Blood Harvest by James Axler

Title:  Blood Harvest
Author:  James Axler
Format:  PB
Pages:  315
Genre:  Science Fiction / Action & Adventure
Publisher:  Gold Eagle, 2010
ISBN-13:  978-0373626014
Series:  Deathlands, Book 92

Favorite Quote:  "And smote the Philistine in his forehead," Doc continued.  "And he fell upon his face to the earth."  Sylvano stumbled two more steps forward and collapsed.  The reflected red light of the sunset left Sylvano's great sword like a snuffed candle as it fell to the sand.  "Samuel, Book 1, Chapter 17, Verses 48 and 49," Doc concluded.

Synopsis (Amazon):  Washed ashore in the North Atlantic, Ryan Cawdor and Doc Tanner discover two islands still pristinely intact after Skydark, but whose inhabitants suffer a darker, more horrifying punishment. A hideous strain of mutation manifests, turning some into half-monstrous giants with an unquenchable thirst for blood. The Nightwalkers unleash a hellish feast of horror when the sun goes down. Now Ryan and Doc struggle to survive this enclave of unimaginable terror, trapped in a baronial conflict between the rulers of night and day, with only one way out--internecine war in a world of the damned....

Review:  I'll freely admit it.  The Deathlands series is my secret weakness.  I love them.  They are full of guns, killing, sex, violence, mutants and horrors.  They are not by any stretch of the imagination great literature.  I still love them.  Every so often, I need a break from reading books that are supposedly great and meaningful and this series never lets me down.

I love the characters:  Doc Tanner, Jak, Ryan, J.B., Mildred and Krysty.  My favorite is either Doc or Jak, depending upon when you ask me.  I love the post-apocalyptic world of the Deathlands.

The best thing about this series is that I can read one or two of these books and stop, then read a few more months later and still not be lost since each is a story unto itself (with a couple of exceptions), although they do have a chronological order which I have followed.

Over the course of several years, I have read 92 of these books and, really, I'm not tired of them yet.  This story, like all the rest in this series, is unapologetically violent, with Ryan and his gang being forced to fight for their lives against evil.  They always survive and this time they won.  The story is original even if it does follow a very similar formula to the other novels.  For the serial pulp fiction that it is, this was a great story and a fast, fun read.

Rating:  8 / 10