Secrets of the Xenoscope is a horror novel that provides a rather... unusual take on the "dinosaur fiction" Sub-Genre. Instead of being revived via cloning, brought to the present with time travel, or found in a Lost World, the prehistoric animals in Secrets of the Xenoscope are actually undead spirits, and require a device— the titular Xenoscope— in order to be seen.
The story starts with the Marley family— father James, mother Susan, and sons Tyler and Matthew— going on a vacation in the Appalachian mountains of North Carolina, and staying in an old house that once belonged to reclusive collector of fossils named Gordon Sinclair. While exploring the house, Tyler stumbles across a device resembling a tiny telescope made out of stone. Looking through it, he realizes he is able to see the ghosts of extinct animals. In particular, he develops a close bond with a female Yi qi named Furcula, who was once a close friend of Sinclair.
Meanwhile, Gastrolith, a megalomaniacal Giganotosaurus, seeks to obtain the Xenoscope for himself. If the Xenoscope is destroyed, it will destroy all life currently on Earth, and bring the prehistoric animals visible through it back to life. The Marley family now have to stop Gastrolith, before he can destroy the Xenoscope and bring about a new age of dinosaurs.
There is also a sequel, titled Return Of The Xenoscope, which focuses on an entirely new cast, and relocates the setting to Palmetto Point, a beach resort on the coast of North Carolina. The sequel follows Dr. Stanley Blackwood, a paleontologist, who has discovered the remains of the Xenoscope and reconstructed it. In doing so, he crosses the path of an obsessive fisherman named Captain Joseph Tory, as well as a various Mesozoic sea reptiles that threaten Palmetto Point.
Finally, there is a third book, called Dawn Of The Xenoscope, which as its title suggests will focus on how the Xenoscope came to be and the true source of its powers. This book takes place in the future, fifty years after the events of the previous two, and yet again features an entirely new cast. In addition to featuring a much wider variety of extinct animals (including, for the first time in the series, prehistoric mammals such as mammoths and saber-toothed cats), it also involves prehistoric humans.
Tropes found in all the books:
- Always a Bigger Fish: Each of the three books contains at least one instance of this.
- In the first book a bear appears to menace the protagonists, only for it to be promptly killed by a Gorgosaurus.
- In the second book, the Shonisaurus is the Bigger Fish to everything else in Palmetto Point.
- In the third book, the Torosaurus that attacked the heroes previously is baited into fighting the T. rex trying to kill them.
- Animalistic Abomination: Most of the prehistoric animals count towards this to some degree, but special mention goes to Patagium the Quetzalcoatlus in the third book— a skeletal, half-decayed, eerily demonic-looking pterosaur.
- Animal Talk: The prehistoric animals have a language called "Saurian". Some, however, can speak English, and some humans can learn to speak Saurian. Prehistoric humans, like the ones in the third book, can't speak it naturally either, though other primates such as the Gigantopithecus can.
- Artistic License – Paleontology: While the author tries to stay accurate, a few cases of this slipped through the cracks.
- The Argentinosaurus are shown caring for their young, even though real sauropods probably didn't do that.
- The Eustreptospondylus is shown as an aquatic dinosaur, complete with webbed feet, and able to swim very fast underwater. In real life, Eustreptospondylus could probably swim, but it wasn't truly aquatic.
- The second book depicts Shonisaurus as essentially a prehistoric kaiju, a whale-sized super-predator capable of sinking boats, being much larger and more ferocious than the real animal. The Liopleurodon are also oversized, though not to the same degree as in Walking with Dinosaurs.
- The third book features a Koolasuchus that is able to move about quickly on land, despite the real animal being sluggish and mostly aquatic.
- The Australovenator in the third book are so different from the real animal that they approach Informed Species territory.
- Behemoth Battle: Each book has at least one— Giganotosaurus vs. Argentinosaurus in the prologue of the first book, Liopleurodon vs. Shonisaurus in the second, and Tyrannosaurus vs. Torosaurus in the third.
