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Three couples travel together into the New Zealand mountains, ready for horseback riding, hunting, fishing, and camping in the great outdoors. What begins as a perfect vacation in paradise takes a violent turn when mutant creatures and menacing humans attack the group. First, the group encounters an ecological disaster when they find a downed plane that has leaked gallons of growth-promoting hormones into the landscape and waterways which the animals in the area have ingested. Giant spiders then ambush the unsuspecting group. After a narrow escape, the travelers return to their camp with plans to report the bizarre events. When two of the men go off hunting, three brothers come upon the women back at the camp. Fueled by drugs and alcohol, the meeting takes a deadly turn. When the men return to camp, a hunt begins for human prey as one of the husbands seeks to avenge the death of his wife.
With action-packed hunting sequences and vivid descriptions of the landscape, Marshall unfurls an adventure story that captures the beauty of nature as well as the brutality of man. As Marshall builds the two storylines of separate groups roving through the trees with wildly different intentions and values, their collision seems inevitable. He builds the tension as each group carries on unaware of the other’s presence, and frantic page-turning ensues to reach the heart-pounding conclusion. Marshall’s eco-adventure novel is more than a revenge story set in the majestic New Zealand countryside. It is also a commentary on the loss that comes with rogue outlaws and disturbing poisons that impact the natural world. It is an unsettling story of a paradise broken by violence and the creep of seemingly distant social issues into the lives of unsuspecting people.