FantasticLand by Mike Bockoven

My favorite genre is horror and I do feel like each season invites its own kind of horror. Summer, with its hot sticky days, is the perfect setting for a different kind of horror to the gothic chills and thrills of the Fall. I tend to find myself more drawn to thrillers, monster/animal stories, and anything set in the summer itself. For these reasons, FantasticLand really hit the spot. Furthermore, it's a book of interviews which I always enjoy. Or a fiction book masquerading as actual reporting. Or whatever the actual word for this kind of novel is!

This book landed in my possession during a short lived subscription to My Thrill Club and as I have recently, unfortunately, been weeding my TBR stacks, I decided to read it. The cover is fantastic and I didn't really know much in advance what it was going to be about but I did enjoy it. It has a Battle Royale, Lord of the Flies vibe but in a unique setting with a modern psychological understanding.

FantasticLand is a fictional theme park where each section of the park is a different land. Think pirates, fairys, etc. It was built by a charismatic visionary who insisted that visitors would be able to see the ocean from the park. Being so close to danger, the park developed an extensive plan for emergencies should anything go wrong. However, the plan hadn't necessarily been updated in modern times as a huge hurricane hits the coast.

With the employees, largely young adults, trapped inside the park, things begin to go violent. Otherwise normal kids have to start thinking about what to do to survive as people start breaking off into groups, hoarding supplies, and enacting violence to establish territory. In very little time, it's a matter of survival for those in the park.

I enjoyed how fast paced and imaginative the book was. FantasticLand felt real and I had no trouble understanding how quickly things disintegrated...it really only takes one person to act violently in order to set off a chain of events when people are surrounded by uncertainty. There are some gruesome images as well, so definitely not for those with a weak stomach.

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