CANIS DIRUS

Set in Yosemite National Park, this fusion of horror, SF, and mainstream thriller involves the discovery of a pack of prehistoric predators believed to be extinct for more than 10,000 years.

After a hiker disappears in Yosemite’s high country, chief park ranger Axten Raymond and his fiancee, Petra Stahl, a world-class rock climber and manager of a nearby camp, set out to find the man. Forced to deal with a significant earthquake—whose epicenter is just 40 miles away—and its aftershocks as well as a looming threat from a group of anti-government militiamen bent on “reclaiming” the park, Raymond and Stahl soon discover the missing hiker is just a precursor to a much larger problem. A pack of dire wolves, existing in a massive subterranean cave system for millennia, has been freed after the earthquake created a new opening. The formidable alpha wolf—“the size of a healthy tiger”—has a grotesque head, “with a blunt, unwolf-like muzzle, and oversize bat-like ears that sit on a lowbrowed, flat head. The animal’s eyes are a sickening pale yellow, bordering on albino, huge, the size of quahogs.” Powered by dark imagery (a mountain peak resembles a “gothic castle in a child’s fable,” and wind whips around a cabin like a “legion of angry harpies”) that complements the narrative’s brutal and bloody tone perfectly, O’Neill’s tale savvily alters the point of view throughout. The story subtly switches from third person to first and second person in places, making the reading experience more emotionally connective and immersive. Examples include: “All we see, at first, are canine-like legs, but larger, thick set, chunked with muscles,” and “You can almost hear the snow melting.” But arguably the tale’s biggest strength lies in the sheer amount of breathtaking, heart-stopping action and adventure, which creates a relentlessly paced, adrenaline-inducing thrill ride that will have readers on the edges of their seats until the very end.

A riveting page-turner starring prehistoric beasts; Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Lost World in California.