The Siberian Incident

By: Greig Beck

Narrated by: Sean Mangan

Length: 11 hrs and 53 mins

Publisher's Summary

For lovers of John Carpenter’s The Thing comes a tale of alien horror from international best-selling author Greig Beck.  

100,000 years ago the object hit the lake at the deepest point, quickly sinking into its mile-deep Stygian darkness. The sheets of ice closed, time moved on and the land forgot.  

But over the centuries, legends grew of people vanishing, of strange, deformed animals and of an unexplained luminescence down in the lake depths.  

When Marcus Stenson won the lucrative contract to create a sturgeon fish farm on the site of disused paper mill on the shore of Lake Baikal, he thought he had won the lottery and refused to listen to the chilling folktales, or even be concerned by the occasional harassment from the local mafia.   

But then animals were found mutilated in the frozen forest and people started to go missing. And worse, some came back, changed, horribly. 

In the depths of the lake, something that had been waiting 100,000 years was stirring. And it needed the warmth of mankind to survive.

©2019 Greig Beck (P)2020 Bolinda Publishing Pty Ltd

The narrator mispronunciations are distracting

Narrator is fine but the direction is terrible mispronunciations abound , good story though and worth a credit.

Another Exceptional Tale

He did it again. This was another gripping tale that I found myself listening too far too much, more than I planned as I had great trouble putting it down.

Very Cool

Before buying this book I read many reviews and went with the endless comparisons to The Thing, which is one of my all time favorites. While I did enjoy this book a lot, I don't see enough similarities. Only 2 things in common here, first being that they're both about hostile aliens, and second that they both take place in icy frozen areas. Other than those things, they differ quite a bit. I do massively prefer Who Goes There? But this was certainly an enjoyable Sci-Fi/Horror story.

A fun story really dumb science

There is not much more to say, the story is fun, it really would have benefit it it was simpler, but yet I could enjoy.
But the "science" OMG, next time don't explain anything if that is what the explanation it. I am not exaggerating when I say a high school student would have done a better job.
as example with spoilers. The monsters are supposed to have an ultraviolet color. instead of them being black, like scorpions, which are actually mentioned in the book, they are invisible. That is so dumb and unnecessary to the story it's really hard to thing this book has been review by an editor at all.

Great concept, great action, mediocre execution

I love my cheesy B horror. Pulp. Something scary but with action. And this book delivers!... Eventually.

Unfortunately what holds this book back is pacing issues. You spend 4-5 hours with nothing, very little build up toward anything, and the ending action, which was great, felt so rushed I was genuinely shocked when the book ended right when it felt like it was building to something great.

I wanted to love this book. instead, I loved parts, and was bored for the rest of it.

I don't think I can recommend it only for the ending two hours when it's such a slog to get to.

That being said, I'm going to try another book by the author, in the hopes that it'll be better. I really enjoy his writing style and concepts, so with any luck, this book wasn't representative of his entire library.

excellent adventure

loved this book. was an adventure from start to finish. you could almost feel the cold of siberia. and the russian was great. loved it

Just so disappointed

This story is chocked full of disjointed connections. As if the author was grasping at anything that would fit and make some sense to move the story forward to the finish deadline. I kept catching incidences of this, paused, and wondered what was up with that?
I like Greig Beck as an Author, mostly. Sometime the pressure of producing something, anything, really shows! I am just so disappointed with this book.

gripping book. loved it

good characters had me gripping the steering wheel when I was listening when I driving.. very well written . great author. love it

Who goes there?

I've always had a soft spot for John Carpenter's "The Thing" and any similar books, movies etc. So when I saw this one on offer, decided to give it a try. This author could be someone to watch, but this book is just average. The buildup takes too long , and it all devolves into Navy Seals versus- I won't spoil that one, because this book WAS entertaining! If the narration seems a little slow, tale it up to 1.20x, and you should be good to go ! I would be willing to try another book from this author.

Greig beck is always a do read

Takes a while to get going but once it does you don't want to put it down good beach read....

another fantastic book by Greig Beck.

Great sci-fi elements. Nods to the thing and also predator. Brilliantly read. Awesome new characters.

Seems as if changed writer halfway through

Starts as a horror inspired by The thing with a god mixed of characters and an interesting monster.

However by the end it becomes just a shoot em up with cheesy characters and an really obvious ending.

Scary

A good old fashioned horror story with lots of gung ho action and bloodthirsty description 👍👍👍

Builds decent tension then goes generic...

Firstly by no means is this bad book. Sean Mangans narration takes a bit of time to get use to but once you do, it wasn't so bad.

I liked the setting and the feeling of isolation. The characters weren't too irritating and the Russian baddies were suitably menacing. There was a good period of mystery built up before we got the opportunity to meet the 'main' antagonists. I don't want to spoil the story, if i had to put a main criticism of the book it would be the last couple of chapters. I felt the optimistic ending (involving the heroes) ruined the story, this should have been a much bleaker ending. What we got was very Hollywood and gun-ho. Some of this gun-ho dialogue was pure cheese. It was a shame that the built up tension fizzed out the way it did. 2/3 of the story was quite engaging.

I'd recommend this book if you like creature features along the lines of John Carpenters 'The Thing' but without the stark, ambiguous, 'brave' ending John crafted.

90% great, last 10% almost ruined it all.

Great start and middle.
Give it a try.
I want to complain about the last part. At some point it feels like the author really had to go to the bathroom but he could not before ending the book.
It reminded me of Chekhov's Gun (had to google it, did not know it by heart)
He sets up many pieces that in the end he completely ignores.
Ending felt like a cheap action movie, put in as many explosions as possible and hope people will be blown away.
I do not know if I look forward to the sequel or not.

Worth your spare time.

Well read, but cheesy.

It’s a well read story but the plot is rather cheesy and predictable. Ok to just switch off to though.

would love to see a movie of this

I saw a review that stated if you love the thing then you will love this book and I have to say I completely agree, the latter half of the book kept me guessing though, it is a very slow start, stuff doesn't really start happening until chapter 17 everything before that sets up the characters and motivations which is welcome but some of it just drags a little bit too much, like there being a big confrontation with the Russian Mafia, I felt like there was quite a lot of time spent on that sub-plot

Superb from start to finish 👌🏼

A great multilevelled story that is well written and brilliantly read. If you like The Thing or the Metro book series, this is definitely for you.

A great listen

Really enjoyed this and I was gripped to it from start to finish. the narrator kept me glued and the story was awesome.

The worst sort of shlock

I don't know why this book is getting such great reviews. I don't mind cheese but this book just was not good.

It had a decent set-up but it quickly went downhill. Bad dialogue, paper-thin characters and poorly written female characters (of which their were only two in the whole book). Even the voice actor never really emoted that well.

The main characters never even reacted like they were even in danger at any point. Really the author gave us a diet-coke of a horror novel.

Sorry, a hard pass from me.