{"id":19959,"date":"2025-07-21T07:00:58","date_gmt":"2025-07-21T11:00:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/?p=19959"},"modified":"2025-07-13T22:25:17","modified_gmt":"2025-07-14T02:25:17","slug":"review-tick-town","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/review-tick-town\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Tick Town by Christopher A. Micklos"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"cover<\/p>\n

Tick Town<\/i> by Christopher A. Micklos<\/a>
\nCastle Bridge Media (June 2025)
\nReviewed by W.D. Gagliani<\/strong><\/p>\n

Giant bloodsucking beasts invade\u2026<\/span><\/i> screams the cover copy, and if you\u2019re like me, that\u2019s about all you need to crack open this short novel and wait for the fun. So you may know going in what you\u2019ll get, and the question is: how rip-roaringly entertaining will it be?<\/span><\/p>\n

Draw a line from ’50s-’60s-’70s atomic war and genetic engineering cautionary tales and eco-horror, low- and big-budget creature features from, say, <\/span>Them! <\/span><\/i>to<\/span> Tarantula<\/span><\/i>, to <\/span>Night of the Lepus<\/span><\/i>, <\/span>Piranha<\/span><\/i>, etc., all the way to <\/span>Jaws<\/span><\/i>, <\/span>Lake Placid<\/span><\/i>, even <\/span>Alien<\/span><\/i> and a hundred more\u2026 and you\u2019ll have a pretty accurate geneological chart that leads to Christopher Micklos\u2019s <\/span>Tick Town<\/span><\/i>. And when seeking the novel\u2019s literary ancestry, look no farther than Guy N. Smith\u2019s giant <\/span>Crabs<\/span><\/i> novels, which are referenced both in a blurb by the legendary Ramsey Campbell himself, and in the book\u2019s back cover copy.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Armed with the Guy N. Smith reference, plus the perfect throwback cover art, it\u2019s then no surprise that <\/span>Tick Town<\/span><\/i> \u201cticks along\u201d like a barreling B-movie\u2026 and mirrors those movies\u2019\u00a0 best qualities in plot and style. <\/span><\/p>\n

Of course the most perfect analogous example might well be <\/span>Jaws<\/span><\/i>, due to the plots\u2019 superficial similarities: a resort town holiday (or, in this case, festival) threatened by an inconceivable monster, while a heroic police chief and brave assorted citizens defy the glad-handing mayor to attempt to save as many townsfolk as possible. In the northern Wisconsin resort town of Tomahawk Hollow, the Harvest Moon festival is about to get under way, but this year the local fauna includes something new and horrific. Everyone whose spare time is spent cavorting in the woods knows about ticks\u2026 and here these tiny monsters are blown up in fine pulp fashion. The ticks aren\u2019t gigantic in relation to humans, but they are in relation to normal tick size, they move deceptively fast, and their slashing <\/span>chelicerae<\/span><\/i> (jaws) are razor-sharp. And if that\u2019s not frightening enough, there\u2019s a nestful of eggs\u2026 and a queen.<\/span><\/p>\n

The cast includes Chief Tim Donovan, an earnest cop trying his best to keep his farmers and townies safe, Jackson Reed who owns the town\u2019s tiny newspaper, and Emmaline Blackdeer, driven young journalist and Jackson\u2019s only employee. Mayor Silas Cankerby (whose name tells you most of what you need to know about him) is highly focused on making the festival \u201cthe best ever.\u201d Besides being unctuous and sleazy, there\u2019s a strong subplot about how the mayor\u2019s corruption has led to the current crisis, and how it has caused the \u201csolution\u201d that will prove as fatal to the townsfolk and tourists as to the giant ticks, who are just <\/span>hungry<\/span><\/i> after all. It\u2019s no stretch to see a throughline from Amity\u2019s Mayor Vaughn to Cankerby and he fulfills the need for a stealth antagonist. When the upgunned guys with the foreign accents and shadowy motives show up, though, that\u2019s when the book picks up steam and the stakes escalate toward a satisfyingly savage climax.<\/span><\/p>\n

Trying to guess which cast members are redshirts will always be part of the fun of pulp-style horror, and <\/span>Tick Town<\/span><\/i> delivers enough <\/span>oh no! <\/span><\/i>surprises in this department to keep you turning pages. If you\u2019ve been to Wisconsin\u2019s North Woods you know exactly what Tomahawk Hollow looks like and how its industry is almost completely reliant on the tourist trade, making <\/span>Tick Town<\/span><\/i> especially relatable summer \u2014 or perhaps campfire \u2014 fare. Readers will find it\u2019s a near-perfect, creature-driven pulp horror extravaganza with a subtle but serious message lodged in its stinger. Despite several gun-related gaffes in key scenes, Christopher Micklos\u2019s first novel is entertaining indeed, and will surely inspire me to check out what he comes up with next. Recommended especially for summer reading, and during small town fall festival season.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tick Town by Christopher A. Micklos Castle Bridge Media (June 2025) Reviewed by W.D. Gagliani Giant bloodsucking beasts invade\u2026 screams the cover copy, and if you\u2019re like me, that\u2019s about all you need to crack open this short novel and wait for the fun. So you may know going in what you\u2019ll get, and the … Continue Reading! “Review: Tick Town by Christopher A. Micklos”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[80],"tags":[3438,79,3437,407],"class_list":["post-19959","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-christopher-miklos","tag-reviews","tag-tick-town","tag-w-d-gagliani"],"yoast_head":"\nReview: Tick Town by Christopher A. 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