Those Who Went Remain There Still

Heaster Wharton is dead, and that could mean an end to the hostilities between two families, if they survive the beast in the cave that guards his last will and testament.

From Publishers Weekly

Cilled a thing heer—D. Boone reads a message carved outside a spooky Kentucky cave in this slightly thin campfire tale. The thing is a bizarre creature with wings and a sharp beak, and despite Boone's declaration, she survives and spawns. By 1899, the cave is known as the Witch's Pit, and Heaster Wharton Junior—whose father accompanied Boone and fought the monster—hides his will there so his feuding descendants will have to work together to find it. Inevitably, the searchers tangle with the monster's bloodthirsty family. Humor enlivens the action, and Priest (Not Flesh nor Feathers) adds cool touches like Boone's ghost and an angry phantom woman, but the monster's origins remain a little too mysterious, giving the story a slightly undeveloped feel. Mark Geyer's illustrations lend old-fashioned atmosphere. (Dec.) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Better known for her southern gothic horror novels, Priest here changes pace with the gruesome tale of a winged monster haunting the backwoods of late-nineteenth-century, rural Kentucky. When Heaster Wharton dies, his surviving grandchildren in the feuding Coy and Mander clans are faced with a daunting challenge. To retrieve his will, three Coys and three Manders must stop bickering long enough to visit the Witch’s Pit, a remote cavern in the hills. Before they can get their bearings in the foul-smelling recesses, they are assaulted by a gigantic, feathered beast with a deadly beak. Although their guns and their axes help them protect themselves somewhat, the ghost of a certain Kentucky frontiersman who confronted the beast 100 years before—Daniel Boone—is much more helpful. Priest spices the narrative with frequent flashbacks to Boone’s own beastly encounters during his trail-cutting days. Ultimately, the gore and the feathers are a bit overdone, though all for the sake of good, gratuitous fun. --Carl Hays

From the Inside Flap

Heaster Wharton is dead, and his passing might mean an end to hostilities between the Manders and the Coys. If the the elderly patriarch showed the kindness and foresight to split his land cleanly between his feuding descendants, then a truce could be arranged. But his final request is a strange one, delivered across the country to the straggling remnants of his tribe. Representatives from both families must visit a cave at the edge of his property in the hills of Kentucky. There, he promised, they would find his last will and testament. But there's more than paperwork waiting underground, as vindictive old Heaster was well aware.In 1775, Daniel Boone and a band of axe-wielding frontiersmen struggled to clear a path through the Cumberland Gap into the heart of Bluegrass country, and they did not work unopposed. Hounded and harried by an astonishing monster, the axe-men overcame the beast by sheer numbers and steel. They threw its body into a nearby cave.It was not dead.And now, it is not alone. Crippled and outraged, for 100 years something terrible has huddled underground, dreaming of meat and revenge. But its newest callers are heavily armed, skeptical of their instructions, and predisposed to violence. With their guns and their savage instincts, Heaster's grandchildren will not make for easy pickings.

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