Hive
by Tim Curran
Review by James R.Cain
"Hive" is 271 page graphic novel and is penned as a sequel to H.P Lovecraft's "At the Mountains of Madness".
The story centres at Kharkhoiv Station, a research facility at the South Pole which has been shut down and isolated in an Antarctic winter. Jimmy Haines is a maintenance worker, routinely doing his duties as a distraction from the snow and cold, when alien mummies are brought in and stored onsite. But things are not as they first appear. Communications are shut off as the station is put in lockdown when the ruins of a pre-human civilization is discovered. People start having nightmares, and become paranoid and unhinged. Insanity and death follow close behind.
I thought Curran's writing was superb as he delivers the narration with kick-in-the-guts effectiveness. His use of prose was both authentic to Lovecraft's own style and contemporary so it's unencumbered in its potency. The story barrels along to a dramatic climax in the ruins of an impossible city that only Curran could have described. This is the jewel in Curran's crown to date and if he keeps up writing books like this one, Curran will fast become a name up there with the likes of Joe Lansdale, and Stephen King.
ISBN: 0-9759229-4-7