Review: The Troop by Nick Cutter (4/5)

Tuesday 5 August 2014
LORD OF THE FLIES meets STAND BY ME and THE THING in this fast-paced and completely addictive psychological thriller that will really get under your skin.

He felt something touch his hand... which is when he looked down...

For the scouts of Troop 52, three days of camping, hiking and survival lessons on the remote shores of Falstaff Island will be the closest thing they'll get to a proper holiday this year.

Which was when he saw it...

But when an emaciated figure unexpectedly stumbles into their camp begging for food, the trip takes a horrifying turn. The man is not just hungry, he's sick. Sick in a way they have never seen before.

Which was when he screamed...

Cut off from the mainland, the scouts of Troop 52 face a nightmare far worse than anything they could have made up around a campfire. To survive they will have to fight their fears, the elements... and eventually each other.

I've started trying to ignore reviews before reading a book, especially since starting blogging however I took a look on Goodreads before starting this book and saw it had been added by Stephen King and he wrote: 'The Troop scared the hell out of me, and I couldn’t put it down. This is old-school horror at its best.' Okay, if it scared Stephen King then it must be good... And after finishing it I can safely say that it was brilliant. I've been wide awake reading it the past couple of nights and couldn't get enough.

This book is absolutely not for the faint hearted or anybody who has just finished eating a meal that doesn't want to immediately vomit it back up. I'm usually quite unaffected by graphic descriptions in the written form but that definitely wasn't the case here. My stomach turned more than once. In particular there are some pretty nasty scenes involving animals which could offend or put some people off (always fascinates me how that offends some people more than human suffering). All in all though books like these have a specific audience and I think said audience will really love this book.

As always discover the book for yourself but the basic premise is a group of boy scouts find themselves trapped on an island. Okay so they can just find a way to leave? Not so simple when you have a crazed man being eaten alive by a tapeworm (which is just disgusting. I can't even look at a witchetty grub let alone imagine this) there too and military forces trapping you on the island. The author writes about the various different stereotypes you find in a high school and whilst perhaps actual scouts probably aren't so varied it was good to have that mix of characters. It's impossible to put this book down and I read it over two nights, the second going into the very early hours of the morning and fell asleep feeling quite queasy. Sorry for how I'm going to end this review but if this book was made into a film the popcorn bags would be overflowing with sick.

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