Top Ten Tuesday-Holiday Reads #1

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.  http://www.thatartsyreadergirl.com/top-ten-tuesday/

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Now I'm not a person who enjoys reading holiday romances or cozy Christmas mysteries so of course I'm putting my own spin on things! I'm looking at ten scary books with a winter setting that I haven't read yet. What could be better holiday reads than that!

1) Ike Hamill-Extinct
Channel Two predicted a blanket of snow for Thanksgiving weekend--unusual, but not alarming for the little Maine island. What comes is a blinding blizzard, and a mass disappearance of nearly every person Robby Pierce knows. He and his family flee, trying to escape the snow and the invisible forces stealing people right from the street.
 
Miles away, Brad Jenkins battles the same storm. Alone, he attempts to survive as snow envelops his house. When the storm breaks, Brad makes his way south to where the snow ends and the world lies empty. Join Brad, Robby, and the other survivors as they fight to find the truth about the apocalypse and discover how to live in their new world.

2) James D Dean-The End Begins
It was always a joke. The “what ifs” and the planning were just conversations to have fun with. Who would be the first to go? Where would people be safe? Who would survive the zombie apocalypse? No one is laughing anymore.

Awakening to a nightmare, Dan Foster is forced to flee his suburban Chicago home. Together with his wife Abby and little girl Katie, they begin a dangerous trek across the wintery Midwest in hopes to reconnect with his brother in the heartland of Wisconsin. Dan soon discovers the ravenous hordes of undead are not the only things out there that threaten the lives of his family. Can he stay the man he is, or will he need to become something more dangerous in order to protect the ones he loves? In the end, how much of Dan’s humanity will survive this dying world?

3) Jason Deyo-Winter's Salvation
Machinery Technician Third Class Eric Hagen of the U.S. Coast Guard abandons his post out of Jacksonville, Florida, after his whole world is transformed. The streets are teeming with crazed people, possessed by an insatiable appetite for human flesh. He soon learns that these manic people are not what they appear—they are undead.

Traveling north in a post-apocalyptic world, Eric leads a team of four to Baltimore, Maryland, in search of his family, and in the process forms a family of his own. The cold winter months provide some relief from the undead, but Eric soon realizes that dangers from within his newly-formed family are just as deadly as the perils outside.

4) Taylor Adams-No Exit
On her way to Utah to see her dying mother, college student Darby Thorne gets caught in a fierce blizzard in the mountains of Colorado. With the roads impassable, she’s forced to wait out the storm at a remote highway rest stop. Inside, are some vending machines, a coffee maker, and four complete strangers. Desperate to find a signal to call home, Darby goes back out into the storm . . . and makes a horrifying discovery. In the back of the van parked next to her car, a little girl is locked in an animal crate. Who is the child? Why has she been taken? And how can Darby save her?

There is no cell phone reception, no telephone, and no way out. One of her fellow travelers is a kidnapper. But which one? Trapped in an increasingly dangerous situation, with a child’s life and her own on the line, Darby must find a way to break the girl out of the van and escape. But who can she trust?

5) Matthew Iden-The Winter Over
Each winter the crew at the Shackleton South Pole Research Facility faces nine months of isolation, round-the-clock darkness, and one of the most extreme climates on the planet. For thirty-something mechanical engineer Cass Jennings, Antarctica offers an opportunity to finally escape the guilt of her troubled past and to rebuild her life.

But the death of a colleague triggers a series of mysterious incidents that push Cass and the rest of the forty-four-person crew to the limits of their sanity and endurance. Confined and cut off from the outside world, will they work together or turn against one another? As the tension escalates, Cass must find the strength to survive not only a punishing landscape but also an unrelenting menace determined to destroy the station—and everyone in it.

6) Shari Lapena-An Unwanted Guest
A remote lodge in upstate New York is the perfect getaway. . . until the bodies start piling up. It's winter in the Catskills and the weather outside is frightful. But Mitchell's Inn is so delightful! The cozy lodge nestled deep in the woods is perfect for a relaxing--maybe even romantic--weekend away. The Inn boasts spacious old rooms with huge wood-burning fireplaces, a well-stocked wine cellar, and opportunities for cross-country skiing, snowshoeing, or just curling up with a book and someone you love. So when the weather takes a turn for the worse, and a blizzard cuts off the electricity--and all contact with the outside world--the guests settle in for the long haul. 

