I'm not sure who Brad Carter is (though a quick Google search reveals he also novelized
Cruel Jaws), but I
am aware of the 1980 killer Bigfoot film
Night of the Demon. Well, it got a novelization. In 2021. A rare instance of a movie being novelized decades after it's come and gone from theaters. Or at least 2021 is the copyright date on the inside front page. I can find no evidence of it having existed prior to this (i.e. from back when the movie was new). I think it's a similar case to when they got Shaun Hutson to novelize
X the Unknown a few years ago. But whereas Hutson (for some reason?) modernized the story (even though it added not a dang thing), Carter said the heck with it and kept
Night of the Demon set in the 80s. As to how this thing even came about, it was originally offered (along with some other goodies, including a figure of the Bigfoot from the movie) as part of a Blu-ray bundle sold by Severin, the home video company that got the rights to release it on DVD and Blu-ray. However, they do also sell the book separately, so don't worry.
The story is mostly the same, but has been completely restructured. The film is about a college professor, Bill Nugent, who takes his students out into the wilderness to look for Bigfoot, complete with them encountering a mysterious cult of some sort (a similar setup to
Shriek of the Mutilated, except the monster isn't fake this time). Evidently, after filming was finished, the producer went back and added a bunch of gory attack scenes, and you can tell they were added late in production after principal photography had wrapped because with the exception of the beginning and ending attack scenes, they're all flashbacks, stories told around the campfire by Nugent and thus disconnected both from his expedition and the overall main story. Carter fixes this problem by having the attacks occur during the main story, with each victim or victims getting their own introductory chapter before they're killed off. So, still a little disconnected, as most of these people never encounter Nugent's group, but given the structure of the movie there was only so much Carter had to work with.
Carter also does more with the pseudo-Satanic Bigfoot cult and really makes it clear the entire community is in on it (well, almost everyone), something the movie doesn't really focus on all that much. Even the guy Roy bribes with booze is in on it... and pays for saying things he shouldn't once the reverend who's in charge of the whole thing gets wind of it and decides he's tired of the guy talking to Bigfoot-hunting strangers. Carter also changes who comes to see Nugent in the hospital at the end. In the movie, it's a guy named Inspector Slack (the doctor quite clearly says "S
lack"), whereas in the book Sheriff S
tack (did Carter mishear? Did the actor playing the doctor misspeak?), who gets his own subplot where he's investigating the killings (he's one of the few people not involved in the cult) gets killed and instead it's his deputy, now acting sheriff, who comes to interview Nugent... and he's involved in the cult, so it doesn't look like the Professor's got a much bright future ahead of him.
The attack scenes are pretty brutal and gory. Particularly the infamous scene with the biker who stops to take a leak and accidentally pisses on Bigfoot's head. And speaking of pissing, whenever a guy needs to go relieve himself, Carter falls back on the same description of what it feels like to have a full bladder: he says the beer/soda/whatever they drink are "yearning to be set free." It was clever with Floyd the hunter at the beginning, but when Carter does it with Stack's deputy, Gordy, at the end and at least another time between those two scenes, I'm left wondering, does Brad Carter not know of any other way to describe what it feels like when you need to take a piss? Also, it's always two drinks; two beers, two sodas, whatever. Man, the male cast of
Night of the Demon sure have some weak bladders.
All in all, though, this is a fun book based off of a fun (if clunky) killer Bigfoot movie. Brad Carter did everything right that someone doing a novelization ought to do; stay true to the story while expanding on the world and characters and also fixing some problems. I highly recommend it. However, as it was only written for inclusion with the Blu-ray bundle released by Severin, it can only really be bought on their website (new). But it's affordable and they ship it well, in a strong little box chock full of packing peanuts.
