"This book hits like a summer squall and never lets up, a real-time, one-location doom machine that earns its place beside The Mist." - Daniel Kraus, author of Whalefall
A sudden storm appears above an isolated farmhouse in rural Illinois, bringing with it a relentless and unnatural rain. A rain that eats away at everything it touches. A rain that turns people into monsters.
Trapped inside his crumbling home, a father must do everything he can to keep his family from falling apart. But the rain calls to them, and not everyone wants to stay inside.
Haunted by memories of a tragic childhood, he must put aside his painful past and find a way to keep them all safe. But the rain shows no signs of stopping, and time is running out.
From the award-winning author of Suburban Monsters comes a heartbreaking tale of terror, hope, and survival. You'll never look at rain the same way again!
“This weatherman is forecasting nightmares coming in from the North. Not since Stephen King’s “The Mist“ has a shift in meteorology felt this terrifying, but it’s the human drama playing out under these cosmic storm conditions that truly elevates Christopher Hawkins’ novel.” - Clay McLeod Chapman, author of Ghost Eaters
"Downpour is a frickin’ beautiful, gorgeous little novel. Love seeps out of every page just as the 'relentless and unnatural' rain seeps into the lives of the characters." - HorrorTree
“Christopher Hawkins’s DOWNPOUR delivers tension and dread with excellent prose, but it’s the complex dynamics of modern family structures that will ultimately haunt the reader... Like much of the best speculative fiction, Christopher Hawkins’s DOWNPOUR transmutes social and cultural anxieties into a compellingly-visceral conflict with forces that defy understanding.” - IndieReader (Starred Review)
"Dread descends in unrelenting sheets throughout Downpour. The moment you think the skies will clear, a roar of thunder cracks the walls of reality, and you fall into darkness." - Alan Lastufka, author of Face the Night
“Downpour hammers out a harrowing, heart-wrenching tale of loss of control. A stellar setup that absolutely delivers when the violence and chaos come to collect. A thrilling ride from start to finish.” - Lauren Bolger, author of Kill Radio
Finalist
Assessment:
Plot/Idea: The genius behind Hawkins’s plot is his skill at revamping a natural phenomenon into a malignant, evil force. Suspense builds from the start, and readers will be on the edge of their seats until the very last sentence.
Prose: Hawkins is a polished, talented storyteller, with chilling prose that splatters visceral fright across the pages. The book’s setup is intense, and the writing style delivers shocking turns through succinct, measured phrasing.
Originality: The book’s premise—incessant rain that turns humans into uncontrollable, deadly creatures—is an extraordinarily original concept, and Hawkins melds the moments of horror and the characters’ experiences into an epic, not-to-be-missed read.
Character/Execution: Scott is a riveting lead, willing to do whatever it takes to protect his loved ones. The tension simmering just below the surface of his family life ignites a frenzy from the first pages, and his attempts to preserve his family and survive at all costs are palpable. Hawkins renders the situation Scott finds himself in remarkably well, deftly portraying the sacrifices he must make and evoking the fierce, all-consuming emotions he feels throughout.
Date Submitted: August 30, 2023
Seamlessly blending horror, speculative fiction, and urgent domestic drama, Downpour offers a fast-paced thriller fueled by themes of family discourse, childhood traumas, and a gripping and original environmental danger worthy of The Birds—a day of relentless rain that seems to transform people into monsters. Hawkins (Suburban Monsters) sets the story in a dilapidated old farmhouse, where Scott, his wife, Dana, and their two children—a teenage son, Jacob, and younger daughter Tallie—live a seemingly quiet life in the rural town of Scott's childhood. With tension in his marriage, dark feelings from his upbringing he still struggles with, and his neighbor, Ned, putting pressure on him to sell his inherited land, Scott is already stressed when he notices an unusual storm cloud looming overhead. Once the rain starts and upsetting videos surface of strange occurrences, Scott realizes that he was right to worry—and that it’s up to him to keep his family safe.Hawkins uses the tension of the central family and the unknown effects of the rain to build an intense tension that escalates throughout the story. With relatable and fully developed characters, and a commitment to moment-by-moment detail, readers of survival horror will quickly become invested in Scott, his family, and the impending storm and whatever it portends, especially as the rain seeps into their home, exposing not only the cracks in the farmhouse, but in their family dynamics.
Scott will stop at nothing to protect his family, but Hawkins demonstrates throughout that this demands hard choices that keep the stakes rising, especially when Scott makes the startling realization that they may be safer venturing into the storm. Hawkins’s transformation of a common natural phenomenon into a force of terror adds to the psychological suspense, creating a com[pelling mystery and sense of humanity’s helplessness. This is a propulsive horror story, suspenseful throughout, and readers who enjoy genre-blending thrillers will tear through the pages.
Takeaway: Tense, smart horror that pits one man and his family against the rain.
Comparable Titles: Josh Malerman’s Bird Box, Darcy Coates’s Dead of Winter.
Production grades
Cover: A
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A-
Marketing copy: A
