Nature takes its revenge in cruel and unusual ways

Blood Hunters By Steve Voake Published by Faber and Faber ISBN 978 0 571 230031 3

Deep in the Mexican jungle, a team of scientists were exploring the world's deepest sink-hole, an underwater shaft that held many natural secrets. William Simms was alone the day he discovered the jelly-like slime oozing through a tiny gap in the wall of his submersible.

Silently, he smeared a small sample into a plastic specimen tube. The jelly seemed to be moving. This could be Simms' chance to startle the scientific world. All he has to do is work out what the mysterious green slime is.

A few days after his return to England, Simms is mysteriously killed. A colleague, Martin McDonald, is arrested for his murder. And while the police are searching for clues to convict McDonald, the smear of green slime that Simms brought from Mexico has broken out of its tube and is starting to grow. And the creature it is becoming needs blood to live.

Steve Voake's Blood Hunters could only be what the title suggests. Readers expect something strong and unsettling in a story with such a tough and direct title, and Voake does not disappoint. After setting up the double mystery to keep readers intrigued, Blood Hunters homes in on teen Joe McDonald as he works out what is going on behind his father's arrest for murder.

No one knows about the creature Simms unknowingly brought back from Mexico, and when a series of random horrific murders happens in the city where Joe lives, the police are baffled. But Joe soon links the killings with something that once happened at his father's laboratory. He knows there is something horrendous out there and that it is only a matter of time before it comes after him.