Viral Snow by PM Barnes
Mia has mostly closed herself off from the world. She works from home, has nearly everything she needs delivered, pays her bills on-line. Her world is small, but safe. However, on this snowy day, things are about to change for everyone.
This was a delightful slow burn of a horror story. Since it’s only 37 pages, I dove into it expecting the horror action to start up within the first few pages. It didn’t, but I found myself wanting to know more about Mia, about why she has closed herself off from most of the world, and wanting to know about the few people in her life.
Fred is her best friend and they have been communicating via computer for a few years now. The author did a good job of capturing how real human connections can be made these days through Skypeing, etc. There was a hint of something deeper to their relationship and I looked forward to seeing where the author took that.
Mia has a large picture window for her loft apartment and it overlooks a park. On a snowy Tuesday morning, there isn’t much going on. However, Mia pays witness to a disturbing scene that she isn’t sure later on if it was her imagination or not. As the reader, I wasn’t sure either because we’re only privy to what Mia experiences.
Eventually, the horror starts to unfold and I really wasn’t sure where the author would take the story. I wanted Mia to live but she’s so isolated I couldn’t count on anyone coming to her assistance. However, since few knew of her existence, that might be the thing that kept her alive. Indeed, I was chewing my nails near the end of the book. The author surprised me with the ending. I did find it fitting.
Honestly, my only complaint with this book is that it should have gone through one more round of editing. There were plenty of typos, incorrect word use, and switching of tenses towards the end that it was distracting from the story. There were few, if any, of these in the first half of the book, but things got progressively sloppier as the story went on. Other than that, I would say this is a solid read.
I won a copy of this book, no strings attached.