Venom

by Alan Scholefield

Resurrected as a killer, a gas station owner terrorizes a group of teenagers ..

Genres: Horror

Paperback

Published January 1, 1979

About the author

Alan Scholefield was born in 1931 in Cape Town, South Africa. After leaving university he became a journalist and travelled widely in southern and central Africa, Europe, and America. He now lives in Hampshire with his wife and has three daughters. Most famous for his Macrae and Silver series, Scholefield has also written other novels, including Venom, which was made into a film in 1981.

Reviews

[Graham · Rating 5 out of 5]

Alan Scholefield turned his hand to writing a thriller with great success. The story delves into criminal minds with electric tension and perspicacity, creating a rising tension that builds to a crescendo that lasts to the last page. His characters are believable and even the antagonist has an element of likability. In his usual style, his prose is comfortably elegant and engaging. A highly entertaining and enjoyable novel.

[Wayne · Rating 4 out of 5]

A nice little kidnapping with a twist novel. I saw the movie years ago and now just got around to reading the novel. I can say the book did more for me. Nice back stories on characters that are well done and helps the story along. The one thing I did find strange was the book was about a black mamba snake but the serpent is not in this for much of the time. When it appears, things start moving. This was a good one.

[Adrian · Rating 2 out of 5]

Kidnappers break into a posh London house and take a sickly kid hostage. Unfortunately due to a comical mixup at the pet shop, the snake his parents have bought him is a highly venomous black mamba, which is now loose in the house.

There are flashes of a really taut thriller here with the stand off between the kidnappers and the police in an armed siege, with the wild card of the snake who could bite anyone. Unfortunately this is padded out with large chunks of backstory for each of the characters, each of which seems to boil down to how great colonialism was. Because of this, reading today, you really want the snake to win (everyone else is a bit of a shit). Luckily there are some sections written from the snakes perspective.

The moral is, always check your pet shop purchases before taking them home to your kid.

[Mikepottz · Rating 3 out of 5]

Two sharp incisors that looked like they could pierce steel. Saliva dripping, they were teeth that could rip, tear, chop, and cut. Looking like it could tear off a face like a rubber mask. It's not a snake but a lion. Sold as an animal attack it's really a hostage siege with a sprinkle of animal attack. The mishap with a black house snake mistaken for a black mamba. A boy now has the most aggressive and deadliest snake in the world. Snake on the loose in a house that is now a hostage scene. Convulsions, pain, numbness, certain death. This snake packs a punch like a frozen refrigerator. I like my animal attack pulpy, gory, ridiculous. This wasn't that unfortunately.

[Jonas Buijs · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yayyyy i finished my bookgoal for the year!! Anyways:

3.5
Het serpent van london/Venom was an enjoyable thriller with a twist. It wasn't what i expected from the title. The dutch title has a different feel then the english one, feeling more like it's about a gang. After page 100 it got going and was a nice pageturner, if not for the fact that Sholefield really goes too deep into his characters backstories. Every time something happends, the stories wanders back to some strange backstory. There even are like 3 pages about why there is a scar on an etui. It's pretty insane. Anyways, enjoyable read, read it if you have it but not worth buying really