Shredders

By: Michael Cole

Narrated by: Benjamin Williams

Length: 6 hrs and 50 mins

Publisher's summary

Lorenzo was a quiet Michigan town, known for its beautiful lake and resorts. Summer has arrived and water activities are abundant. It was one of the reasons Officer Royce Dashnaw took the job in the small town. Being a single dad, he wanted to live a quiet life where his daughter could enjoy the beauty of nature.

Unfortunately, nature also has a dark side.

The peaceful serenity of Lorenzo has been disrupted by a series of strange events. A woman flees from the water with strange bites on her legs; bodies are found in the shallows, stripped to the bone; and the local population of fish have mysteriously disappeared.

As the body count rises, Royce learns the truth. Genetically enhanced fish have been dumped into the lake. With scissor-like jaws, they can reduce a full-grown adult to a mere skeleton in under a minute. A race against time ensues as Royce and his partner struggle to evacuate the very large and busy lake before too many fall victim to the shredders.

©2021 Michael Cole (P)2022 Tantor

So many teeth

Shredders like most of Michael Coles books is another great dive into the world of genetically altered creatures. As far as the overall plot it was really good with great pacing. The story was very engaging. I really enjoyed all of the humor and banter between the characters. If I was to describe this story in a nutshell. I would say it is a better version of the Piranhas movies. The narrator did a phenomenal job at telling the story and giving each character their own voice. All in all I would recommend Shredders to anyone who likes these kind of books or likes a good horror thriller.

So, about them shredders. [Spoilers]

This is an adequate attempt at a lake monster story, but has a bit too much of the "hero cop" narrative and takes significant issues with environmentalists. (Who are more or less a stand in for terrorists, but like, watered down terrorists?)

The critters that make up the monster bits are compelling. They are probably the reason you got this book and they're the bitey vicious things they should be.

The characters. So. Yeah, there is a rather weird subplot where the leader of the "eating animals is murder" (A stand-in for the ecoterrorists of the '90s, I think. I don't know what they did to Cole, but he's got a grudge) puts a bunch of murderous hyper piranha with incephilitis in a lake to stop fishing in said lake. She then hires three armed killers to chase our intrepid fascist (and yeah, the book keeps saying it's an overblown thing, but the protagonist literally tortures an inmate for information. He's a fascist) because an actress has "hired gun" money as well as "modify these fish to be killing machines" money. It's absurd.

The book also dates itself as directly as possible, as the two kids (the protagonists breakfast cooking, woke hating daughter, and her friend who doesn't know how to fish) constantly complain about Marvel's Love and Thunder. Like, at least five times, by name.

Let's see... the narration was good. Decent range of voicing and differentiates the characters well enough.

The cops in the book are broadly bad at their job. The resolution to the problem is "get everyone out of the water, because the fish will eat each other." This plan results in innumerable fatalities because the cops can't convince anyone the area is a no swim zone. But, they aren't life guards, so...

I would recommend the book if you're into the police being portrayed as heros. Kind of. As well as a throw back to the time when ecoterrorists were the bad guys, because the meat industry said so.

Horror Movie Nostalgia!!!

This fantastic little piece of literature had me fanboying so hard!
It feels very much inspired by the classic Piranha movies (and maybe a little bit by the modern remake, except less porny), which is absolutely awesome and made me actually dig up the old dvd's and give 'em watch.
I particularly enjoyed the writers approach to describing the gore and death scenes, which although not for squeamish, really got the severity of the situations across.
Awesome stuff. 👌

Enjoyable

I'm no book critic but I just wanted to say it was okay. A short decent listen.

The concept

Story was a great concept, but way tooooo much right-wing fox news for me lol, also Animal activists and bad guys against the right-wing fascist pigs not believable! love most of M.Cole's other material probably won't give another listen Thanks for the effort though.