Dead in the Water

By Nancy Holder

Book Overview

From Bram Stoker Award-winning author Nancy Holder comes a chilling novel of horror on the sea. This is how it will be when you drown. . . . At a sun-washed dock in Long Beach, California, the creaky freighter, Morris, loaded with brightly colored boxcars, takes on passengers. Among the vacationers- a disgruntled yuppie couple, a child stricken by cancer, a woman searching for her lost husband, and a female cop packing a .38 and bitter memories of a boy who drowned before her eyes. In seas of love and blood they will drown, one at a time. And for their company, they will have those who have drowned before them-and those who have received a message in a bottle. . . . Praise for Dead in the Water " Dead in the Water is saturated with brooding, claustrophobic, hallucinatory menace. Nancy Holder's vivid voice and sharp characterization make it all real. I'm never going on a boat again!" -Poppy Z. Brite " Dead in the Water is an involving and truly frightening book. This is the kind of horror that gets underneath your skin and works its way into your soul. Real terror . . . for those daring enough to take the trip. I enjoyed it immensely." -Rick Hautala "Nancy Holder proves why she's an award-winning author. Eerie-effective-excellent! A chilling combination of Lifeboat, Ship of Fools, and John Carpenter's The Fog, Dead in the Water keeps you treading water with every page, gasping for breath, sucking you under. A nightmare cruise into black waters and terrifying depths." -Lisa Cantrell "I'd feel safer in the water with Jaws ." -Brian Lumley "A nasty tale well told, infused with the eerily surreal quality of fevered nightmares. Discovering Nancy Holder is like finding a vein of true horror gold." -Cheri Scotch "Man the lifeboats. Don your life jacket. Nancy Holder takes you on a cruise you won't soon forget. Scary stuff." -Maxine O'Callaghan "I couldn't put it down! A whale of a tale. A page-turner-the first sentence will hook you and what follows will reel you in. Dead in the Water is fast-paced and exciting, mysterious and spooky!" -Chris Curry "Nancy Holder enshrouds fascinating characters within a chilling atmosphere and creates a relentless tale of terror at sea. Holder is one of my favorite writers." -Elizabeth Massie

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0440614074
• ISBN13: 9780440614074
• Release Date: March 1995
• Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
• Length: 428 Pages
• Weight: 1.25 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 5.5" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

Haunting...it definitely stays with you

I read this book over the course of two days - I couldn't put it down. Although, as another reader mentioned in an earlier review, there were some stock characters, they, and the story itself veered off in directions I never anticipated. It was a confusing, haunting book that still left me wondering days later. I wouldn't classify this book as true horror - it really wasn't that scary - I would consider it more of a horror "mystery".

Cliche-defying and truly frightening

Most of my fellow reviewers are exactly correct. This book starts with a crusher of an opening sequence and only gets better as the plot develops. Seemingly 'stock' characters are introduced, but fortunately Nancy veers away from all tired cliches, heading off into a horrible, surreal nightmare. Easily one of my favorite horror novels, even now, 5-6 years after first reading it. Holder covers the gruesome and, yes, touching aspects of her novel with equal skill and aplomb. Readers should be advised to seek out Holder's short fiction as well - she appears in countless horror anthologies and I've yet to find a clunker. Why we haven't seen a new, 'original' horror work from her (aside from her myriad 'Buffy' novelizations and collaborations) continues to escape me. She also wrote a good SF trilogy ("Gambler's Star") that is worth checking out as well.

A nightmare from which you will not awaken

From its famous opening line to its unsettling conclusion this surreal horror tale will hold you spellbound. It is the tale of shipwreck survivors being "rescued" by what turns out to be ghost ship of The Flying Dutchman type. Author Nancy Holder keeps the reader locked inside a fever dream that refuses to end at the novels finish. Highly original and deserving of its Bram Stoker award.

Horrifying and utterly original nightmare

The prologue remains one of the most disturbing things I have ever read. From that point on, the story only goes up in terms of pure horror and violence. The book continues to haunt me 2 years after I first read it. It's passages have a haunting poetry to them, and the overall effect is that of living through a particularly horrible nightmare. In the right hands, it could make one of the most horrifying and visually arresting films ever created.

A dark disturbing masterpiece ...

This is simply one of the best, most disturbing horror novels I have read for some time. I have a habit of judging novels by their opening pages and this book opens with a tour de force which draws the reader him/herself into the nightmare of drowning. I think it is fair to say that the rest of the book is even more disturbing and the ending still haunts me ... a must-read for horror fan