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Dark Woods [Paperback]

Jay C. Kumar (Author)
4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (23 customer reviews)


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Book Description

July 6, 2004
One of the country's premier outdoors writers makes his chilling fiction debut. It came out on the night of the hunters.

Deputy Frank Vaughn is tracking a strange, wounded beast. But there's only one thing more terrifying than what he's hunting. It's what's hunting him.

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Product Details

  • Paperback: 320 pages
  • Publisher: Berkley (July 6, 2004)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0425197077
  • ISBN-13: 978-0425197073
  • Product Dimensions: 6.6 x 4.1 x 0.7 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces
  • Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (23 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #198,923 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Jay C. Kumar (1966- ) is a first-generation American who does a lot of writing, just not frequently in book form. He is the grandson of Irish author Vivian Connell, whose most famous novel was The Chinese Room. He loves the outdoors, rock music and most especially his family and the Big Man.

 

Customer Reviews

23 Reviews
5 star:
 (15)
4 star:
 (6)
3 star:    (0)
2 star:
 (1)
1 star:
 (1)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
4.4 out of 5 stars (23 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Riveting and intense, February 12, 2007
This review is from: Dark Woods (Paperback)
I often like to remember each week of my life by the book I was reading, it's a small habit I have that brings a smile to my face and helps the gray cells from shrinking. This week was truly good in the wild world between pages of a book that almost made me smell the earth, hear leaves flapping in the wind and the concentration and precision that made the main hero such an incredible character pushed through my veins and made me hold my breath on more than one occasion.

Dark Woods is an exquisite surprise, the world of hunting never interested me, a person who would never wear fur and who detest any type of animal abuse but I found myself lost and mesmerized by Mr. Kumar's polished language. The book was not only a real pleasure to read because it was so smooth, intense and woven with light and sound that leaped of the pages but it contained just a small handful of characters who stood out and who were truly memorable. Frank Vaughn is a Deputy Sheriff and a hunter who seems to have spotted a trail that left a dead body and a ripped apart animal that point to non other than a Sasquatch, that's Big Foot for those not familiar with furry monsters. He often goes hunting which is well depicted with great respect to the animals and with clear intentions of not wasting anything away. While on his hunting trip his friend Boone gets wounded and ends up in the hospital while Geek, I swear not everyone had funny names, helps Vaughn take their friend to safety but refuses to go back and make sure the animal is not staggering wounded and in pain in the dark woods. The also find a body of a local poacher who suffered a terrible death by the same dark creature that they caught a glimpse of. Pretty soon the word gets out and Vaughn is joined by a science professor Art Lansing and a few other characters, some with genuine intensions and some not so spotless. Some people in the group seemed to have an idea about how expandable the over populated human society is and would stop at nothing in the pursuit of the beast.

Mr. Kumar does an excellent job of writing about the Skookum County, Washinton's rugged mountainous terrain and the dark, the cold and lonely hunt that Vaughn and the others perused. The tale is truly addictive, I felt every breath held, every calculated step, the babbling of the cold brook, the serene air and grace of nature and the tiny powers of the human against its wrath. Everything was very tantalizing until the crew noticed something, the hunting slowly turned tables and they were no longer hunting, they were becoming the hunted and the terror was more than real, it was hair rising and quite fabulous to read about. For those who have been in the woods alone like a needle in haystack this book can reenact some of that eerie yet calm feeling. It was a really great experience since woods are nothing foreign to me and it reminded me of the tranquil days I spent, not chased by a colossal creature thank god but in the presence of nature.

This tale is about something that is greater than we can comprehend and perhaps it is real, running in the wild out there somewhere. Perhaps it's the world's smartest creature because it has never been caught and experimented on in the lab, free to me be king of its own dense domain of silent servants that the trees so willingly became. So read Dark Woods and find out for yourself what elegant and thoughtful writing is about, and this book will surprise on many levels that are beyond a creature story but a tale that deals with environmental issues and how politics can corrupt pretty much everything to appear the way the heavy movers want us to see, whether its an UFO, Yeti or the Aliens.

- Kasia S.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Very Smart and Well-Written, May 24, 2005
By 
Craig Larson (Maple Grove, MN USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   
This review is from: Dark Woods (Paperback)
I came to the book expecting more of a horror novel, based on the cover art and the jacket blurbs/description. What I got instead was a book that takes the bigfoot/sasquatch legend seriously, assuming that such creatures must exist, given all the evidence which has accumulated over time, as well as an ongoing argument about the effect of the Endangered Species Act, should it ever be proven that such a creature does in fact exist. There are powerful forces out there whose interests would not be served by such proof. Even though the focus isn't so much on the horror, this is still a fast-moving and scary book, which is very atmospheric, with great descriptions of the settings and locales. Although the book does at times threaten to become more of a lecture (hunting is good, the government is bad), it is still a very entertaining and thought-provoking novel, and a real page-turner, too.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Great first effort!!!, December 4, 2004
By 
This review is from: Dark Woods (Paperback)
I read this book within two days, and thoroughly enjoyed it. It's a novel about a hunt for a Sasquatch in fictional Skookum County, Washington (which is based on Skamania County, Washington). A hunting party apparently finds a dead deer and a dead body, one member shoots a Sasquatch, which gets angry and attacks one of the party members. Deputy Sheriff Frank Vaughn is the man who shot the Sasquatch, and the team rushes the wounded man to the hospital. Vaugh returns to the area along with an employee of Carolina Pacific, Chris Mackey, to try to humanely put the Sasquatch out of its misery. Along the way, they meet a University professor, Arthur Lansing (who is modeled after the late Grover Krantz) and a member of the national Fish and Wildlife Commission, Alison Lombard, who is sent by her aunt, Brenda Underwood, a bigwig in the Fish and Wildlife Commission, to "keep an eye on things." As the party tracks down the Sasquatch, finding more footprints and hearing eerie howls, it becomes clear that they are the hunted rather than the hunters. I won't spoil the book for you, but it comes to an exciting and satisfying conclusion. A very highly-recommended book even for those who are not into Sasquatch.
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Inside This Book (learn more)
First Sentence:
THE rifle in his hands felt lighter now. Read the first page
Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
tape trail, timber executives, bipedal primate, dermal ridges
Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Brenda Underwood, Carolina Pacific, Endangered Species Act, Chris Mackey, Skookum County, United States, Mark Kingston, Tom Sun, Pacific Northwest, Forest Service, Mount Saint Helens, New Jersey, Deputy Vaughn, North Carolina, Art Lansing, Hey Frank, Arnie Schwarz, Native Americans, North America, Western Washington University
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