The Devil's End

By: D.A. Fowler

Narrated by: Michael Reaves

For 70 Years, He Has Waited....

In Sharon Vallery, at teen slumber parties and around campfires, the story is told. Seventy years ago, on Halloween night, Nathaniel and Myrantha Ober made a pact sealed by bloody human sacrifice...a pact with the devil himself.

This Halloween, Evil Will Return....

Nancy Snell is the most popular girl in high school. She is beautiful and wealthy, and she has discovered the key to unlimited power. The occult force that was summoned to this sleepy town decades ago. She has already chosen the perfect victim needed to perform the ritual: the new girl in town, Lana Bremmers.

The Devil's End

Once again the town of Sharon Valley will be the doorway to the legions of darkness. And the devil will have his payment in blood, on an even more terrifying Halloween night.

©1992 Debra A. Fowler (P)2019 Capricorn Literary

Absolute Mayhem!

Thank you to Capricorn Literary for sending an audiobook download in exchange for an honest review!

The Devil's End by D.A. Fowler was originally published by Pocket Books in 1992 and has been out of print ever since. Fortunately, Capricorn Literary has come to the rescue yet again! They picked up the rights to all of Fowler's books, so we now have a brand new paperback edition of The Devil's End as well as an audiobook narrated by Michael Reaves, who also narrated The Black Cat by John Russo which I reviewed last year. Michael's voice is gravelly and gruff and perfect for vintage horror.

SYNOPSIS: In Sharon Valley, at teen slumber parties and around campfires, the story is told. Seventy years ago, on Halloween night, Nathaniel and Myrantha Ober made a pact sealed by bloody human sacrifice...a pact with the devil himself.
Nancy Snell is the most popular girl in high school. She is beautiful and wealthy, and she has discovered the key to unlimited power. The occult force that was summoned to this sleepy town decades ago. She has already chosen the perfect victim needed to perform the ritual: the new girl in town, Lana Bremmers.
Once again the town of Sharon Valley will be the doorway to the legions of darkness. And the devil will have his payment in blood, on an even more terrifying Halloween night.

This book was like an amped up version of the popular '90s Point Horror series. It had all the high school drama of those books, but with extra doses venom. It is far more vulgar, mean-spirited, darker, gorier, and more depraved than Point Horror ever got, especially toward the end. As the evil begins to poison the minds of the townspeople, things. get. crazy. The ending literally had my mouth hanging open, and yet I couldn't stop smiling for the rest of the day. It's just delightful in its mayhem. Though, for this reason, I can't recommend it to anyone with a weak stomach or to those who are easily offended. There are also some racial jokes and slurs toward a character with mental disabilities, so be forewarned: this book is a product of its time.

My main gripe with The Devil's End is the long list of characters which began to get tangled in my brain, but of those characters there were a few standouts that I really enjoyed reading about, especially Lana Bremmers. I found her to be a well-written character. I also loved reading about Nancy Snell, as awful as she may be.

Overall, this is a must read for anyone who enjoys vintage horror, and the audiobook gets the Library Macabre seal of approval as well. Thanks, Capricorn Literary!

Excellent

The author does a good job setting up the story in the first half
The second half all hell breaks loose with a fantastic ending that hits you like a ton of bricks
Well narrated and perfect if you enjoy your horror a little more extreme but not overly done
I received a free review audiobook and voluntarily left this review

WOW!!!EXTREMELY GRAPHIC!!!!

Where do I begin? The 1st half of this book reads as an older YA-then turns into a somewhat interesting possession horror before evolving to a full blown SHOCK & GORE fiasco! (Dog lovers beware-I had to skip a whole chapter! ) If you're not bothered by Rape, Sodomy, or incestal necrophilia this book is for you. many times I almost lost my lunch!

A horrifying tale

very good book entertaining and well narrated and excellent read as well. Thank you

Mixed feelings on this one.

I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

I have really mixed feelings on this one. It was most definitely horror. And it was very horrific at times. The story overall was very good and held my interest well. It had a few very likable characters, and some you liked to hate.

I did enjoy it. There were just some parts where I thought the story line fell apart somewhat.

This book is not for you if you are faint of heart! There are instances of child abuse, animal abuse and murder. It is fairly gore filled and holds nothing back.

Perfomace of narration was 5 stars for me. very well done! All other aspects are four stars.

Well so much for happy endings

Definitely didn’t see end coming, won’t go into details don’t want to give anything away. But I will say I rather did enjoy the story was great listening to over Halloween. Definitely recommend to anyone looking for a scare. And narrator also did great. I was given this audio in exchange for honest review for free. I would had not been given it still would have enjoyed just as much and is definitely worth a credit.

Entertaining horror story

Great horror story. Perfect for the Halloween season, especially with it getting dark earlier. Narration really added to the story. Entertaining listen for people who enjoy a good scare. Reminded me of the old school horror movies.
I was given this free audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

Bad. Just bad.

This book made me mad. First of all, none of the characters are likeable. Then the ending is a disappointment. Not worth the credit.

Had lots of promise to be original, but

It was not horrible, horrible but some of it was incredibly predictable especially at the end. I love horror fiction and sometimes things tend to end similar and I'm not one for happy endings so much as a good resolutions to stories. There has been a plague of so so writing to bad writing. I thought it was rather original but things were put in there for shock value, cruelness where people do outlandish things with no consequence that is rational or within the scope of the story. Actually, the scope of the story itself was never really established so some things happened, then some more things happened and the ending was a sneaking obvious one.
It maybe worth a read for some people but it just got to be too much as the story went on.

It was just ok

This starts off pretty normal. New girl in town wants to get to know the local kids before starting school midway through the year. She unfortunately gets on the bad side of the most popular clique of girls because one of their on-again-off-again boyfriends approaches the new girl to make his girl mad. The new girl meets the boy next door; literally the school's biggest pariah, a kid with developmental disabilities and the body of a adult giant. She feels bad for him since his mom is abusive. She takes on his puppy as a favor and the boy's crush for her begins.

Meanwhile the mean girl crew gets mixed up in some town folklore and one of them starts going a little too far with the old witch legend.

Of course Halloween approaches, bad things keep happening and the new girl gets deeper down the rabbit hole of weird social dynamics as she tries to integrate into the teen population. She starts dating Bruce, a nice-guy stoner who's really not her type but he likes her so that's ok.

So the first half of the story is build up and character development. You immediately hate the crappy mean popular kids, have a soft spot for Lana the new girl and the misunderstood Spiro neighbor boy. But as time goes on, you start to not like Lana as much as it becomes apparent her truer nature. She's not as good a girl as you'd like to think. Spiro seems more and more disturbed and his family dynamics more and more troublesome.

The 2nd half of the story stirs you right into screamer horror movie territory with tons of gore and shock value violence. You're wondering who's going to end up alive at the end.

The story is pretty original although it follows many of the same horror movie formulas with predictable outcomes or so much shock value its hard to suspend disbelief. Lots of cruelty and a bit of animal cruelty which was ironically the part I found the hardest to listen to.

If you like horror and blood and guts and R-rated themes, this is a great guilty pleasure of their genre.

I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.