The book itself is an oversized (5 1/4 inch X 8 1/4 inch) paperback. The copy I purchased had a printing problem that had pages 49-80 printed twice, but otherwise was of good quality. The cover is a nice colour piece by Chris Appel, while there are numerous black and white illustrations by Richard Pollard spread throughout the book featuring some of the main characters of the story.
The story is set on the colony world called Banshee, named after the howling winds that blow across its surface. Humans had come to Banshee decades earlier through a transport device known as "The Tunnel". The earlier pioneers discovered that Banshee held an abundance of a valuable substance known as "ghost rock", which led to a flood of settlers hoping to make their riches. For those unfamiliar with the Deadlands setting, ghost rock is a supernatural substance first discovered back in the Weird West in the late 1800's and whose properties allowed for the development of "mad science" devices. Eventually, tensions between nations of Earth led to The Last War which devastated the planet and caused The Tunnel to shut down in 2081, leaving Banshee a "lost colony".
Banshee itself was not without its share of problems. When the pioneers first settled on Banshee, they discovered an indigenous race known as the Anouk, a purple-skinned tribal people with a strong connection to the land. Conflicts arose between the settlers seeking ghost rock and the Anouks protecting their lands, which soon escalated between to an all-out war between various Anouk tribes, the Reapers (a group of Earthers siding with the Anouks) and UN-EXFOR (the United Nations Expeditionary Force). In the middle of it all were the Colonial Rangers, the lawmen of the Way-out West who simply tried to keep the peace. EXFOR had led a nearly genocidal campaign against the Anouks, but near the end of the Last War the majority of the military force had been recalled back to Earth, leaving the colonists and Colonial Rangers to deal with the Anouks. Shortly after The Tunnel stopped functioning, a devastating Worldstorm covered Banshee, effectively putting the war on hold for thirteen years.
Enter the main character, Colonial Ranger Debbi Dallas (yes, the name is explained in the story). Debbi is stationed in Temptation, the largest of the human settlements on Banshee. There, Debbi and the rest of the Colonial Rangers and their allies deal with the many problems that follow in the wake of the Worldstorm, from a renewed Reaper menace to fearful enemies holding dark supernatural powers.
Overall, the book is an enjoyable read. The characters are fairly well developed, and the authors manage to tell a good pulp story of horror and heroics on an alien world. One of the dangers of novels based on game settings is that sometimes it is difficult to get away from the game mechanics in order to tell a story. In Banshee Screams, this is not the case; Clay and Susan Griffith manage to tell an engaging story that makes the most of the rich background of the Deadlands setting. I'd recommend this book to anyone who plans to run a Lost Colony game or anyone who simply likes some well-written pulp sci-fi/horror.
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