Review - Welcome to Scar Ridge by Jonathon Mast

Synopsis -

A train station sits neatly at the top of Main Street, but tracks are suspiciously absent.

A false priest presides over an unusual amount of funerals.

After a young man comes home from the Civil War, trees start to randomly appear

in strange locations.

From the moment Carter returns home to find his beloved western town and the people within it have disappeared and he must win it back, we learn things have gone strange in Scar Ridge, Arizona.

The nine stories presented here are intimately intertwined in this isolated location, dusty and hot, a perfect place for the Landowner to work his odd magick. There's

an unusual relationship between Jarvis, his hands, and the cows of his ranch.

Cattle drivers experience something during a monsoon storm that sems to be not quite a deer. A cursed skull is stolen from Danzig's General Store.

Each individual story will lead you to the ultimate terrifying conclusion, that there is something truly wrong within this town, within the people, and within this world that might just be a part of our own.

WELCOME TO SCAR RIDGE.

AND BEWARE.

Review -

From the moment you read the opening few lines in the first story in this collection, you are made aware that Scar Ridge is not your average Old West town. The first and last stories actually serve as bookends of sorts for what is an excellent collection of short stories.

I enjoyed how certain characters and locations appear throughout the book, with Danzig's General Store and the twin saloons almost feeling like characters within the intertwined tales.

Honestly, there is not a bad story in this collection and I am hard pressed to choose one as my favorite. There is a little something for every horror fan in this collection, which is a quick, fun read.

5 stars out of 5