Wetbones

By: John Shirley

Narrated by: Edison McDaniels

Length: 10 hrs

Publisher's summary

A flesh-and-soul-devouring addiction runs rampant through the dark playground of the Hollywood elite in this tale of horror from a Bram Stoker Award winner.

Welcome to Los Angeles, where every addiction is encouraged....

Struggling Hollywood screenwriter Tom Prentice can hardly believe that the emaciated and mutilated corpse lying on the morgue slab was once his ex-wife. Then his roommate’s missing brother turns up in a local hospital having sliced open his own chest and legs for some sick, inexplicable reason. In Oakland, the Reverend Garner, a recovering addict, leaves his ministry in search of his teenage daughter, who was last seen in the company of her ghoulish kidnapper. And the Los Angeles police are meanwhile baffled in their hunt for the elusive “Wetbones” serial killer who leaves nothing of his victims behind except a damp, grisly pile of bones. 

Though Tom, the reverend, and the LAPD are on separate quests for answers, they are all being led into the darkest shadows of Hollywood, where the debauchery never ceases and pleasure is a drug that devours human flesh, blood, and sanity. But the true source of the all-consuming addiction is the most horrifying revelation of all, for it is not of this rational Earth. 

From International Horror Guild Award-winning author John Shirley comes a true masterwork of modern terror. It’s decidedly not for the faint of heart.

©1991 John Shirley (P)2019 Mark Alan Miller

Loved it

Another classic novel given new life in audiobook form
Full of debauchery,exploding bodies and soul sucking worms I enjoyed every minute
Excellent narration from Edison his voice fit this genre well
Highly recommended if you like your horror darker and more extreme
I received a free review audiobook and voluntarily left this review

Splatterpunk at it's finest

John Shirley blows it out of the park with gruesome and horrific detail. Wetbones is a fun-filled story in the gorey and sexually disturbing kind of way.

My only difficulty is the narration. It's decent and well paced enough that I can get through the whole 10 hours of it, but the lisp in the narration really grinds at you through the whole ordeal. Other than that, it's well suited to add the vivid imagery that makes the whole book stand out on top.

I Highly recommend the book if you want some good, blood splattering fun

Good

Good book. The mind control was really frightening. A little graphic. The narrator was very good. Recommended.

Nice Work

The story itself was well done and at times gruesome, nothing too bad though. Some pretty good suspense and build up with good payoffs. My main gripe is the different character accents. I listen on 2x speed for the most part, except when the Narrators do accents for characters so I can get the full experience. Well, going to normal speed for the accents was a bit disappointing because they were a bit weird, and more lispy than anything. And listening at 2x with the accents was hard to understand at times. Story was nicely done though!

John Shirley never disappoints

Loved the book, disturbing as it is. The narration is alright, but the performer's tendency to use a weird lisp to represent different voices and accents is grating to say the least. It's a shame really, he reads well apart from that.

An Outstanding Story From A Great Author

I read this book long ago and really enjoyed it when it first came out, so I knew what to expect with the story. That said, I wanted to give it another go, but this time as an audiobook. I'm definitely a fan of Shirley's storytelling and descriptive prose. He can tell a story like no other. As I listened to this story, I was reminded why I had read the book so quickly way back when. Definitely an amazing story with good character development and plot progression.

I also really enjoyed McDaniels's narration of this story. He did an outstanding job with voice, pacing, character dialogue, etc. I will definitely look for other stories he's narrated.

There's nothing about this audiobook I didn't like, and I wholeheartedly recommend it.

An unusual horror

Wetbones .. This is an unusual horror. Gripping and well paced . It is outside my usual genre but thought I'd give it a try.
The story is strong and interesting with unique twists and turns that you don't see coming.
Some very strong and well developed characters.
Edison McDaniels narration style is well suited for this audiobook and definitely compliments.
An excellent read .
I received a free copy of this audio book at my own request and voluntarily leave this honest review.

Not my cup of tea

This book was given to me for free at my request and I provided this voluntary review.

Just not a fan of graphic sex in stories especially when it just seems to be thrown in for shock value with no help in advancing the stories or characters. The concept and story itself is not bad, but it's just not for me. The narration is great. Edison does a fine job of telling the story and giving the characters life. If you like graphic kind of horror stories then this might be for you, but it's just not for me.

Awesome Old School Splatterpunk

John Shirley and the rest of the splatterpunk movement have a writing style that needs to be experienced. While extreme horror and gore still exists today there's this punk attitude you find in their works that if you enjoy you suddenly have a handful more books to devour. This story is pretty brutal especially for the time, in a nice place to live there's someone leaving husks of people behind and dead. Then there's a reverend and a police officer who get roped into the web of the killer. What ensues is a stylish dive into the underbelly of the city and a bunch of not great and disgusting situations described in a fantastic and unique style. The narration does a great job of bringing it to life as not everyone could attune themselves so well to such a work.

I received the review code for this audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this honest review.

Irritating

I am sad to say that I could not finish this, not because of the horror, which I never got around to, a minor death and that was about it, but the constant repetition of 'ha ha' drove me insane, I just could not listen to it anymore and the 'daddy dude' from Constance was equally infuriating.

The sample provided did not include the constant repetition of 'ha ha' that occurs with such regularity you become sure the author is trying to brainwash you. (It does occur twice though)

Edison McDaniels does a great job with the narration, as far as I listened, I would certainly listen to other books narrated by him but never anything by John Shirley, ever again.

I will add that I rarely stop listening to a book after an hour, I usually plough through to the end, but this one is just too annoying.

I received a free review copy in exchange for my honest, unbiased and freely given review, which you have here.