The Haunted Forest Tour by James A. Moore and Jeff Strand Rating: 8.5 out of 10 monsters

I won't lie; I went into this book with more than a little trepidation. The idea of horror and humor together in a book always makes me nervous. See, horror and humor is a mix that soars like an eagle when it's done well, but crashes like a drunk falling off a barstool when it's done poorly.

So, before I go any further, let me say this: The Haunted Forest Tour doesn't crash. It might not soar with the eagles, but it comes damn close - if you substitute a deadly, fire-breathing dragon for the eagle. If you enjoyed SHAUN OF THE DEAD in the theaters, you'll absolutely love this book.

Now, let's get into the details.

The Haunted Forest Tour begins with a fantastic premise: A strange, scary, and dangerous forest has inexplicably sprouted in the New Mexico desert, faster than a person can say 'watch out for that rapidly growing pine tree.' It springs up so fast, in fact, that the majority of a small town is destroyed, and most of the residents either impaled by the impossible trees or eaten by the monsters who dwell in the dark woods. There's enough blood and guts to make the freaky dude from SAW cringe, and more than once you see a character killed off just as you thought maybe he or she was going to end up being important to the story. As towns go, quaint old Cromay seems inhabited solely by red-shirts from Star Trek.

Scary stuff, right? Yet somehow Moore and Strand manage to turn this into an almost slapstick comedy that will have you chuckling even as you wonder how you could be laughing at multiple dismemberments and disembowelments.

Flash forward a few years, and now the Haunted Forest has been put to commercial use by a fast-thinking entrepreneur, who's turned it into a giant, living version of a theme park haunted house ride. The reader gets to go ride along with a special Halloween tour that's taking a large group of daring tourists further inside the forest than any tour before it.

Yeah, as soon as you read that, you know what's gonna happen, but knowing their fate doesn't make it any less enjoyable to read about it.

Quick version: the tourist trams are attacked, lots of people are killed in exceedingly gory fashion by hundreds of monsters that range from gruesome and scary (giant ogres) to downright comical (bouncing, laughing creatures that play with their food before eating it).

The few remaining survivors band together to try and make it out of the forest alive. Do they all make it?

If you've read anything by James A. Moore or Jeff Strand before, you'll know how silly a question that is.

Along the way, some of them learn that the forest is actually the home of a sadistic, sarcastic demon named Pestilence, who cracks wise while torturing his victims. Pestilence has decided our world is ripe for the picking. His plan is to combine a lot of blood sacrifices with a human host, thus filling him with enough power to spread his hellish forest across the entire world.

Naturally, the last members of the fated tram ride, along with a few unlucky company men and women back at corporate headquarters, have to do their best to stop Pestilence.

The book, like the forest, is filled with horrible creatures who enjoy nothing more than gutting, de-limbing, and eating humans. Strand and Moore have outdone themselves here, creating a veritable field guide to monsters and demons. Every page delivers a new horror, ranging from tiny flying fish that bite little pieces away to mold-monsters that slime their way into a host and rot it away from the inside out. Hellhounds, ghosts, tree-crushing-multi-eyed behemoths; they're all here.

Which brings me to the first problem I had with this book - trying to maintain my involvement in the truly original and frightening premise, while at the same time allowing myself to be pulled away from the horror to enjoy the laughs. And laugh you will, there's no doubt about that. But unfortunately the comic scenes and snappy banter in the dialog take away the horror.

I've read previous works by both authors, and I've enjoyed Moore's dark gore as well as Strand's impish, farcical, sometimes outrageous humor. Both of their influences are visible here, and in certain places they mesh well together. But in others, the humor jarred me from the story. A few examples:

Christopher, one of the main characters, gets plucked from a tree by a giant eagle-type creature. As he's sailing along to an unknown fate, these are his thoughts:

You know, you did pay for this vacation, he thought. It's a beautiful view, and despite the agony of the whole business with the bird talons puncturing your skin, maybe you should just try to enjoy the moment.

Hello? I'd be screaming in terror, if not unconscious from the pain.

In another scene, Christopher meets up with Pestilence, who tells him he's going to kill him. But before that, they have a witty, casual conversation about the weather, and the weirdness of the whole situation, during which Pestilence refers to Christopher as a 'dumb-ass.'

Or a third scene where Christopher and some other survivors are attempting to climb a rope ladder to a waiting helicopter, as giant bats attack them:

Barbara cried out as a bat lashed against her kidneys, and for one horrifying second Christopher thought she was going to lose her grip. Though her ass would be a pleasant final sight as it plummeted toward him, he preferred that she not fall.

I realize horror is fiction, but one of the aspects of being scared is you have to let go of reality and believe you're in the situation you're reading about. Initially, as I read this book, there were too many instances where the humor jarred me from the story, the same way an unbelievable fight scene in a movie will make you shake your head or laugh, as you watch two supposedly normal people bash each other over and over again with fists, feet, and any handy objects, without ever suffering bruises or broken bones.

But then, halfway through the book, I had an epiphany: The problem wasn't with the book, but rather with my preconceptions. I shouldn't be treating it as horror at all. Instead, I should consider it a humorous story with gross, horrific scenes.

And suddenly, everything clicked, and the real genius of the writing became obvious. I realized that more than anything, The Haunted Forest Tour reminded me of the great books by Alan Dean Foster, books like Into the Out Of, Glory Lane, or his Spellsinger and Midworld series. Foster had a real knack for making you laugh, even though his people didn't react in horrific situations the way real people would.

But Foster's books were more sci-fi than horror; he wasn't trying to scare you as the same time he made you laugh. In order to appreciate Haunted Forest, you first have to be ready not to be scared.

The two writers' styles balance each other nicely, with the chilling descriptions of demons turning screaming people into piles of bloody meat done in a lighthearted fashion. You can almost imagine Strand and Moore grinning from ear to ear as they dispatch yet another innocent victim.

The book is a fast read; an action-filled romp with barely a moment to rest and catch your breath. Along the way you meet a large assortment of characters (proving a point I've always said that you can have a lot of characters in a book without confusing the reader), some of whom you like and some you don't, some who you're happy to see killed off and others you wish had made it out alive.

I wasn't particularly enamored of the ending, which seemed kind of rushed and tacked on to me, even if it did make logical sense. And you really have to suspend your disbelief in order to accept that a giant forest filled with dangerous creatures would have ever been allowed to be turned into a theme park in the first place - I mean, c'mon. No government attempts to blow it out of existence? No huge contingents of scientists entering it to study the very 'wild' life?

But those nit-picks aside, I can honestly say that I enjoyed reading the book, and I would recommend it to other members of my family. In fact, I'd have given it an even higher rating if I didn't think there might be readers who will find it too comical.

Personally, I think The Haunted Forest Tour would be more at home on the general fiction or sci-fi/fantasy shelves, alongside Alan Dean Foster, Piers Anthony, and David Gerrold. And yes, I'd pay my own hard-earned money to read it.

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JG Faherty is a writer of dark fiction. His short stories have appeared in many magazines and ezines, most recently in Cemetery Dance #58, MagusZine, and the Garden State Horror Writers Association 2007 anthology, Dark Territories. He's also writes regular columns for the Horror Writers Association monthly newsletter. You can visit him at www.jgfaherty.com.