Welcome to my Saturday Screams.
I couldn’t resist this book. The title. The cover. The blurb. The hippos! Oh My!
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River Of Teeth
by Sarah Gailey
Genre: Alternative History / Fantasy / Science Fiction
My Review
Being a southern gal, I’m always looking for stories set in my neck of the woods. The author did a superb job describing the bayous and the muddy Mississippi. I heard the rising shrill of the cicadas, the buzz of the annoying mosquitoes, and the grunt of alligators. Caught a glimpse of huge alligator gars as they rolled on the surface, while being lulled by the back and forth swaying on top my hippo. Yes, I said hippo.
The US Government came up with the idea of importing hippos into Louisiana for a much needed food supply. Sounded like a good idea, but didn’t happen. Except, in this book it did. And now the hippos are feral and eating everything, including humans, making the river a dangerous place. A ragtag group of hippo wranglers enter the swamp to round them up. All is not as it seems.
I read somewhere that in Africa more people die from hippo attacks than any other animal. They hide under the water, move at tremendous speeds, and their teeth are gigantic. In this book you have hippos that the wranglers bond with from birth, making them safe to ride, most of the time. Then there’s the feral ones. No one wants to encounter them. When some of these characters come across a feral, it’s bloody mayhem.
The characters you meet are varied and odd. One of my favorites is Winslow Houndstooth. He’s usually somber and withdrawn, until you shake his hornets nest. Then he’d as easily kill ya as step on an ant. He’s a charmer and I loved how he could make men preen and blush from his attentions.
The writing is haunting, powerful, and visual. Such a superb job for this author’s debut. The good guys aren’t all good and some bad guys aren’t all bad. Action, intrigue, and betrayal keep you glued to the story. And the hippos, I just couldn’t get enough of them.
Do I recommend this book? Most definitely. Will I be reading the second book? Hell yes!
5 Stars
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Synopsis
Sarah Gailey’s wildfire debut River of Teeth is a rollicking alternate history adventure that Charlie Jane Anders calls “preposterously fun.”
In the early 20th Century, the United States government concocted a plan to import hippopotamuses into the marshlands of Louisiana to be bred and slaughtered as an alternative meat source. This is true.
Other true things about hippos: they are savage, they are fast, and their jaws can snap a man in two.
This was a terrible plan.
Contained within this volume is an 1890s America that might have been: a bayou overrun by feral hippos and mercenary hippo wranglers from around the globe. It is the story of Winslow Houndstooth and his crew. It is the story of their fortunes. It is the story of his revenge.
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