Carnosaur (novel)

A novel by Harry Adam Knight (a penname of Australian sf author John Brosnan, used for his schlockiest work), written in the 80's, some time prior to Jurassic Park. The novel's story is vastly different from the In Name Only Roger Corman film. In it, David Pascal in Cambridgeshire, England is trying to discover the causes of a recent rash of deaths. The local bigshot, Sir Darren Penward, who collects rare and exotic predators, insists it was a Siberian tiger that escaped from his private zoo. However the lone survivor of one of the attacks, a small boy, claims it was a dinosaur.

Pascal investigates further (mostly through wooing and ultimately sleeping with Penward's wife, Jane) and discovers Penward's scientists have cloned predatory dinosaurs for him to add to his collection. Inevitably the dinosaurs escape and wreak carnage throughout Cambridgeshire as the local police attempt to battle them.


 * Action Survivor: David and his girlfriend Jenny are really put through the ringer.
 * Aristocrats Are Evil: Penward.
 * Bad Guy Bar: Penward's goons frequent a rural British version of one.
 * Cassandra Truth: David Pascal.
 * Covers Always Lie: Tor released a movie tie-in version of the novel to coincide with Corman's film, whose cover, featuring the movie poster artwork, blurts, "In the Startling Tradition of Jurassic Park!"
 * The End - or Is It?:
 * Friend on the Force: Constable Keith Driscoll.
 * Hellish Copter
 * Infant Immortality: Both played straight and averted. Fiona gets killed but her brother Simon is rescued.
 * Intrepid Reporter: David Pascal, again.
 * Police Are Useless
 * Rich Bitch: Jane Penward.
 * Screw the Rules, I Have Money: Penward doesn't so much screw the rules as not even believe they exist in the first place.
 * Stock Dinosaurs: Subverted. Knight uses a Tarbosaurus instead of a T-rex as the novel's main threat.
 * Storming the Castle
 * Wouldn't Hurt a Child: Penward's goons opt not to kill Simon, the little boy that survived the third dinosaur attack, due to not liking the idea of killing a child, reasoning no one would believe him.
 * Penward himself Would Hurt a Child however, and plans to have the boy murdered.