecessary characters and scenes that had no impact or bearing to the overall story were added. What was the point of the realtor lady story?

I stuck it out, painfully, to the end. If you decide to read this, read the first third, then skip to the last chapter. You won't miss anything.

[Alisia Soles · Rating 5 out of 5]

Perfect ending? to the trilogy

No spoilers here, but as with the past two books in the trilogy, no one is safe. There is a lot of fun terror here. We meet some new characters who may or may not survive their kraken encounter. There's also great points of view from the kraken to add to the suspense. A really intriguing twist in here that I won't go into in order to avoid spoilers, but it definitely leaves room for more books. In short, this book is exiting, suspenseful, and leaves you hoping for the series to continue.

[Fred Rayworth · Rating 4 out of 5]

Karaken Hunters is the third book in the Crypto-Hunter series. It was super long and had a lot of plot twists. Don’t expect everyone to live either. However, in this one, despite seemingly taking forever to get there, things worked out okay, for the most part. It was an interesting tale involving the Bermuda Triangle and of course, humongous icky bugs (octopi in this case). I had a mostly great time though like I said before, it was way too long. I can say this was a nice conclusion to the series. For finding it at random on Amazon, not a bad investment. Recommended.

[William Newbury · Rating 5 out of 5]

Surprises and twists!

I was really surprised by the twists in this one! I’ve liked how this author puts twists in a basic monster story and makes it more interesting. I won’t ruin the ending for anyone but you will enjoy it. I actually read one scene twice lol. Sad that this might be the last book but see where this goes. I thought it had a lot more potential for books/episodes and explore a lot more creatures and myths.

[Bradley Guenther · Rating 5 out of 5]

New Twists in the Crytoverse

This book has a different feel than either of its predecessors. It had a lot of action and lots of twists. I found it highly enjoyable. I definitely recommend it it!
You could read this book on its own, but I'd really recommend reading the series in order. There are events important to character development that won't make sense otherwise.

[Mary · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't want the series to end! Love all the characters and all three books. This third book contains the wildest of of all three stories, but I still love it and found myself finishing the audiobook in two days.

[Greg Noneman · Rating 5 out of 5]

An epic conclusion to a great series

A most fitting finale to the Crypto Hunter saga, and more than a few send offs for the characters. Here is to eventually seeing the team go off on future cryptid hunt adventures.

[William Shearer · Rating 2 out of 5]

I liked parts of this one a lot more than the previous book, but the scope of the story has gotten so far away from cryptid hunting that the titular kraken is barely even in its own book. The story could have probably dropped a hundred pages to tighten everything up a bit.

[Nína Dóttir · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars
I read all the books in one go and unfortunately this was my least favorite. I feel like it was just a tiny bit too long and I wanted more Crypto, less space-time-continuum. That's just a personal preference though and I still look forward to the next one!

[Teresa Tidwell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent Fun Read!

Loved the book. Tons of action and suspense. The characters are all extremely well written and believable, just like in all Ricks other stories.

[Brandon · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was so hyped for this, but it ultimately let me down. Bigfoot Hunters was the best in the series but this was nothing like that. i know what he was going for but it ultimately didn't work for me.

[Zoe · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great

The savage badgers were certainly a surprise in this story of daring do.
The emancipation of feral children made me feel warm.

[Eric Evans · Rating 2 out of 5]

Worst book of the series. Drags on with unnecessary information and characters added to the story. The ending wasn't a favorite either.

[Frank karasienski · Rating 2 out of 5]

sadism at its best

This story was well written but the main characters the author lives to kill off. This story was so much more SiFi instead of creatures.

[Tim Frost · Rating 5 out of 5]

Real Good

Nice monster, sci fi story. I hope there is going to be another. I think there books just keep getting better.

[BookLoversLife]

Have to put it aside for a while!

[Kim Hillard · Rating 5 out of 5]

History Repeats

The book was good and I enjoyed it. It completes the trilogy...but there are potentials for the future. Enjoy reading it, but read the series in order.