Ursus

Once, North Hill was the commercial and social center of Piketon, a growing city in the Rocky Mountains. Now it''s a place of boarded-up stores and roaming gangs. Even deadlier predators are about to make their appearance.

When local residents start disappearing, the city''s ruling political elite blames wild dogs. A local zoologist has another theory, though -- about mutated bears, small in size but intelligent and immensely strong, that have come down from the mountains and hunt in packs. He joins with an aide to the mayor and a policewoman to hunt the animals.

As deaths mount, the city is gripped by fear and the elites used to running the city are beset by political panic. The mayor''s helplessness in the face of the mysterious predators threatens to expose the corruption, fraud, blackmail, and bribery that have run rampant in City Hall for years. The final bloody confrontation between man and beast, each simultaneously hunter and hunted, mirrors and finally decides the confrontation at the highest levels of city government.

"Lots of gore, a nicely controlled pace." - Kirkus Reviews

"Believably frightening." - Rocky Mountain News