Alma Katsu's fourth novel and first standalone after her 'Taker' trilogy comes up very frequently in the Books of Horror group I frequent on Facebook. Many readers adore it, as a blissful example of historical horror, but some didn't connect with it at all and often DNF (did not finish). It didn't take many chapters before I found an understanding of both perspectives and that's probably because this is a horror novel perhaps third after historical novel and adaptation of factual events into fictional form.

Initially, it's all drama, as Katsu introduces us to a wide array of characters who are heading west in the Donner party along the Oregon Trail to California in 1846. Most Americans ought to get something out of that, I think, but what might vary considerably. What we should know going in is that this was a quite routine thing back then. The United States was in the east, but there was a lot of land opening up in the west and the only way to get to it was to pack up wagons and go west, young man, through the territory of a whole slew of Native American tribes who may or may not be happy about your intrusion. It wasn't an easy journey and the Donner party had it really bad, not dying of dysentery like the game but from a set of poor decisions that led those left alive to eventually resort to cannibalism.

So, it makes sense to turn this true story into a horror novel, I think, but Katsu doesn't do that for quite a while. She starts out with leadership battles between the core party and the groups that joined late; decisionmaking about which route to take to California, now that a new one has opened up; and George Donner's wife cheating on him with other people. It's all well-written and is clearly meant to give us an insight into both the time and the key players, so that we can find our sides in the interpersonal battles to come and sympathise with people who are likely going to die. We're told going in that there was just one survivor of the Donner Party and he's Lewis Keseberg so, unless we know more about the real facts that the author is playing with, we don't expect anyone to live.

It shouldn't be a spoiler to suggest that there are other survivors, though many people, including main characters, die at various points on the way. No, I'm not going to tell you who, because even those of us who know a little about the Donner party don't remember names and history is a spoiler here. Katsu is careful to play pretty closely to the truth but to throw in interpretations that cast a supernatural light on proceedings.

For instance, the Nystrom boy is lost and, after a search, enough of him is found to be buried, but those parts were savaged, perhaps by wolves but perhaps not. Edwin Bryant is fascinated by Native American folklore and explains that a tribe called the Anawai are rumoured to be conducting human sacrifices to appease the demon at Trucker Lake. Guess which way the party is heading? And some remember that it has been said that Tamsen Donner is a witch. It's not too long before we realise that Elitha Donner can hear the dead, something that becomes all the more obvious when there are more dead.

Yes, there's definitely a supernatural element here and it hangs over the story like a dark cloud, or the Sword of Damocles, I suppose, because what's hanging over the story isn't just going to rain on them at the worst moment, it's going to fall and kill most of them. From a horror perspective, it's fair to add an abiding sense of impending doom that grows as time goes by. These folk don't make good decisions and the journey is soon doomed to failure as an exercise in both stupidity and inevitability.

It doesn't help that the majority of the Donner party is comprised of a set of families, often large ones, so there are built-in factions. When things start to go wrong, each family knows it can trust its own but builds the littlest suspicions, rivalries and prejudices into insurmountable barriers. Those are Germans. He's single. She's a witch. What's more, the folk they should be listening to are generally not the folk in positions of trust. James Reed warns early about the need to conserve supplies but he doesn't have the leadership gene that Donner does. Tamsen Donner is very capable but a strong object of suspicion. The two with the most intelligence and common sense are single men: Bryant, who eventually heads out on his own, and Charles Stanton, who's seen in a poor light because of what people think he did back east.

I found all this fascinating, but mostly as a historical novel and a fresh take on historical events. Katsu is very good at detail and she kept me wondering about how things were going to go wrong. That they are going to is a given, but I didn't know how and she kept me on the hop trying to figure that out. However, there are well over a hundred pages before things truly get serious. The man who agreed to guide the party through the new route isn't where he's supposed to be and they get word too late that he's even recommending that they don't take it and go back to the usual one. They're too late in the season for it to be viable and too low on supplies because they didn't listen to Reed. There's no good option left. So, they have to buckle up and do the best they can to make it through.

Oh, and while never losing sight of the fact that there's something out there and it ain't no man. No, it isn't a predator but we're never quite sure what it is. We get closer to it, whatever it is, and it starts to pick off members of the party. However, we have to have a lot of patience here because Katsu has zero interest in showing us the monster in reel one and, as much as this is horror, it's hardly a slasher movie in historical times. The horror is in the mood and the tension and the inevitability far more than it's in choice scenes. There are some of those, but they still leave us with questions. Is it werewolves, demons or zombies, for a start? Is it something else entirely? It can be read a few different ways.

And, of course, eventually we get to the cannibalism, because of course we do. If the Donner Party had meant anything to us going in, it meant that. Even here though, Katsu doesn't turn her novel into the schlocky gorefest it could have been. She's still interested in motivations, about driving her characters as far as they can before they snap, in what it would ultimately take for them to break that taboo. That anticipation becomes palpable but it's a long way into the book. It's debatable whether those readers who perhaps expected something that Katsu wasn't interested in delivering would have enjoyed it once it got to a particular point. I think they might, but they'd given up long before that.

This is very much a book for readers with patience, who are willing to bring something with them when they pick up a book, who want to ask questions of what they're reading rather than to sit back and let a writer repeatedly punch them in the face with the horrific. By sheer coincidence, I finished this book on a particular evening that my better half had posted an article about the Donner Party for our oddities group on Facebook to read, and I didn't realise until I was already deep into Wikipedia, comparing the events of this book to what we know of their real life inspiration. That discovery, however prompted an enjoyable discussion and that's exactly what I want as a reader. I want the book to not be over when it's over and, as carefully crafted as this one is, it very deliberately hangs around.

And that's why so many readers rave about it as a blissful example of historical horror, while some DNF. By this point, I'm pretty sure you know which you'll be. So you're welcome! Or nevermind. ~~ Hal C F Astell

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