The blurb:
What should have been a breeze of a bank heist for James Glenn and his crew goes violently wrong, forcing them to flee, blood-stained and angry. They stumble onto a remote lodge that doesn't open for another month—a perfect place to lie low until the heat's off.
Except it's occupied.
The Moore family, just arrived to prepare for the season, are taken hostage by the criminals, but not without bloodshed. And when blood gets spilled, something ancient notices. Something malevolent. Something ravenous.
Their only hope is the youngest Moore, teenager Rueben, outside and unseen when James and his gang arrive. It's up to Rueben to get help and save his family, but the influence of the ancient evil is taking a toll on him as well...
When a horror novel is called something like "Blood Covenant," that sets certain expectations, and I happily say that Blood Covenant by Alan Baxter lives up to them.
The setup is pretty straightforward: a group of bank robbers has a job go horribly wrong, and decide to find somewhere quiet until the heat is off. That turns out to be a hotel back in the bush that’s only open during the summer; unfortunately, it’s almost summer and three generations of the family that own and run the hotel are there, preparing for the season opening.
The bank robbers are led by James, who is definitely not the most stable of individuals, lets say: he’s largely the reason the bank heist goes wrong in the first place. When he meets the Moore family, they’re not ready for him at all. And nobody’s ready for the malevolent entity that lives in the bush around the hotel. Clay, the family patriarch, and his now-deceased wife Molly, managed to defeat it in the past–or fight it to a stalemate and put it to sleep, anyway. Now, with the bloodshed brought by James’s crew, it’s awake again–it feeds on blood, and the robbers have brought plenty of it with them.
Several forces are in play here: the isolation, with nobody in range to help the family; James’s violence and unpredictability; and the malevolent force in the bush that wants blood. True to the genre there are numerous near escapes, temptations and corruptions abound, and there’s a substantial body count. Don’t get attached to any characters, basically.
It’s tightly written and plotted, and there aren’t many chances to sit and take a breath; this thing moves like it’s jet-propelled. It’s a fast, bloody read that doesn’t let up at any point throughout the whole plot. Very exciting, much enjoyment in reading this.
Started: 26 August 2025
Finished: 31 August 2025
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