Audio Book Review: The Haunted Forest Tour by James A. Moore and Jeff Strand

This wasn't as fun as it looked. Definitely horror trick, not treat.
The Haunted Forest Tour
Written By: James A. Moore, Jeff Strand
Narrated By: Joe Hempel

Date: August 2018
Duration: 8 hours 56 minutes
Publisher: Tantor Audio
Genre: Dark Fantasy, Horror
My Rating: 3.0 of 5.0 Overall; Story 3.0; Narration 3.5.

Summary:
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Haunted Forest Tour! Sit back and enjoy a smooth ride in air-conditioned comfort as your heavily armored tram takes you through nature's most astonishing creation. The forest is packed to capacity with dangerous and terrifying creatures of all shapes, sizes, and hunger levels, and you'll get to observe these wonders in complete safety.
Howl with a werewolf! Gaze into the glowing eyes of a giant spider! Look right through a spooky ghost! See horrific monsters you couldn't even imagine, only inches away from you! Things with fangs, things with claws, things with dripping red jaws-you'll see them all!
Not thrilling enough? Well, it's Halloween, and so we're offering a very special tour through the Haunted Forest. The new route goes deeper into the woods than any civilians have ventured before, and you're guaranteed to get a good scare! Rest assured that every possible security precaution has been taken. The Haunted Forest Tour has a 100% safety record, and technical difficulties are unheard of. You will be in no danger whatsoever.
We promise.

Review:
A few years ago a strange deadly forest popped up out of nowhere devastating a small community in New Mexico. After the first days of death and terror the growth had stopped and has seemed to be contained. The owner of the land was able to send teams into the forest to build a state of the art, totally safe tour attraction. Since the initial spread, there have been no deaths, except for couple of accidents.

A select group of tourists, young and old, have gathered for a special Halloween, Haunted Forest Tour. The new Halloween route is special as it goes deeper into the forest and the guests are expecting to see all types of strange monsters. Most are excited about the adventure and everyone expects the ride to be a bit scary but fun and safe. And for half the trip all is good. Then the first tram bus stalls on the track. The monsters creep closer until the tour guide decides it might be a good idea to pass out the handful of weapons they have stowed on board…just in case.

The story begins with trauma and then moves to a theme similar to Jurassic Park. There is little development although the author presents a range of characters with different reasons and enthusiasm levels for the special tour. There is a wide assortment of monsters but after a while as they just kept coming, the descriptions became less interesting to me. I cared about some of the struggling characters but at about three quarters of the story I had just about had enough. I stuck it out, so I did learn the catalyst that brought the monsters out and a means of ending the terror was revealed. Even that was gruesome, but it was a relief that it was over.

I had hoped this would be fun but there were only a few flashes of fun that came through the horror and carnage. Also, I didn’t care for some male sexual fantasizing that got to be icky. This might be a good read for true horror fans but not for those looking for a light, monster story.

Audio Notes: Joe Hempel does a good job with the narration. There was some variety in the voices and I didn’t find confusion among the characters. The audio version helped me get to the end.

Source: 10/2020 Audiobooks.com Mystery Audiobook Club. This qualifies for 2020Audiobook goal.