Characters connecting with other characters is the basic of what all fiction is about. Relationships make for drama and opportunity for growth. Add in the end of the human race, and there’s a recipe for the extremes of character exploration. In K.C. Jones’s Black Tide two lost souls attempt to survive an apocalypse. Mike and Beth find each other at low points in their lives. Little do they know, they’re about to get a little lower thanks to a meteor shower. As they try to survive, Beth and Mike form a relationship based on mutual survival, and as the reader learns more and more about them, we enter a relationship with the two. Oh, and there’s a cute dog, too.
Disclaimer: The publisher provided a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. Any and all opinions that follow are mine alone.
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TL;DR
Black Tide by K.C. Jones is an excellent story with two flawed but very likeable characters. It’s an in-depth character study that attempts to break them during an apocalypse. Humanity might be at an end. Will Beth and Mike find out if they’re the last humans alive? Highly recommended.
From the Publisher
A character-driven science fiction/horror blend, KC Jones’ Black Tide is Stephen King’s Cujo meets A Quiet Place.
It was just another day at the beach. Then the world ended.
Mike and Beth were strangers before the night of the meteor shower. Chance made them neighbors, a bottle of champagne brought them together, and a shared need for human connection sparked something more.
Following their drunken and desperate one-night stand, the two discover the astronomical event has left widespread destruction in its wake. But the cosmic lightshow was only part of something much bigger, and far more terrifying.
When a lost car key leaves them stranded on an empty stretch of Oregon coast and inhuman screams echo from the dunes, when the rising tide reaches for their car and unspeakable horrors close in around them, these two self-destructive souls must fight to survive a nightmare of apocalyptic scale.
“This is gasp-for-your-breath, peek-through-your-fingers horror, and I loved every page of it.” —Jonathan Janz, author of The Siren and the Specter
Cover design by Esther S. Kim
Review: Black Tide by K. C. Jones
Black Tide opens with Beth berating herself. In her mind, she’s a screw up of such epic proportions that she screws up other people as well. Next, we see her house sitting, professionally. She’s getting paid to stay at a house on the beach and to take care of Jake the dog. Beth has kept herself out of trouble, but she’s getting bored. One night, she sees the neighbor, Mike, sitting out back, drinking beside a fire. The champagne is too tempting for her to pass up. After too much alcohol, the two end up spending the night together. Mike wakes and walks to the ocean. He’s decided to kill himself. As he walks into the surf, meteors streak across the sky. Meanwhile, Beth dreams that she’s in a wild, terrifying place. A large jellyfish fills the sky, and the air is sulfurous. In the morning, Mike returns to his house. He’s chosen to live after finding what he thinks is a meteorite that smells like garbage and stings his skin. The electricity has gone out. Jake the dog is going wild. The three drive towards Portland to see what’s going on. They stop at a beach where people are gathered. On the beach, they find another garbage ball. A group of people are trying to signal a boat offshore; they’re fleeing the area.
It’s here on this beach that the majority of the novel takes place. The meteor shower brought with it an apocalypse no one prepared for. It’s also on this beach that the body count begins to pile up. Beth loses the key to the car that brought them there, and they’re trapped on the beach with murderous creatures. And the tide’s begun to come in.
Black Tide is a first person point of view book that mostly alternates between Beth and Mike. The majority of the novel takes place on the beach over the course of a day. The science fiction apocalypse is set dressing for a character intense narrative. The novel rests on whether the reader likes Beth and Mike’s relationship dynamic. I did, and I think that most readers will too.
Character
This novel excels at making the reader care about the characters. Jones creates flawed characters that aren’t the most interesting in the beginning of the story. As the narrative progresses, the reader becomes invested in them and their survival. While helping each other, they end up confronting the darker part of themselves. Against the backdrop of the end of the human race, both Beth and Mike have to learn that they are more than the stories they tell themselves. Beth tells herself she’s a car wreck waiting to happen, and that her mistakes will take Mike with her. During the course of the novel, I couldn’t help but wonder if Mike would succumb to his suicidal thoughts again. After all, the situation seems hopeless many, many times.
Character is the focus of this book. Mike and Beth are never in a position to save the world. And that’s okay. The joy of the book comes from cheering on their survival. Along the way, the reader begins to care for them as we learn more and more. These two character studies twist and twine in a way that makes both greater than the sum of their stories.
A Day at the Beach
This novel takes place mostly at the beach. By mostly, I mean 75 to 80 percent is in one location. It did get a bit old. Jones uses vehicles to act as different locations on the same beach, but at times, it felt like their struggle to leave the beach was too drawn out. The struggles, problems, and solutions were creative, but it could have been broken up with flashbacks or something to provide a little variability.
Horror Mixed with Science Fiction
Jones spices his horror with science fiction elements. Black Tide is a horror because it’s about survival in the face of overwhelming odds. Beth and Mike face cosmic horror elements; the forces arrayed against them are unearthly and intent upon feasting upon the pair. They are pushed to their limits physically and psychologically. But this isn’t a science fiction (SF) novel. The SF elements provide a problem and enemies; however, Black Tide is a horror novel. It succeeds by attempting to break its characters.
While the SF elements are good, they do create enough of a distance that it’s less horrific than more realistic novels. The emotional engagement comes from getting to know Mike and Beth from their flaws to their dependency on each other. When their lives were in danger, I didn’t feel horror. It felt tense but not scary. There were moments of body horror and a scene where the horror comes from being a witness with no control or ability to help. This isn’t a criticism. I made an emotional connection to each of these characters; they stayed with me after I closed the book.
Conclusion
Black Tide by K. C. Jones is available from Tor Nightfire on May 31st, 2022.
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