They come in with the snow. They are the snow . . .
The blizzard begins pummeling the Midwest on Christmas Eve, leaving hundreds of passengers stranded at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport. Todd Curry doesn’t need another reason to disappoint his son, so he joins three other people in renting the last four-wheel drive available and they set out into the blinding snow.
Only two hours into the treacherous trip west, Todd swerves to avoid a man in the middle of the highway. The stranger claims his daughter is lost somewhere out in the snow. Though his odd demeanor and ripped clothes make Todd and his group uneasy, they agree to take the man to the nearest town—if the now-damaged car can make it.
What awaits them at the next exit, however, is nothing they could have imagined. Around an empty town square, fires burn, cars are abandoned, storefronts are smashed. And there is no one to be seen—for now . . .
But soon the shadows lurking on the edges of their vision will step into the light, and Todd and his fellow travelers will find themselves facing a sharp-scythed evil shaped from the snow, tearing its way into human form—and taking the neighborhood by storm.
Snow by Ronald Malfi. Narrated by Joe Hempel. Published by Tantor Media, 2023. Runtime of 8 hours and 25 minutes. Originally published in 2010.
*Trigger Warning: fatphobic / body shaming comments
Snow has a fun premise. Snow, monsters, people trapped in a blizzard. Alright, I’m on board. Sounds fun. But that fun went to awful REAL quick!!! D: Where do I even begin??
I don’t like being mean to a book, but the writing is just….. ROUGH! 
There is a real horrible romance angle. Ugh. I hate when, in a horror story / movie, things are getting crazy with killer monsters or other horrible shit, yet the characters hook up for romance. Like, REALLY??? Aren’t there more pressing issues to deal with right now? This was super not needed at all. and it felt absolutely forced. 😦
There are some really cringe writing as well. “Baby blue like a baby dreaming of the womb”…..? What the FLUFF?? What does that even mean? There were soooooo many weird, cringe, awkward sentences. I was left scratching my head at the writing the whole time. I don’t like to say this sort of thing, but good lord it was dreadful!
What really killed this book for me, is the fat phobic comments throughout Snow. 😡 I get it if it is part of the character’s personality, or if the author is just using body descriptions as details of what people look like. I’ll even excuse it some what if the book is a product of an older era…..However, none of the above felt like what was going on.
First of all, there were hardly any descriptions of what any of the characters looked like, except when a character is plus sized. And the description is always a more negative sounding word like ” chunky”. Second, it never felt like commentary FROM the character, you know? It felt like the author was just being a dick. It came off more as mean than descriptive. THIRD, why is it that all the obnoxious, sloppy people in this book the only plus sized characters? And never was it “oh that guy is a real bastard!”, it was always ” that fat bastard!” Like, really? If you are describing why so and so is a bastard, why do you have to constantly have to add in that the guy is fat? What does that have to do with them being a bastard? *shrug* I don’t know… I get it happening once, maybe even twice… but it happened a lot. I mean. a LOT. And like I said, it just kind of came off as mean and made the good guy character look like the asshole. And don’t even get me going on that poor big guy at the start who was SO stereotypical and cartoony “sloppy fat” guy, it was just ridiculous. 😡
I was honestly really disappointed with this crap. I’ve heard so much about what a great author this guy is, and I look at the great reviews for Snow…. I just don’t get it. Did I read a different book or something? *shrug* The over all writing and the fatphoic sounding descriptions were just a massive turn off for me. The plot is ok, the monsters are decent, but neither could save the way this book was written. Snow felt like a chore to read and I’m not sure I want to read anything else by this author. D:
Creature From The Book Lagoon 