Churn the Soil

By: Steve Stred

Narrated by: Shep Pryor

Length: 5 hrs and 28 mins

Publisher's summary

Two hundred miles north of the town of Basco sits The Border. It’s a quiet, off-the-grid settlement, where the residents have developed a tentative agreement with those that live on the other side of the clearing.

But things are about to change forever.

As night falls, a teenage girl is brutally murdered as she flees across the clearing.

Now, it’s up to Basco PD officers Brown and Reynolds to find her killer.

But the truth is far worse than they could possibly imagine, and the more the officers uncover, the bolder the things beyond the clearing grow.

"Under an icy snowfall…"

"Under a clear, blue moon…"

North of The Border lies a land unseen by man. A land where things are ready and waiting… to feed.

Splatterpunk-Nominated author Steve Stred, who brought you Mastodon and Incarnate, delivers a pulse-pounding, high-stakes story where if the cold doesn’t kill you, the Forest Guards will.

“Churn the Soil is a wonderful mix of mystery, creatures, and bloody horror.” (V. Castro, HWA Bram Stoker Nominated author of \The Queen of The Cicadas and Goddess of Filth)

“The sense of place is immaculate. Churn the Soil has the bone-chilling atmosphere of a frozen arctic tundra.” (David Sodergren, author of The Forgotten Island and Maggie’s Grave)

“Veteran readers of Steve Stred will know that nothing good ever comes out of venturing into the woods and encroaching forests! ‘Churn the Soil’ finds the prolific Canadian author up to his old tricks, focussing on a community which lives off the grid and has an uneasy alliance with the beings which haunt the forest. Stred is on a seriously cool hot streak, following the superb ‘The Window in the Ground’ and wild monster novel ‘Mastodon’ with another page-turning blend of intense supernatural horror where death lurks around every corner. Stred is going places and is a master of fast-paced, punchy, and easy-read horror fiction which will have you speed reading in a matter of minutes.” (Tony Jones, Ginger Nuts of Horror & Horror DNA reviewer)

©2023 Steve Stred (P)2023 Steve Stred

Beware of Evil

The indigenous tale tells of a broken treaty between the border people and the forest guards.

The forest was creepy and full of paranoia. I loved the bravery of the k9 dog the best.

Good story with okay voice performance

I feel like this book is a good book to get back into reading or listing to stories it has a good story that isn’t too hard to follow with listening and can keep your attention with enough action. The voice acting is just okay brings the book down slightly.

Love!

The story was VERY good, but at some times the quality of the actual audiobook was questionable. This was heavily recommended on BookTok and I was not disappointed!! Fast paced, great character description, gore galore. Will definitely recommend

the setting and the cane corso

I like the environment . ending felt flat and cut short but overall okay book

Perfect cold weather creep-fest

Churn The Soil is a perfect winter read. It combines a classic creature feature, a police procedural, and a frozen Canadian wilderness to create a bone-chilling mystery with plenty of gore. This book is a fresh take on a classic horror creature. The mythos Steve Stred created for this creature and its history is awe-inspiring. This review does no justice to this excellent tale, and I hope you'll read it despite my abject failure to convey its brilliance.

Great Read, Poor Narration

So the book itself is fantastic. Absolutely great horror read. The pacing is good and the horror is there. I wouldn’t say it’s too terribly terrifying, but it’s good. My biggest issue with the book is with the dog, Bruiser. Up until the final encounter the dog is quite literally invincible and the reasoning for this was “because its ears were docked, not leaving anything for the creatures to grab onto.” Completely absurd. The dog is overused as an untouchable plot device until suddenly it’s touchable.

The narration is monotonous and attempts at female voices by this narrator are cringe at best. There is nearly no emotion put into this through the entire book. Additionally, this doesn’t sound like it was recorded in a studio. There’s some strange background sound that’s reminiscent of someone speaking into a tape recorder instead of a studio quality microphone.

I would suggest reading this one on paper.

Absolutely loved it!!

This book sucked me in immediately. The narration is phenomenal and you are doing yourself a disservice if you just read it although the story is awesome as well. Twisted and dark but also lighthearted at times! I wish I could give this more than 5 stars!