fuonlyknew

I don’t know about you, but I just love freebies. Especially when they’re books!

I think the idea of offering a book for free is ingenious. Maybe the author doesn’t see a huge jump in sales after offering their book for a free download. Maybe it’s a gradual growth.

I do know that when I purchase a free download, if I really enjoyed the book, I will buy other books by that author. Not all at once as I have a book budget, but one here and one there. And if I really loved the book, I will go for the print copy. I love to have a physical copy to put on my bookshelf. I can take it down and hold it, smell it, feel the paper between my fingers. A print book is wonderous.

So, I’d like to thank all of you awesome authors for the many free books you have made available. I, for one, am now your biggest fan!

Claws is a book I discovered for free on Amazon.

When I get a free book, I feel bound to do a review. It’s the least I can do.

Plus, I love reviewing books. The only thing better is reading them!

You can get a free copy of Claws here!

So here is my review of Claws.

Have you ever went to do your review and lost all of your notes?

I am stompin mad! I can’t find any of my notes, so now I have to start from scratch.

To begin:

In picturesque Athens, Alabama, a pet food company is working with an experimental cat food laced with hormones and appetite enhancers. The feed causes cats to add muscle, gain weight, and exhibit extremely aggressive behavior. When Patricia Reese, head of the research project, threatens to expose the pet food as a threat to public safety, she finds herself out of work, her home ransacked, and all her carefully gathered proof missing.

The cats involved in the testing are scheduled to be euthanized by the company, but well-meaning animal rights activists release the animals. These enhanced, hyper-aggressive felines begin to prey on small game in the area, and then the ravenous animals turn their attention to people.

An unemployed scientist, a small special ops team, and a homeless veteran join forces to protect the inhabitants of Athens. Racing against time, they try to prevent the looming catastrophe.

But when someone steals the secret formula that created the menace and sells it to eight foreign enemies of the United States, the most deadly biological weapon ever created has been unleashed. The genie is out of the bottle and the world may never be the same.

My Review

When will they learn? Someone always thinks they can tamper with Mother Nature and it inevitably ends up with bloodshed and death.

The pet food company knows something’s wrong with their product, but the side affects to the cats opens another door. A door with big dollars, when several other countries want the formula for their own.

When the animal rights activists free the cats, they have no idea of the repercussions. These aren’t your ordinary house cats anymore. They are much larger, packed with muscle, longer teeth, and larger claws and they are hungry, always hungry. You don’t dare get between them and their food.

There’s a slow building romance between Patricia, the former head of research at the pet food company, and Jerry, an undercover special ops soldier. What’s a good horror story without some romance and characters to care about.

Throw in some scumbags and mysterious characters with hidden agendas and you have a great tale of suspense, mayhem, and murder.

You might think cats aren’t a big deal, but these cats aren’t ordinary. They’re hormonally enhanced, much more lethal than your normal house cat. They’re also very vicious. Let’s put it this way, they’re spitting mad.

You could probably handle a few when they attack, but when they ambush you in large numbers, you’re kibble.

Imagine what happens when dogs become involved.

After reading Claws, I’ll never look at my pets the same way again. Who knows what’s in that new brand of pet food you just bought?

I liked everything about this book. The author moves you through the scenes smoothly, building the suspense, putting the horror right in your face, and sprinkling many colorful, intriguing characters throughout the story to make this a very exciting read.

The author gives you a killer ending, but leaves an exciting opening for more of this story, which continues in Claws 2. It’s like the last scene in a not so happily ever after movie.

4 Stars and on to Book Two!

This is book two, just warning ya.

I’ll be telling you about this one soon!

From California to the east coast, it rained across most of the continental United States. From Los Angeles to New York City, residents reported an odd, whitish-grey residue that coated everything.

Cats groomed the residue from their bodies, because that’s what cats do, and then they turned to their feed bowls with increasing hunger.

The most deadly biological weapon ever created had been unleashed. It was one that would effectively pit most forms of animal life against mankind.

Humanity was immune to the growth hormone. However, exposed to massive doses, mankind was not immune to the chemical component of the compound that triggered the hyper aggression, nor was humanity immune to the appetite enhancer.

By mid-February, violent mobs of enraged hungry people were rioting in the streets of every major city in the world. In American cities, some of these riots were sparked by angry pet owners who were outraged that the government was supposedly plotting to exterminate all dogs and cats as a preemptive measure to protect the population. Pet owners viewed the mandatory registration of all dogs and cats with government officials by the end of February as a prelude to that extermination effort. Other people, generally those who didn’t own pets, were supportive of the measures. This led to protests and counter protests, which quickly turned violent as the hyper aggressive groups clashed.

In the months that followed, one by one, the governments of the world collapsed under the strain of trying to maintain order. Food production ground to a halt in most of the world as the men and women who’d been feeding the human race succumbed to the effects of massive exposure to the formula.

As the governments collapsed, so did the infrastructures supporting the civilization of mankind. Mass transit, power generation, and water purification were among the first to fail, but they were quickly followed by oil and gasoline production.

In six months, humanity plunged from the top of the food chain to a position near the center and the world would never be the same.

This is a 112,500 word book that has numerous accompanying photographs to depict the scenes.

About the author and where to find his books.

Ricky Sides was Born in Florence, Alabama in May of 1958. He has a wife named Sue that he married at age 18. He has one adult son named Larry Dale.

The author studied martial arts from 1981 to the mid 1990s. He has been an avid camper and student of survival. The techniques described in his fight sequences are often from his own personal experience and training. He has taught women’s rape prevention seminars in the 1980’s that he conducted free to the public.

The author’s writing experience includes the ” Peacekeeper” series, the “Brimstone” series, “The Ultimate in Women’s Self-Defense,” and “Adventures in Reading,” “Claws,” which is a suspense / horror novel that will ultimately serve as the back story for an epic post apocalyptic novel that he will release in 2011. “Claws 2. After the Apocalypse,” and “Lina’s Story,” which is connected to the peacekeeper series.

Amazon / Goodreads