Slither in Splatterpunk

Dec 28, 2011 Kasia rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Leave it to Edward Lee to write something that is both funny and scary and beyond addictive to read once the book is open. The writing style involved wit and charm and totally fascinating scientific jargon that I always enjoy learning something from as he made a tale that was gross enough to raise a few hairs and a tale which made me stay up reading until I was dead tired and count even think of going to work the next day but it was all worth it.

Pritchard's Key was a seemingly deserted lush trop Leave it to Edward Lee to write something that is both funny and scary and beyond addictive to read once the book is open. The writing style involved wit and charm and totally fascinating scientific jargon that I always enjoy learning something from as he made a tale that was gross enough to raise a few hairs and a tale which made me stay up reading until I was dead tired and count even think of going to work the next day but it was all worth it.

Pritchard's Key was a seemingly deserted lush tropical island right off the coast of Florida. It was the perfect place for polychaetologists such as Nora and Loren who spend their entire academic lives studying segmented worms to take a National Geographic photographer Annabelle for a rare photo shoot revolving around the very rare bristle worm. The island was a non operating military reservation with running water, electricity and barracks, the perfect place to relax, catch a tan and photographs some of nature's most beautiful creations but then there was something else, something unnatural and dangerous, something beyond the crews wildest nightmares that slithered in the shadows and wasted no time...

Along with the scientist and the photographer came Trent, the army warrant officer who was in charge of keeping them safe and because he was responsible for checking in on the island every month to make sure it was in tact as it was closed off to the population. Right off the bat Nora and Annabelle hated each other, the scientist was tall and thin, pale with frizzy hair while Annabelle was a blonde bombshell with stellar physique that turned heads and enjoyed playing dumb to get all the male attention. It was staggering how Edward Lee wrote both of the characters are they were as opposite as night and day and the bickering and the fighting was one of the best parts of the book. The comments were clever and hilarious while an ominous and dreadful atmosphere started to spread. Pretty soon after getting to the island strange things began to happen as the crew started to notice some unusual behavior involving species of worms and insects they have never seen before. The whole island seemed to be crawling with yellow ova which are mobile worm carrier attacking fish and crustaceans in the water and mammals on land

What the parasites did to the human hosts was unimaginable but it only made the mystery of their origins deeper as figures clad all in black ran around the island watching everyone form the shadows. The gore and the disgusting mutations happening to human victims who seem unaware at first of what was going on were pretty fascinating. The people in the book turned out to be the lab mice and only the ending, glorious and imaginative brought with it the relief and the horrendous answer to al the questions raised along the way.

Great tale that really sucked me in and had me hooked until I finished the last page and sat back amused. Now I can't wait to read more of Lee, for he always surprised with his silky smooth writing that is corroded with darkness and mischief. ...more

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Apr 23, 2025 Rachel rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Absolutely loved this fun book! old school horror at its finest with a super fun twist at the end thet I never saw coming. Loved loved loved this!

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Jul 13, 2021 Christine rated it really liked it · review of another edition

A small group of people arrive on a supposedly long-abandoned island, for a zoological excursion. Their mission is to photograph and study a rare marine worm.
However, when they get to the island they begin to notice strange things. There are cameras planted in the trees, one of the team members seems to be keeping secrets, and of course, the worms. Not the ones they're come to study, but a new species entirely. Not even the professor recognizes these strange worms. They're parasitic, they grow ...more

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Apr 12, 2025 Pisces51 rated it liked it

SLITHER [Crossroad Press 2022] By Edward Lee
My Review 3.5 Stars

I was privileged to engage in an anticipatory romp with the legendary Lee’s “Slither” in a Buddy Read this past week. I read the 2022 Kindle version released in 2022. The novel was originally published in a sensationalist paperback version with an erotic cover art in 2006. First of all, that pretty much tells you what you can expect from this hybrid extreme horror-sci-fi feature novel.