The power's down but they've got candles, blankets, and wood--a genuine rustic experience! Soon, though, a body turns up--surely an accident. When a second body appears, they start to panic. Then they find a third body. Within the snowed-in paradise, something--or someone--is picking off the guests one by one. They can't leave, and with no cell service, there's no prospect of getting the police in until the weather loosens its icy grip. The weekend getaway has turned deadly. For some couples, it's their first time away. For others, it will be their last. And there's nothing they can do about it but huddle down and hope they can survive the storm.

7) Matthew Reilly-Ice Station
Antarctica is the last unconquered continent, a murderous expanse of howling winds, blinding whiteouts and deadly crevasses. On one edge of Antarctica is Wilkes Station. Beneath Wilkes Station is the gate to hell itself...A team of U.S. divers, exploring three thousand feet beneath the ice shelf has vanished. Sending out an SOS, Wilkes draws a rapid deployment team of Marines-and someone else...

First comes a horrific firefight. Then comes a plunge into a drowning pool filled with killer whales. Next comes the hard part, as a handful of survivors begin an electrifying, red-hot, non-stop battle of survival across the continent and against wave after wave of elite military assassins-who've all come for one thing: a secret buried deep beneath the ice...

8) Gustavo Bondoni-Ice Station Death
All Argentine Army Colonel Javier Balzano had to do was babysit a group of scientists to Antarctica. The months spent at the Belgrano II base promised to be more tedious than dangerous. His only real concern was a mysterious undercover American observer. What might be worth observing on the frozen, empty wastes of Antarctica, no one knew.

When the base suddenly goes off air, no one is unduly concerned. Antarctic communications have always been patchy. Then strange creatures are sighted in the surrounding seas and the crew are suddenly thrown into savage battle against prehistoric monsters and the brutal elements. Can anyone survive Ice Station Death?

9) Ray Garton-Lot Lizards
A "lot lizard" is a female hooker who works a highway truck stop as her territory. When trucker Bill Ketter looks for a little relaxation and release, he discovers, too late, that he has bitten off more than he can chew. In fact, his lot lizard is the one that does the biting--she is a vampire, one of number who move from one truck stop to the next under the watchful and vicious eyes of the repulsive Carsey Brothers. 

Against his will, Bill becomes one of the undead. He follows the brothers and their cargo to another stop where he meets his ex-wife and children and Bill finds himself battling the vampires and their age-old leader for the life of his teenaged son. Garton has created another small masterpiece, contemporary adult horror at its most gruesome and loaded with extras doses of sex and gore. The confined setting creates a perfect claustrophobic stage for the story and the hellaciously quick pace never lets the action slow down.

10) RA Hakok-Among Wolves
Gabriel remembers the Last Day. He and Mags had been on a tour of the White House with the rest of Miss Kimble’s first-graders when it happened. They fled with the President to a long-abandoned bunker, even as the first of the bombs began to fall. Ten years have passed, and now Gabriel is almost grown. He still lives deep inside the mountain, waiting for the world to thaw. But outside the storms continue to rage, and supplies are running low. The President says it will be okay, because they are the Chosen Ones. But Gabriel isn’t so sure. Gabriel’s their scavenger, and he’s seen what it’s like out there.

Then one day Gabriel finds a bloodstained map. The blood’s not a problem, nor are the frozen remains of the person it once belonged to. Gabriel’s used to seeing dead bodies. There's far worse to be found in any Walmart or Piggly Wiggly you care to wander into. Except this one he recognizes, and it shouldn’t be all the way out here. Now all Gabriel can think is how he's going to make it back to the bunker and let the President know what he's found. But Gabriel's troubles are only just beginning. For things are not as they seem inside the mountain, and soon he will face a much larger problem: how to get Mags and the others out.