Deadland by Sawyer Hall

Deadland by Sawyer Hall
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A timely thriller-horror story about a fabulous new theme park and a virus that gets in with the guests.

Deadland is the latest premiere amusement park to open its gates, and people are flocking to enjoy its offerings. The park is themed on five different cultures’ vision of Hell, and park guests wear a metal smart-wrist-cuff that reads their body’s reactions and tallies their participation points as they work their way through the sections, rides, games, and amusements while trying to avoid being “bitten” by roaming zombies. The guest with the most points at the end of the day wins a fabulous (but unnamed) prize.

On this day, the guest list includes Nick Calvo and his son, George. George is a little younger than the minimum age, but he’s being allowed in as part of a Make-A-Wish-style dream trip. George is in remission from a rare form of leukemia.

Another guest group is the Abernathy family from San Francisco. Sisters Blake and Lola and their younger brother, Asher, are in the park sans parents. The two girls are well-known social media influencers, but Deadland prohibits guests from having cellphones, cameras, or other recording devices inside the park, so they’re focusing more on cute boys leaving Asher to fend for himself.

Then there is Dr. Piper Prescott, a renowned but disgraced virologist and special VIP guest of the park’s multimillionaire creator, Derek Farber. Piper and Derek have a history. Eight years, the Apopka virus, with a 100% fatality rate, had killed the entire population of two remote islands as the whole world looked on. Without knowing how the virus was transmitted and fearing it had already spread from ground zero, a vaccine had been developed, and people were required to get it. However, weeks later, it was discovered that the vaccine had an unforeseen reaction in approximately 10% of the treated population, and millions of people died. Anti-vaxxers seized the day with the result that unvaccinated people were buying forged ‘proof of immunization’ documents on the black market. Piper, the most knowledgeable person about the vaccine debacle (and a staunch proponent of vaccination), appeared at a professional convention to promote her new book on the Apopka virus when Derek showed up and humiliated her in front of her peers. Now he’s offered an olive branch and wants her to come to observe his park, many aspects of which are based on the viral pandemic, and give him her opinion.

George and his nervous father, Nick, are having a great time, though, when they meet up with Asher Abernathy, who is trying to enjoy the park on his own. But while making their way through the first section, Asher becomes visibly ill and, rather than accepting Nick’s help, goes off to find his sisters. Soon after, George gets separated from his dad, and Piper runs across Nick searching for him. The two find the boy lying unconscious and exhibiting the same symptoms Asher, symptoms Piper readily identifies as those of the Apopka virus.

As Piper and Nick desperately try to get help for George, they are detained at the park’s infirmary. Piper begs Derek to put the park into quarantine and call the CDC but not before numerous guests, including the Abernathys and a very sick Asher, leave.

Blake takes her sick brother to the nearest medical facility she can find and contacts her parents to come to help them. Asher appears to be making a recovery when their parents arrive, so their father decides to fly back home with the two girls, leaving his wife and son behind. But when the senior ER doctor, Stick Williams, sees the rash on Asher’s face, something clicks in the back of his mind, alerting him to the possibility that this might be the Apopka virus. He must now work against the clock to get Asher the treatment he needs and quarantine the ER, all the while knowing that he himself is harboring a terrible secret regarding the virus.

Deadland was an absorbing story, heart-pounding and exciting. It is a timely thriller, horror story considering our current pandemic and recent approval to distribute and mass-inoculate with fast-tracked vaccines. (So, it is hitting a little close to home and may not be the right book for some at this time.)

I liked the characters, especially Nick and George Calvo, and rooted for their success throughout the book. Blake and Lola Abernathy felt like real teens with their distractions, worries, and sibling rivalry. Poor Asher seemed like a good kid but we really don't get to enjoy him much before he becomes desperately ill. Dr. Piper Prescott was another favorite character. I liked that she seems to regain her confidence and get back on her feet while under pressure, and I liked that she was a more than competent competitor in the Deadland scoring. I did not understand Derek’s past animosity toward Piper and that part of their backstory.

The separate timelines for the Calvos, the Abernathys, and Dr. Prescott were a little odd to me. The three groups of park visitors were all there on the same day, yet Piper’s story stayed about a half a day ahead of the others until she joined up with the Calvos.

The idea of the visions of Hell as the theme for the various sections of the park was a winner for me but not being overly familiar with any one of them had me wondering about the presence of zombies there at all. I understood the zombies part in the scheme of the game but wondered that they were in keeping with the theme. Parts of this reminded me of the old Fright Nights at Six Flags Over Texas – good times!

I thought the situation with the various personnel at the local hospital was a great addition to the plot. I worried about the young, inexperienced, and inept doctor, and the lazy lab tech actually made me mad. This part of the story kept me guessing who would figure things out and save the day. The hotline story was a total surprise and totally shocking. All in all, the action at the hospital was a real highlight.

I recommend DEADLAND to readers that enjoy apocalyptic style tales, medical thrillers, and even those that would enjoy a pulse-pounding action story set in an amusement park. With the exciting plotting and the page-turning quality of the writing, I’ll certainly be looking for more by this author.

I voluntarily reviewed this after receiving an Advanced Review Copy from Reedsy Discovery.


See my original review at Reedsy Discovery