Xanadu’s Reviews > Ravenous > Status Update

If the bear knows what explosions and chemicals are, why wouldn't it know what a gun is?

"The night was quiet...too quiet" ?

Great natural detail and survival knowledge evident. The plot is so unoriginal, though.

Breaks from bear brutality are necessary, of course, but the pacing is really frustrating here past the halfway point. Any decent thriller ought to be in high gear by this stage, but every chapter reverts to some cozy domestic scene, sometimes with a little exposition wedged in, to build back to something relevant to bears.

The perspective is inconsistent: are we observing the world through the eyes of a character who is being killed? Then, how do we know what things looked like after they die? Effective and appropriate use of gore, but if even the characters themselves are "bored" with their death scene, the readers can't be having much fun.

Blizzard and starvation pushing all the bears into town was a good distraction, but we're firmly in derivative-of-Jaws territory now and the multiple romantic affairs are no more meaningful than that of Mrs. Brody and Matt Hooper.

Quarter-star deduction for "chomping at the bit." Prepub is no excuse.

Awful lotta romance shoehorned into a killer bear story.