The Haunting of Sigma: A Dogman Legend

by Frank Holes Jr

Twenty years before the Dogman terrorized the Northern Michigan town of Twin Lakes, another tiny community suffered a far worse fate. The Haunting of Sigma chronicles the last days of this isolated village. At first, horrifying grunts and howls echoed through the night, keeping the residents awake, tired, and irritable. Then pets came up missing, and livestock are found mutilated. The action escalates out of control as property is damaged buildings are ripped to shreds, just before several townsfolk mysteriously disappear. The strong personalities of the independent inhabitants erupt in an unprecedented hunt for the creature, right out in the wilderness that has become its stalking ground. Can a pair of boys and a rogue conservation officer convince the crazed residents of the extreme danger the creature possesses before the town completely vanishes into the summer night? In this terrible prequel to the regional thriller, Year of the Dogman, Frank Holes, Jr. yet again spins a tale of suspense and horror.

260 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2008

Reviews

[Nyarlathotep · Rating 5 out of 5]

Superb Reading

This is the first work I've read by this author. This is an excellent dogman/werewolf story. The suspense is kept at a high level and liberally intermixed with the action sequences. I have seen several "monster" shows about the dogman , and was intrigued to read about it. The author develops the characters that need development while leaving the secondary and tertiary ones as cutouts. There several books in this series and I can't wait to find out more.

There is one con though. At times, when the author details locations, such as Sigma itself, it drags. I don't neednnto know the exit ramp, how far the town is to other locations (it's 40 mile South of some city, 100 miles west of another). It was so detailed, I was expecting GPS coordinates. Thankfully, this only happens once or twice and doesn't detract from the overall story.

[Keith Putnam · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic Read!

I loved it. The way the author lays everything out in the proper proportion and it wasn’t long winded. I chose to read this prior to the other book just for some foresight into what I was about to get into and I was not disappointed. The ending epilogue felt just like the ending of an old 80’s horror in a small town movie as well. The descriptions of each character, and especially the creature, were incredible.

[Jake Metzler · Rating 4 out of 5]

Let me start off by saying I am a huge fan of the songs about the Dogman by Steve Cook (The Legend and The Sigma Story) as well as the Dogman folklore. I was vacationing in the Manistee area in Northern Michigan and I noticed several of Franks Hole's books. I was interested but didn't want to pay $15 for an author I had never heard of before. I decided to order The Haunting of Sigma on amazon for $0.20. Overall, I think this is a good book. I appreciate the way it references The Sigma Story lyrics as well as how the book is about an entire community rather than just two or three characters from a community. I do, however, have two main complaints. The first complaint is several factual errors regarding firearms (a gun just "goes off", and according to the book revolvers have manual safeties, the Remington 870 is double barrel, and Remington makes a 700 rifle chambered in 50 BMG). This can probably be overlooked unless you're a gun enthusiast, and it's definitely not enough to ruin the book. If you take nothing away from my review, hear this: stop reading at page 207. The remaining pages after 207 felt tacked on, cheesy, and ruined what I thought could have been the perfect ending. Apart from that, this is a good, eerie read that makes you wonder whether you're being watched by two glowing yellow eyes or whether you'll wake up to some hideous howling outside of the bedroom window.

[Cindy Koch-Krol · Rating 3 out of 5]

You can definitely tell this author is from Michigan, there are a lot of details about the weather. Of course, in Michigan the weather is a character in every plot as it is in this book. I should have known how the story would end by the details shared about the weather near the end. No spoilers.

The reason I gave this book 3 stars though is because I cared about only a fraction of the characters. Two little innocent children, a 30-ish developmentally disabled man with apparent psychic abilities and a DNR officer just trying to do his job whom no one listens to. And being from a hunting family from the U.P. you got to know that I feel uncomfortable about caring about the DNR officer. These all might be personal problems and those of you who read this tremendously scary book can take my opinion with a grain of salt. But I loved the scary bits of this book. The scene in the basement of the stone house is tremendous! The scene on the Dredge near the end was very nicely done, and the end was spectacular, despite the constant reminders about the weather. All the rest of the characters in the book I quickly relegated into a category called "Don't want to know, don't care." Which is fine because most of them die anyway.

Dogman is a great new fiend in a field where all the fiends are old hat.

[Keekee Bird]

It was creepy but also a well written and truly enjoyable book!

[Barbara Bluefield · Rating 5 out of 5]

A Michigan author about a Michigan mystery legend. Good Read.

[Hailey Beimers · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is amazing and left you feeling eerie like the Dogman was watching you. The book keeps you on edge and I want to read the rest of his books.