 Unnerving’s Rewind or Die series has an aim to entertain, channelling the spirit of video nasties of the 80s with hideous creatures, high body counts and lots of action. What you’d also find among these titles, was sequels with ridiculous subtitles, and with Sole Survivor 2: Drop Bears on the Loose, Zachary Ashford delivers the series’ first sequel, promising, as so many of those movies did, to be “bigger, badder, hungrier”. Like those movie sequels, a knowledge of the original is not wholly required to get to grips with the story, even though it does feature the first book’s sole survivor, December Foss. Book one’s premise was simple: contestants on a reality TV show are dropped on an island to see who can survive longest. The trouble is the island is populated by carnivorous koala bears, or ‘drop bears’, based on an Australian folklore hoax (you think the spiders and snakes are bad, wait until you encounter the drop bears…). The sequel expands on that simple premise, bringing the threat to Brisbane, expanding the role of the TV show’s creator, and introducing several new threats. In this kind of scenario there’s always a danger that in taking away the original setting the story can lose its edge, but Ashford expands the story with great success. December Foss is a likeable protagonist. She’s angry about the events of the first book, particularly with Joseph Steinberg the man responsible for the show. His role is expanded hugely. We discover that he is responsible for genetically engineering the drop bears, and he’s working on some even greater horrors which feature in the second half of the novella. But it’s not Steinberg who is responsible for unleashing the drop bears on Brisbane. The first series of Sole Survivor has attracted the attention of an animal welfare organisation known as ARK. Horrified by the murder of the creatures, they swear to take down December and Steinberg. Some of their men infiltrate Steinberg’s lab and release the creatures, bringing the horror to the city. It is the drop bears who remain the main attraction here. We understand more about them. They’ve been engineered to reach maturity in 24 hours, then they can breed, and the gestation period is similarly short, so in no time at all they could over-run the city. With a far more complicated story, with multiple elements, Ashford could lose the focus on what makes the story engaging. Instead, he turns up the bloodshed, the carnage, and the mayhem. The city perhaps isn’t the best setting for drop bears, but Ashford gets around this by setting scenes where the urban collides with nature – the mountains, the gardens, the river, all of which allow the creatures to thrive. Many chapters end with the introduction of a character whose only purpose is to fall foul of the creatures. Here, Ashford creatures characters who are deliberately ridiculous – the soldier desperate to take on the threat on the drop bears, the woman relying on religion to protect her, and the gentleman who drops a bottle of Viagra pills for the beasts to hungrily gobble up. While these scenes add nothing whatsoever to the plot, they’re all incredibly entertaining. Without a doubt, entertainment is high on Ashford’s agenda. His informal, colloquial style, full of slang is perfectly suited to the scenario. His similes are often beyond ridiculous, and all the more fun for it. As the body count continues to rise, as the situation grows both tenser and more outrageous, on every page there’s either a turn of phrase or an image that had me chuckling to myself. When a story concept is as ludicrous (deliberately) as this one is, it is absolutely the right choice to play the situation for laughs were possible. Plot-wise, while there are numerous elements, all focus on December, and for that she becomes a much stronger and more interesting character than any in the original. With so many threats against her, and her desire to save her parents and escape from the events of the first book once and for all, we have a character we can root for. Other point of view characters are interesting because of the way their stories interlink with hers, whether that be as an antagonist or an ally. This focus makes for a much stronger novella, and gives the story a heart to go along with all of the mayhem. Those that have read the first novella will understand references to characters and events in the first, and when a new threat emerges in the second half of the novella, fans of the original will perhaps appreciate it a little more, but there’s nothing to stop a first-timer enjoying this aspect. Ashford does a great job of weaving in the references so as not to alienate new readers or frustrate those in the know. This story is so different from the original too, that it is never in danger of becoming a re-tread of what went before. Sole Survivor 2 is not a novella to take seriously. It’s not going to last long in the memory or have a profound effect on you. It will, however, make you laugh. It will keep you entertained for a couple hours, and there’s a chance it might just make you look at koalas in a whole new light. Review by Ben Langley  The first season of Sole Survivor has aired, a traumatized December Foss is trying desperately to escape her fifteen minutes of fame, and everyone thinks the drop bears are dead. Everyone that is except The Ark: a radical group of eco-terrorists with an axe to grind, and Joseph Steinberg, who still has plenty of them in reserve. When the Ark release the drop bears from captivity, all hell breaks loose and December must face them again. This time, though, they’re on her turf. This time, it’s personal! "Twice the torment, two-fold the turmoil, and double the drop bears! If you like your creature features fast and furious, you’ll enjoy the marsupial madness of Sole Survivor 2!" - D.I. Russell   Comments are closed.
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