The late Richard Laymon dubbed Lee “The living l SLITHER [Crossroad Press 2022] By Edward Lee
My Review 3.5 Stars

I was privileged to engage in an anticipatory romp with the legendary Lee’s “Slither” in a Buddy Read this past week. I read the 2022 Kindle version released in 2022. The novel was originally published in a sensationalist paperback version with an erotic cover art in 2006. First of all, that pretty much tells you what you can expect from this hybrid extreme horror-sci-fi feature novel.

The late Richard Laymon dubbed Lee “The living legend of literary mayhem” and this sentiment appears on the paperback cover, along with the warning “read him if you dare”. Most extreme horror fans know that Lee is one of the co-founders of the Splatterpunk movement in horror. His name is recognized in the genre all over the planet and there is virtually no question about his greatness nor his influence. Lee has effectively demonstrated that he can write incredibly captivating extreme horror novels that are worthy of literary awards. An example would be “Portrait of the Psychopath as a Young Woman” (1998). That said he proved to be equally adept at thrilling the horror-loving general public with his rash of paperback sensationalist thrillers. I loved these when I was growing up and they naturally captivated me.

In “Slither” (2006) the legendary horror master Edward Lee creates an imaginative "creature feature" with a motley duo of "worm scientists" facing a truly terrifying nemesis. I began reading it with the notion that the "big bad" was the trichinosis parasite. This was a gross understatement since the bio-engineered fiend was a trifecta of the trichinosis-ribbon worm-pinworm. Its sci-fi and anything goes which is ultimately of gigantic and unstoppable proportions. In my opinion every reader knows how a story unfolding before them is making them "feel". This is a really good story. It has a host of seedy characters you are dying to see the aggressive worms decimate. Lee also provides numerous expendable thrill-seeking college kids to become doomed. Lee put together a sci-fi horror tale with plenty of creature kills, lots of sex, and cool novice kill shots.

I was not pulled into the story at the beginning and struggled not to yawn. I "felt" I should be excited! The second half was the same story but an escalated pace with more wild worm escapades, sex, and shocks. I read it with a higher level of alertness. There is a wacky plot twist at around the 80% mark that woke me up. I loved the Epilogue which followed the expected ending. It was a surprising gut punch. There was no character development but then in this story was it actually needed? I wanted everyone in the book to be “worm bait” but for the Professor Nora and her TA Loren. To be fair I would not have been crestfallen if Loren had been ingested by the featured 20-foot-long pink parasites.

The bottom line is I just couldn't shake the feeling of exploitative entertainment. Scores of readers do not seek emotional depth and I am not immune to diving headfirst into a novel of sensationalism since I loved Lee's jaw-dropping cult classic "Header". Perhaps the lesson here was to determine before hand what level of expertise and depth that I should anticipate when I opened the book. It has been my experience that Edward Lee is par excellence in many instances, thrills me with his occult thrillers like “Incubi” (1991) and “Succubi” (1992 cult masterpiece) on other occasions, and has also adorned his fanbase with an abundance of sensational “pulp fiction” which was eagerly devoured. The range of his talent is only one measure of his genius.

ENTERTAINING READ FROM THE ANNALS OF LEE’S EARLY PAPERBACK SENSATIONS ...more

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Jan 25, 2023 Charlene (Char)🍁☕️📚 rated it it was amazing

The wonderful world of worms

This book was really good!! I enjoyed it from beginning to end. The characters are realistic and I love how there wasn’t a dull moment in this book. This book is about a species being discovered by some unlikely people and another group of people that will protect their project at all cost. This book isn’t for someone that has a weak stomach.

