You had me at Jaws with wasps, and the killer cover didn’t hurt either. A simple premise paired with an outstanding design was enough to reel me straight into Meat Bees by Dane Erbach. It’s hard to exactly put a finger on what I love the most about this book; all I know is that it gives us super campy horror movie vibes and I am all for it.
By the time Scarlett Sutton arrives at her dad’s cabin in the Smoky Mountains, two locals have already been eaten alive by wasps. Of course, she doesn’t know this yet. All Scarlett knows is her mom finally checked herself into a hospital to take care of her mental health, leaving Scarlett alone with her dad all summer.
After he insists that she get a job, Scarlett accepts a position at nearby Stovetop Outfitters, hoping to spend as much time away from him as possible. She doesn’t expect to trip over a skeletonized corpse beneath the zip-line during one of her shifts—and definitely doesn’t expect to be thrown into a Netflix-style true crime investigation.
The local sheriff’s department is so overwhelmed by these unsolved deaths that when one of the Stovetop Outfitters employees disappears next, Scarlett and her co-workers set out to find him on their own. They discover something much more horrifying: a swarm of yellow jackets stripping the meat off his body. Scarlett never signed up to solve a disgusting mystery, but in order to protect her friends and family, she must defeat the mountain’s darkness and all these godforsaken wasps.
Using Jaws with wasps as a solicitation sets a pretty high bar, and while the story is not a direct retelling with a winged menace, it absolutely captures the intensity and tension when you watched Jaws for the first time. Erbach mixes true crime, mystery, horror and the supernatural to craft a terrifying tale that was hard to put down.
The biggest take away between something like Jaws and a book like Meat Bees is that, in real life, I can simply avoid the ocean where sharks are lurking. Wasps and hornets, however, are a lot harder to escape…especially when they are often in my own backyard. The constant, close-to-home possibility kept my fear level extremely high throughout, letting this story to sink in a bit more and give me chills while turning each page. Thankfully, I was able to read this book while in the dead of winter, when there isn’t a single bee, wasp, or hornet buzzing around, which made the experience just a little easier to stomach.
While the wasps were the truly frightening part of the story, where the plot eventually goes, and how it is all wrapped up, was completely unexpected. The tale takes a journey that took me by surprise in the best possible way. The story may not be perfect, but something about Erbach’s writing style and ability to capture my attention lead this book to be an easy read and a truly horrifying experience.
Each swarming kill by these meat bees is described with vivid, visceral detail, enough to make even the most veteran horror reader squirm. Erbach doesn’t shy away or pull any punches; these moments hit hard and linger. They are like bad car accidents where you want to look away but at the same time can’t take your eyes off the page.
Beyond the terrifying wasp attacks, the characterizations, relationships, and interactions felt authentic and well-written. For the entire first half of the book, it feels as if the story could be real. A protagonist who is not happy with having to visit her father in the Smoky Mountains was a relatable story that had me hooked.
Meat Bees by Dane Erbach is exactly the campy horror story I was hoping for. It delivers a terrifying story of swarming wasps and a supernatural element that kept me truly terrified from beginning to end. And the nod to Paramore? That alone would’ve been enough to keep me reading.
Meat Bees hits bookstores everywhere on August 4, 2026 from CLASH Books.
