A brave new world…
Jon is being used as slave labour on a distant planet. The memory of his crimes has been wiped to help keep him compliant. But Jon has visions of a dead woman with horrific wounds. Who is she? Why is she haunting his thoughts?
Hollie was against the wiping of prisoners’ memories and is horrified they are seeing things. Determined to get to the bottom of the visions, she makes a startling discovery.
Neither of them are prepared for what comes next.
…as deadly as the old one.
Dark bleatings, my lovely tribe. I’m hear to tell you allll about (without spoilers, though!) a new novel from David Watkins. I’ve read his ‘Originals’ trilogy and some other works, and what I have come to expect from him is some sort of beasty (sometimes), and event-packed, thriller-paced, action horror (always). He has a tendency to take the world we all find familiar and twist something supernatural or ancient and seemingly impossible into it. This time around, he has gone into scifi territory, and wasn’t that a fantastic surprise! He’s done scifi horror before, but not (to my knowledge) on a different planet.
Our protagonist, Jon, goes through a “waking up” process, and then finds himself a prisoner on an alien planet, with no memory of his life on Earth, and he learns that he’s apparently a prisoner that has to work out a lengthy sentence. There are other prisoners, also wiped of their memories, including their crimes. And that’s where I’ll stop telling you about the plot, because there are many turns in the road and I don’t want to inadvertently take you down one of them.
This is, as usual for David, fast-paced, somewhat violent, and a great merging of several genres that compliment each other, thanks to the seamless and effortless way that he applies them to his story. I think that this is also a little deeper thematically than his usual work (that’s not to say his usual work is shallow, just that this has a more thoughtful and introspective aspect to it, more so than the usual fun, Hudson-from-Aliens-like flair I’m accustomed to). The memory wiping aspect conjured reflections (for me at least) on real-world conditions that affect memory, and also, because of some finer details, the effects of complex PTSD. The prisoner aspect felt like an almost dystopian parallel to the “us vs them”, almost dystopian real political landscape we’re all currently living in.
Amongst the many other elements I really enjoyed, I particularly liked how things unfolded. David’s set up and pay off felt fine-tuned and thoughtfully executed, and there was plenty of meat on the bones of the characters. I was mildly reminded of a few other movies and shows I like; Demolition Man meets Prison Break meets a rogue episode of Black Mirror. But you could also say that it’s actually like none of those things. That might not make sense, and even as I say it, I’m confusing myself, but that’s honestly my best summary and I’m sticking by it.
While I’m a fan of David’s work in general, there was something a bit extra about this novel for me. Extra depth, extra story telling skill, and extra oomph in general. I’d recommend this to scifi/horror/action fans.
If you’d like to check out the book, it will be out on the 17th (Feb 2026), and I’ve popped a link to that and also to David’s website below. David, if you read this, I’m wishing you the very greatest of book launches – this might be your best work yet!
Bleeeeat!
Happy Goat Horror 
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