Review: Swallowed by Med Smitherman
Blurb:
Earth is broken beyond repair. The Planet is our last hope.
Humanity's first mission to the Planet ended in tragedy, but botanist Jill Jones won't let that stop her from joining the second.
Perfect climate, perfect terrain, perfect flora and fauna; the Planet has called to Jill all of her life. She knows, with bone-deep certainty, it's home. A new beginning for humanity. She just needs a chance to prove it.
But as Jill and her team survey the Planet, a mysterious presence begins to infiltrate their thoughts. When her colleagues start to disappear, it's up to Jill to uproot the Planet's secrets before they consume her, her friends, and the one man she would do anything to keep.
Review:
Come for the horny plants stay for the sensual atmospheric prose. Swallowed was a beautifully written, thoroughly enjoyable scifi romance horror. I may have guessed the ending from the prologue, but I still really enjoyed the prose and watching how everything unfolded along the way. While I would say Swallowed is more spicy than it is scary, there are still plenty of moments that will give you chills!
Swallowed follows Jill and her small research crew as they land on an alien plant decades after the failed mission that left Jill’s mother as the sole survivor. Earth dying and this planet is the only viable new home for humanity. Jill’s team has been sent to collect research to support that the planet is safe for colonization, despite the tragic disappearance of the last research team that was sent to survey the planet. As you may have suspected strange things begin to happen to the scientists the longer they spend time on this lush paradise and it appears that history is set to repeat itself.
Jill is determined to find out what happened to her mother's team, which her mother refused to talk about, before the planet swallows them whole.
Smitherman does a great job of developing a full and interesting cast in only 180 pages. The central character Jill is smart, intersting, easy to connect with and root for while the side characters Julian and Darcie bring some comic relief and a nice amount of tension. Then there is Ben, a soldier and the only member of the team who is not a scientist. The romantic tension between Ben and Jill is palpable and the progression of their romance in this horror show is executed perfectly.
I don’t want to go into too much detail and spoil the story for you but if you are a fan of gorgeous symbolic prose and spice that transports you into a terrifying world then you definitely want to check out Swallowed.
I loved Smitherman’s last scifi romance horror, Thrum, and she has kept the streak going with Swallowed. If you like stories that make you wonder what is going on, make you feel scared and intrigued, and have an element of romance then Smitherman is an author to watch I know I will be eagerly awaiting her next release.
Content warnings: Mind body horror, explicit sexual content
