Booze and Books: Hell's Teeth

From the blurb: "Galipoli, 1916. The campaign is lost. The Turks are driving the Anzacs from their dugouts. Amongst them is Tom Potter, a man who left England in disgrace, hoping to start his life over in New Zealand. But his ghost have not let him go and, when he is cast adrift, lost at sea, they seek him out, they maroon him upon a grey and dismal island. A place where Tom discovers he is not alone, that he is being watched by horrors who have fed upon the blood spilled in the trenches of Passchendaele and the streets of London, and now they wish to feed upon him."

Hell's Teeth is the third book in the Vetala cycle, and a very strong close to the trilogy. It is mostly written in a poetry/prose that has become a signature style of Yeates. It is as beautifully written as it is terrifying. This is a horror book, but one that transcends the genre. It makes the reader consider the past, and how that affects the present. It brings the horror of war and trenches out of the history books and makes it something much more visceral and real. There are layers in the story that bring the past and present together, and then asks the question of what lies beyond death. This was an amazing read, that while horrifying, goes beyond horror and into the beauty that only poetry can bring. Yeates is a master of the English language, and his skills are on full display in this work. I can not recommend this highly enough; this is a book I will be reading again and again. There is also some bonus material at the end, a chilling short story as well as a creation myth that is a beautiful and disturbing poem.