Book Review: Prip'Yat-The Beast of Chernobyl by Mike Kraus

    
Two Spetsnaz officers are dropped into the ghost city of Prip'Yat and tasked with investigating mysterious disturbances around the city and the nearby Chernobyl power plant. Unaware of the special forces operation, two cousins from Kiev sneak away and travel to Prip'Yat under the cover of night, excited to finally explore and experience the forbidden place....And in the abandoned city, a shadow has stirred.

A new book from bestselling author Mike Kraus, "Prip'Yat: The Beast of Chernobyl" is a horror/adventure tale that takes place in the ghost city of Prip'Yat and the nearby disaster zone of Chernobyl.

My Review: 

Dimitri and Yuri have been fascinated by the strange tales of Prip'Yat, abandoned in the wake of the Chernobyl explosion. Rumours of hauntings and monsters intrigue the boys who decide on an overnight trip into the forbidden zone to explore for themselves rather than the official guided tours . The Ukraine government have become concerned about something strange happening in Prip'Yat and ask the Russian government for help. The Russians decide to send a two man special forces Spetsnaz team in that night to investigate and report back.

The boys are exploring an apartment building when they find a strange gel like substance which has been secreted by something but no footsteps to indicate anything human or animal. The freaked out boys leave the building but become convinced that they are being watched. Strange noises occur and they run for the nearby children's hospital with something in pursuit of them...

The men start exploring near the hospital and notice a shadow moving at speed and decide to follow it. Finding nothing, they then stumble across the same gel substance, which frightens Iosif as he recognises it but refuses to tell Lucas what is bothering him. Lucas knows his partner is hiding something important and realises that he knows what it is they are looking for in the dark town. What exactly are they chasing and who is the hunter and the hunted?

It is difficult to say more about this without giving away the best of the plot. There is a ton of tension as the two boys explore the town, gradually becoming scared by strange noises and shadows. By the time they hide in the basement of the children's hospital, they know that there is something true in the horror stories that they have heard because they can hear it searching for them. Now they have to find some way of getting out of the basement without it catching them. It is pretty creepy being with the boys in the basement as the creature closes in on them.

It is the same with the military men. They are well trained and unsure of exactly what the mission is until he sees the gel substance. Now he knows what they are looking for and he is scared, forced to break confidentiality to tell his partner what they are dealing with. They also become aware that the boys are in the area and now have two things to find. If the special forces guy is scared, you know that this monster is going to be something bad and hard to kill, and boy does it live up to expectations!

The monster is different from anything that I was expecting which added to my enjoyment of the book. I liked the use of Chernobyl and the radiation as important roles in the story, and the author tells a very gripping story to entice the reader into this shadowy world. It is well written and makes you care what happens to the characters. I very much enjoyed having two Russian military characters as heroes instead of the bad guys which happens in so many books. I liked seeing Russian and Ukrainian characters working together as well.

There is just so much to like about this creepy horror thriller. It was my first book by the author and will certainly not be the last. I now look forward to reading his apocalypse books!

Read June 2017.
4 stars.