Review: Blacktail

Blacktail by Scott Hawkins
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A bizarre sort of story, but no less enjoyable because of it. Violent and intriguing, and certainly not for the squeamish.

Blacktail is a half-breed - a wolf/dog mix of unknown paternity. His journey is one of revenge, after experiencing betrayal at the hands of humans.

I really enjoyed this revenge story, but it is a little strange to adapt to quickly. We get a familiar animal vs human set up, but then the story mixes in the supernatural and we have to adjust our idea of everything. I didn't mind it at all, but I did find it a little jarring.

Blacktail does not hold back, leading to some violent incidents that put this book firmly in the horror category. At the same time, there's not a lot of atmospheric horror to hold the tension throughout, so the nature of the story changes as it goes. It's this that really held me back from embracing it fully. I enjoyed the idea, the incidents, and the gruesome nature of it, but some of the wandering in between left me a little disappointed and honestly? kind of bored.

That's not to say I didn't enjoy it, because I found the uniqueness of it to be quite attractive. It's such an unusual story, filled with fresh concepts and a unique breed of horror that has the reader questioning whether they're on the right side of the man vs nature divide. There's something quite special about murderous animals - at least to me, anyway.

So it's definitely worth a shot if you're looking for horror with an animal protagonist, and/or something a little different to the usual fare.

With thanks to Macmillan and NetGalley for an ARC

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