What the world needs now is a fun thriller about Bigfoot. Just not this one.
Matthew Scott Hansen’s debut novel THE SHADOWKILLER is all about the legendary, mythical hairy brute on a killing spree. It’s being sold as camp, but I’m not sure anyone told Hansen, because he takes the subject too seriously for the story to take flight. Such subject matter would seem the kind of unapologetic pop-junk on which BOOKGASM was founded, but sadly, it’s too much of a narrative mess.
The rather incredulous protagonist is Ty Greenwood, an Internet gazillionaire who, as the book begins, has just penned his suicide note for his wife to find. He’s despondent, you see, over people making fun of him for claiming to have seen Bigfoot a couple years back at a company party. Instead of growing some balls and counting his piles of cash, a booze-drenched Ty decides his life isn’t worth living.
En route to his final destination site, he stops – wouldn’t we all? – at a 7-Eleven, where a newspaper headline catches his eye about a local man gone missing in the forest. The phrase “broken trees” intrigues him. Could it be that Sasquatch has reared his ugly, oversized head? Might this give him the all-too-convenient opportunity to redeem his good name? Of course.
Ty immediately goes into undercover investigative mode, posing as a Forestry Service employee to dig up the dirt. He’s soon assisted by an aged Native American movie star (Wes Studi, call your agent!) who harbors a psychic link with the creature. There’s a difference between being intentionally camp and just being plain misguided, and for me, THE SHADOWKILLER proved itself among the latter when one character’s surprise was described with the line “His jaw did a Roger Rabbit.”
There’s more that holds Hansen’s novel back: Too many characters. Too much backstory, especially with characters who obviously are introduced simply to give Bigfoot someone to kill within the chapter. And it’s simply too long. Monster hunts should be lean and mean, not a soul-searching 450 pages. Are we here to have fun or to impart a message?
I showed up for a party, but Hansen had designs on a lecture. Witness his afterword, which for pages does its best to convince you of Bigfoot’s existence. Whether or not you agree with his beliefs is irrelevant, but it confirms an earnestness toward the subject that he is not skilled enough to pull off in fiction.
I’m really surprised THE SHADOWKILLER is being released in hardcover, as it’s afforded no prestige, and it’s the type of thing that screams mass-market paperback, which would best suit it. Putting it out as a $25 hardcover is like releasing STOMP THE YARD to a few theaters in December to qualify for Academy Awards consideration: It’s simply the wrong format for the material. –Rod Lott
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