Death Bite

Michael Maryk &
Brent Monahan

While seventies survival-thriller snake stories are enjoying a brief resurgence thanks to the popularity of Snakes on a Plane, a friend thought of me and sent this one my way. It being a typical seventies horror novel, it went down like a shot of flaming Ouzo. I'll set the scene for you:

Take the "gold standard" of ophidiophobia novels-- John Godey's 1978 novel The Snake. Have it written by two Brits with fanciful imaginations. Move it across the country (and why is it set in America, anyway?). And make the snake bigger, more aggressive, and somewhat supernatural. You now have Death Bite.

The plot: a guy who opened a serpentarium in Florida has been lusting after a specimen of the Giant Taipan, found on only one Indonesian island, for his new park. One is finally captured, and he wants it smuggled into America for transport to his park. He has two problems-- he's not the only one who wants the snake, and his agent on the west coast is having some qualms about the illegal nature of the business.

This is straight stock genre writing at its best (or worst, depending on your POV)-- action, shallow characters, stereotyping out the wazoo, and lots of oddly prudishly-written sex scenes. Now, here's the interesting bit-- Maryk and Monahan violate one of the great rules of horror novels here, and get away with it. (Anyone who's read this after reading more than, say, ten horror novels will recognize the violation right off the bat.) That's gotta count for something. And it's got enough of a sense of pace to keep the pages turning. This is by no means deathless prose, but it's certainly good for killing some time. And how can you go wrong with a nineteen-foot devil snake?