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Apr 13, 2025 Unapologetic_Bookaholic rated it really liked it

Shelves: horror-monster-creature, setting-island, horror-extreme, authors-new-2025, group-splatterpunk, buddy-read-april-4-to-11-2025

This was my first Edward Lee book. It was a buddy for a group and I had never read anything by this author. It was pretty engaging and near the end I certainly didn't predict the ending! Overall I liked the story and for as many characters as there was. They were basically set dressing for the creatures to hunt. Which is very typical of horror. I was happy to read something other than zombie horror. I'd read another Edward Lee book. ...more

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Jul 17, 2024 Alan rated it really liked it

Slither

Trashy, campy and horny as hell. But it was still a compelling read overall. Had a lot of fun reading this one. It was like an 80’s Italian horror movie in novel form. Being the first Edward Lee book I have read I wasn’t really sure what to expect, I know he was heavily regarded by splatterpunk fans. He didn’t fail, though as splatterpunk goes it was maybe pretty tame. More along the lines of Laymon than anything, cheap gore and titillation. One thing in his favour is that he clearly rese ...more

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Sep 03, 2022 S.B. (Beauty in Ruins) rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: horror, tentacles

Messed up, perverse, and over-the-top, Slither is a b-grade horror novel that opens with an interesting premise, almost ruins it by fumbling too many plot threads, and ultimately redeems itself with a polarizing twist in the final fifty pages. Edward Lee definitely has a flair for the macabre, not to mention a trashy, free-flowing style, that makes this a compelling, if uneven, read.

The story starts with four separate groups of people stranded on a deserted, nearly inaccessible island. Yeah, tha Messed up, perverse, and over-the-top, Slither is a b-grade horror novel that opens with an interesting premise, almost ruins it by fumbling too many plot threads, and ultimately redeems itself with a polarizing twist in the final fifty pages. Edward Lee definitely has a flair for the macabre, not to mention a trashy, free-flowing style, that makes this a compelling, if uneven, read.

The story starts with four separate groups of people stranded on a deserted, nearly inaccessible island. Yeah, that's a lot of strangers on a deserted island. While a few of the characters do remark upon the situation, that doesn't save the story's roots from being so awkwardly mired in coincidence. Party number one is your typical slasher flick fodder - rich, horny teens looking for a secluded sexual hideout. Party number two is your typical sci-fi thriller fodder - overly geeky scientists, an over-sexed bimbo/bitch photographer, and a by-the-book army grunt. Party number three is your typical b-movie trash fodder - a pair of petty criminal brothers and the skanky whore with whom they so eagerly trade favours. It's only party number four that really distinguishes the story, but we don't find out just how a-typical they are until those aforementioned final fifty pages.

I won't even try to decipher the barrage of scientific nonsense being bandied about here, but I will say it sounds authentic and well-researched. I learned far more about worms and parasites than I ever wanted to know, and you can bet your ass I'll be well-armed with bug-spray and insect-repellent bracelets next time I decide to venture deep into the woods. That's a bit of an in-joke, since it's ridiculous how well they manage to protect party number two but I guess somebody has to have a hope of escape for the story to work.

As for the worms, they are damned creepy. Imagine your worst, darkest, most perverted fears about slender, creeping, malevolent creatures and amp that up to the max. This is tentacle-porn at its most sadistic, stripped of the psuedo-eroticism and reduced to its most primal, albeit sexual, elements. Cover your mouth, pinch your nose, and clench those butt-cheeks tight because the tiniest little twinge or tickle will have you paranoid by the end. Cliches and coincidences aside, Lee knows how to get under your skin.

While the book would have worked better with about a hundred-or-so pages cut out, there's enough here to keep you reading, even through the dry parts. As for that polarizing twist I mentioned? It's either the cheapest cop-out ever slipped into a story, a means of getting beyond the mental roadblock of one too many scientific impossibilities, or the most inspired bit of narrative invention, a development so bizarre that it actually works. For me, it was the latter, ultimately redeeming a story with which I was starting to lose patience.

Definitely a guilty pleasure, this was a ton of fun. Its flaws aside, Slither is a wild ride, full of gross-out horror, eye-rolling sex, brutal violence, and . . . oh, yeah, gross-out sex. Not recommended for weak hearts (or weak stomachs), but perfect for those who love the kind of b-movie drive-in horror flicks they simply don't make anymore.

Originally reviewed at Beauty in Ruins ...more

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