Lusus Naturae

~Chris Coppel

Lusus Naturae was a deep dive into a whole new combination of genres for me. I usually stick to psychological thrillers, paranormal anything, cozy’s, and romance – typically in that order of preference. So when Chris Coppel reached out to ask me to read this, I read the blurb and jumped on it – even though historical anything usually bores me.

Now, I’ve attempted to write my normal style of review on this – scrapping at least five renditions. I kept gravitating to telling more of the story than necessary – I mean, you need to have something to read when you finish the review, right? But every attempt fell short of everything I felt like I really NEEDED to say about this book. So, I am going off script here, and I hope I do justice to the story while giving a solid opinion/review.

Back to the genre thing – I wouldn’t classify this to one particular genre because it really is inclusive of so much. You start out touching on historical, swiftly moving into science, then adding into the mix of those two you have horror, thriller, sci-fi, and maybe even a touch of paranormal when it comes to the creature.

The setting: the seaside town of Deal located in southeast of Kent County, England.

You’ve got the discovery of a wreckage from 1748, Lady Lovibond, that leads to the raising of the schooner that leads to another discovery. The wreckage of a never publicly recorded wreckage of a WWII trawler. Upon that wreckage, a stone box shackled to its hull that scientists decided to forgo bureaucratic red-tape and smuggle ashore under the cover of night. MI6 surprise them, take over the discovery, let curiosity get the better of them, and open the stone box. Surprise is on them as they unleash a creature upon the town and its residents.

It’s now up to the scientists originally brought in to study the wreckage of Lady Lovibond, MI6 agents, and an old WWII biologist who is now retired to reveal the origins of the creature.

How many lives will be lost, relationships tested and secrets uncovered before the creature is stopped – if it can even be stopped?

The story gets off to a somewhat slow start, but don’t be put off by that. The slower start is NEEDED to build backstory that will propel you forward. Once you get past the initial information dump, the pace is steady, keeping you turning pages to find out what happens next. I will admit that some actions of some of the characters left me wanting to reach into the pages and smack them. It was similar to some of the horror movies where you are on the outside looking in, saying WTF are you doing/thinking!!! But we are essentially on the outside reading a story from another person’s creative journey.

Coppel intrigued me with the multiple POV’s – particularly the creature’s PoV. While I am aware the creature was the “bad” entity in the story, I felt such a strong connection to it because of the writing quality by Coppel. I felt Jay was fully fleshed out – we are given emotion and insight into his mind. Yet Emma and Helene, which I felt were his equals in the story, were left a little short. Emma gave me a more immature mentality feeling although she is supposed to be a well-educated scientist – maybe it was intentional based on the relationship between her and Jay being divorced. I could also just be overanalyzing her since I didn’t feel as deep a connection with her as I did the creature and Jay.

Moving on to atmospheric presence, it’s there! Coppel presents us with an extremely well-thought-out descriptive process when it comes to scenes. From shifting of the tides and sands in the beginning with raising the Lady Lovibond, the small-town dynamics, and through all the science and gore – it’s all done masterfully and authentically.

If you are looking for that story with some science, history, gore and a whole bunch of surprises – give Lusus Naturae a read (and let me know what you think of it as well as if my review shift did it justice).

I want to thank Chris Coppel for reaching out and asking if I would like to give Lusus Naturae a read – it was definitely out of my normal wheel-house of reads and something I don’t think I would have given an opportunity if I were choosing a book on my own. But I don’t regret a moment I spent reading this one, and it will go on to take up space in my brain for a while!

As always, all opinions and reviews are of my own volition. I have not been promised any compensation, current or future, by the author or publisher for a fair and honest review.

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