11/26/2025 Exploring the Labyrinth by Kit Power: AN OCCURRENCE IN CRAZY BEAR VALLEY, essay 21
- Candace Nola
- 4 hours ago
- 7 min read
Exploring the LabyrinthÂ
In this series, I will be reading every Brian Keene book that has been published (and is still available in print) in order of original publication and then producing an essay on it. With the exception of Girl On The Glider, The Triangle Of Belief, and End Of The Road, these essays will be based upon a first read of the books concerned. The article will assume you’ve read the book, and you should expect MASSIVE spoilers.
I hope you enjoy my voyage of discovery.
This is the last bi-weekly post as Kit prepares for the release of Volume 1 of Exploring The Labyrinth. Join us monthly as we continue the series on Dec. 17.
An Occurrence In Crazy Bear Valley
Content note - contains discussion of sexual assault
This time out, we’re entering Weird Western territory, as Keene takes us down into the eponymous valley, to meet a band of dangerous outlaws, some unfortunate lumberjacks, and a very strange bunch of cryptids. Hilarity ensues, and by hilarity, I mean, of course, carnage.
I’ve been looking forward to this one.
See, I happen to know from past episodes of The Horror Show and his newsletter that Keene’s a fan of the western genre. It’s easy to see why; it’s a rich environment for a pulp storyteller - mythic, dangerous, gritty, a constant sense of peril and no safety nets to speak of. Twenty books into this journey, it’s pretty clear this genre ticks a ton of boxes for Keene. Add in a horror brief, and I was expecting a wild ride. I was very much not disappointed.
The tale opens with a gang of six outlaws (Tom, Henrik, Vernon, Eli and Clara, led by Morgan) making their way through Crazy Bear Valley, encountering a group of lumberjacks at work. Unfortunately for the working men, Morgan’s gang is on the run, desperate, and in need of somewhere to hold up, and that goes exactly how you’d expect. Keene’s in his element here, setting up the confrontation, the tension, even having Morgan set the men at their ease before opening fire. It’s great because it works on two levels; there’s a psychological realism to the killers trying to get their victims off guard, but of course it’s also dramatically satisfying, creating a moment of visceral shock as Morgan opens fire, sparking off a brief massacre.
The novella drips with atmosphere, with a real dirt-under-the-fingernails vibe that infuses the entire narrative. The gang is an unpleasant, amoral bunch, and the crimes that they are fleeing from give the reader (and maybe the author) permission to feel ambivalent or even gleeful about their eventual fate. At the same time, inevitably, Keene gives them enough humanity that I found myself anxious on their behalf when the fur inevitably started flying.
Before we get to that, honesty dictates that I address the sexual politics of the piece, although on that score I don’t have a huge amount to say. It transpires the lumberjacks were keeping a woman, Crystal, under essentially slave conditions, including raping her repeatedly. Her ‘rescue’ under the outlaws does lead to an unarguable improvement in her material conditions, in that she’s provided with clothing and fed better, and is no longer tied to a post in the centre of the room. On the other side, she’s still expected to provide sexual favours for that improved situation. Is that gross as fuck? Of course it is. It’s supposed to be. The outlaws are not good people. Moreover, it’s pretty clear that Morgan understands enough about psychology that he understands that the relative improvement in her situation is likely to inspire loyalty; it’s a calculated manipulation, in other words, of a piece with his vile, self-serving character.
I feel like there’s a lot that could be said here, in terms of unpacking the psychological impact of abuse, versions of Stockholm syndrome (which I understand is heavily contested, if not outright debunked), and of course the way more skilled abusers weaponise kindness alongside cruelty. But it’s not the central focus or concern of the piece, and frankly, I don’t want to. So, instead, I’ll note that this content is part of the story, it’s as gross as you’d expect it to be given the subject matter, it’s not presented in a way I found remotely prurient or titillating, and I thought it was both horrible, and entirely psychologically plausible, given the period and place. This is something about which reasonable people can and will disagree, and that’s fine too.
I do, however, want to talk about the cryptids.
In the afterword, Keene talks about his fascination with Bigfoot/Sasquatch, and how he was delighted with the chance to write a story with them. What I really enjoyed about the narrative was how the creatures themselves are shrouded in mystery for much of the story. Keene takes his time, establishing the characters and the setting of the cabin in the valley, and the creatures don’t even make an appearance until around the one-third mark. Even then, Keene uses the Spielberg shark technique; allowing glimpses, sounds, and (an advantage prose has over film) smell to build a very satisfying sense of tension. It’s a smart choice, in that it builds enough of an impression that when one of the gang inevitably shoots one of the creatures for meat, the level of foreboding is off the scale before we’re even treated to a close-up description.
