Review: 4* Review
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 04 5, 2014
Toby has had a tough time ever since his mum died in a car accident; whilst he was driving. Toby has always blamed himself. Toby and his dad are both trying to move on and continue with their lives, its hard for both of them.One day a new girl moves in next door; Rachel. Rachel is a Native American and is from the nearby Umatilla Indian Reserve. Rachel is wilful, strong and persistent. Toby takes an instant liking to her.The school bullies regularly give Toby and his friends a hard time, but following the death of Toby's mother things seemed to have stopped; for a while. But now things are returning to normal and the bullying commences. The bullies take Toby's best friend Nate paintball target practise in the woods; their target is Nate! The bullies chase Nate through the woods, where he falls into a big hole, the bullies decide to leave him there. Later that night there is still no sign of Nate. Mike; the lead bully; is made to go back out to the woods; by his girlfriend who goes with him; to look for Nate. When they get Mike gets out of his car to look for Nate but he is attacked and killed.The following morning Toby heads out to the woods to look for Nate again as last night was unsuccessful, he finds Nate wandering out of the woods covered in blood with no memory of the previous night, or where the blood has come from.Over the next few nights strange things begin happening in the town and Toby is convinced that Nate is somehow involved. Is Nate involved? Can Toby find out what is causing the problems? You'll have to read The One You Feed to find out!Toby's character is believable, after his mother's death he becomes somewhat withdrawn and depressed. His emotions and guilt regarding that aside, Toby has the appearance of a regular teen; disobeying his dad, getting into the occasional scuffle, and getting into trouble at school too.James Drummond has a knack for describing scenes in a few sentences, and had a really good writing style. It was relatively easy to guess what the creature is that begins to attack the town and targeting the people of Silver Falls, but the Indian lore surrounding the creature brought some originality to the plot. The action scenes were very direct and to the point, which kept them fast paced.The plot of The One You Feed reminded me a little of the old school horror movies, you know the ones: the small town near the woods, the school kids who sneak off into the woods or go camping only to find some creature lurking in the woods waiting to attack them at nightfall! That said made the book really enjoyable for me, probably because when I was younger and those films were being made my parents wouldn't let me watch them!! I didn't find the book scary; but then I'm struggling to find a book that is scary. The One You Feed is reasonably bloody and gorey; which is another plus for me; I love a good book with blood and gore. Besides the blood and gore there is the ripping apart of bodily parts and some dismembering too.A book not for the feint hearted! I would definitely recommend NOT eating whilst reading some parts of this book. There is a cliff hanger of sorts at the end so I will definitely be back for more when it arrives.