There’s also a sense of inevitable doom to the proceedings, not a million miles away from what we talked about during Urban Gothic. Of course, these callous, vicious outlaws are going to kill one of the creatures, of course, they’re going to make the decision to stay overnight, and of course, the tribe of the murdered creature are going to return to get their revenge.
None of this is intended as a criticism in any way; it’s a strength of the narrative, baked into the bones of the Western. The knowledge of the contours of the story doesn’t serve to undermine the tension but exacerbates it; I felt that old familiar sick sense of dread as soon as Gunderson pulled the trigger. And Keene knows we know, luxuriating in allowing the tension to escalate for the reader as the disquiet and understanding gradually dawn on the outlaws.
The final siege is another action horror setpiece handled with typical cinematic energy and brio by Keene, the feeling of inevitable doom somehow making the raw violence and gunplay feel even worse in its desperate futility. I've said it before, and I’ll no doubt say it again; Keene is absolutely masterful at describing scenes of action and carnage; the prose flies along, the sights, sounds and smells come thick and fast, and throughout as the reader I felt like I had a crystal-clear grasp on the unfolding chaos. This kind of thing is incredibly difficult to do well, and, again, Keene does it as well as I’ve ever seen it done, and far better than most.
I also enjoyed the coda; the entire gang meeting their inevitable grizzly end, but Crystal as the lone survivor felt like a piece of rough natural justice, and the closing image of her allowing the river’s current to carry her out of the valley had a kind of poetic quality that I appreciated a great deal.
Overall, An Occurrence In Crazy Bear Valley ranks very high amongst the Keene novellas I’ve read so far; the western setting imbues the narrative with a sense of legend and mythology, and Keene does a great job in using that atmosphere to build a sense of tension and dread. Bad men, scary creatures, and an apocalyptic final shootout - what’s not to love?
Backing up the collection is Lost Canyon of the Damned, a longish short story featuring a band of survivors fleeing a zombie apocalypse (again in the Old West time period) and a mysterious hidden canyon. The canyon leads to a lost valley of the dinosaurs, similar to Doyle’s The Lost World, only using the canyon and surrounding mountains as the self-contained ecosystem in place of the plateau from that novel.
It’s a fun romp - the zombie plague in this era is called Hamlyn’s Revenge, and affects animals too, giving us first undead coyotes, and then, inevitably, zombie dinosaurs. And yes, it absolutely is as entertaining as that concept suggests. It’s also slight, and the story doesn’t so much end as stop. I enjoyed what I got a great deal, but the narrative felt like it had more space to run than the word count allowed for. I’m wondering if any of what’s going on in this tale will be revisited in The Lost Level series. Certainly, Keene has a flair for writing about, and a keen appreciation for, dinosaurs as well as Bigfoot (BigFeet?). The carnage here is, again, gleefully written, and all the better for it.
And that’s it for An Occurrence In Crazy Bear Valley. And if we were sticking with the strict chronology, we’d be getting into Clickers III next; however, I couldn’t resist spending some time with the author's Preferred Text of Terminal, which recently got released for the first time. So, with apologies to the purists, we’ll be tackling that one next. Looking forward to it.
KP
16/7/22
PRE-ORDER VOLUME 1 OF EXPLORING THE LABYRINTH NOW!
"Exploring The Labyrinth Volume One collects the first 30 essays in this series, and features an introduction by Eric LaRocca, and an intimate, exclusive, career spanning interview with Brian Keene.
Preorder now to get your copy on October 13th:Â http://mybook.to/KPETL
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LINKS TO WORKS BY BRIAN KEENE:
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BIO FOR KIT POWER:
Kit Power is an author of horror and dark crime fiction novels, novellas, and short stories, also a reviewer, essayist, and podcaster. The Finite, A Song For The End (BFA finalist, 2021), and Millionaire’s Day (BFA finalist, 2025) are his most recent fiction works; three novellas with interconnected elements that bring the apocalypse to his hometown of Milton Keynes in three very different ways. He encourages you not to read too much into that.
When he’s not gleefully visiting destruction on his hometown (fictionally), Kit writes non-fiction (much of which is collected in the two-volume My Life In Horror tomes, available wherever books are sold), reviews, blogs, and podcasts on subjects as diverse as Sherlock Holmes, Bruce Springsteen, and short horror fiction.
And if you enjoyed what you just read, please back his Patreon and buy his damn books, because the man needs to eat. Thanks.
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Find Kit at the below links:
Find his podcast feed at https://talkingrobocop.libsyn.com/
Find his Patreon (free membership gets you the newsletter, as little as a $1 a month gets something new every week) at: Kit Power | creating Blog posts, Podcasts, Reviews, and Stories long and sho | Patreon
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