- Cosmic Horror Story: Has some traits of one. The protagonists learn a disturbing truth about how the universe works, the villain is utterly uncaring about humanity and regards humans with mere pragmatism at best, and the story ends with the villain stopped, but others like him are still out there and the surviving protagonists are declared insane.
- The third book takes the series fully in this direction. It turns out the Xenoscope is an Artifact of Doom created by a prehistoric civilization. Not only it is virtually impossible to permanently destroy, but it exerts a corrupting influence over anyone who uses it for too long.
- The Deep South: Takes place in rural North Carolina.
- Elite Zombie: Quite a few. The main villains, like Gastrolith the Giganotosaurus, Panthalassa the Liopleurodon, and Patagium the Quetzalcoatlus fall under the "Horde Master" category, being intelligent undead prehistoric animals who command armies of other creatures.
- Feathered Fiend: A whole bunch. The first book has a pack of Deinonychus as Gastrolith's minions, led by a female named Eon. A flock of equally fierce terror birds appears in the third book. The T. rex in the third book is scaly with a thin pelt of proto-feathers on its back and neck.
- Friendly Zombie: Furcula in the first book, Tethys in the second, and Kamchatka in the third.
- Gentle Giant Sauropod: The Argentinosaurus are the only prehistoric animals besides Furcula that aren't trying to kill the heroes. The Diplodocus in the third book are also harmless.
- Giant Flyer: Ichnite the Ornithocheirus in the first book, and Patagium in the third.
- Ghostly Animals: The dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals have traits of this.
- Goofy Feathered Dinosaur: Played straight with Furcula, but averted with the Deinonychus.
- Inspiration for the Work: All three books were inspired by pictures in The Mysteries of Harris Burdick.
- Invisible Monsters: Any time the Xenoscope isn't being used, the prehistoric animals aren't visible.
- Karmic Death: Quite a few of the nastier humans get what's coming to them. In the first book, James Marley is torn apart by a pair of young Allosaurus. Captain Tory in the sequel is killed by a plesiosaur, and Percival McKnight II in the third book is Dragged Off to Hell by the destruction of the Xenoscope.
- Land, Sea, Sky: The three books have this sort of motif with their respective villains. Gastrolith is a terrestrial dinosaur (land), Panthalassa is a Liopleurodon (sea), and Patagium is a pterosaur (sky). The heroes' prehistoric allies also count— Furcula is a Yi (sky), Tethys is an ichthyosaur (sea), and Kamchatka is a woolly mammoth (land).
- Mauve Shirt: Quite a few chapters are devoted to people other than the main characters, showing them going about their day before getting killed by dinosaurs.
- No Name Given: Many of the prehistoric animals don't get individual names, especially if they only speak Saurian.
- Non-Human Undead: What the various prehistoric animals are.
- Prehistoric Monster: Almost all of the prehistoric animals are aggressive predators or territorial herbivores, who seem driven to kill any human they see.
- Raising the Steaks: What Gastrolith plans to do in the first book, and what Patagium succeeds at doing in the third.
- Revenant Zombie: The prehistoric animals are basically this. They look and act much as they did in life, and are able to physically interact with the living. Most of them seem driven by mere instinct of what they did when they were alive, but others show the ability to think and reason.
- Ridiculously Alive Undead: The prehistoric animals all fall into this, at least insofar as they are capable of killing and "eating" living prey.
- Sequel Escalation: The first book is about undead dinosaurs in a house in the Appalachians. The second ups the ante by introducing Mesozoic sea reptiles, and expands the carnage to a whole beach resort. The third has the entire world in peril, introduces an Ancient Conspiracy, and takes the story into full Cosmic Horror territory.
- Shout-Out: Quite a few references to other dinosaur-related works are sprinkled throughout the story.
- In the prologue, Gastrolith's battle with a parent Argentinosaurus is similar to that between Littlefoot's mother and the Sharptooth in The Land Before Time. James also indirectly mentions The Land Before Time when scoffing at Furcula's name.
- The series as a whole contains a number of creatures that made their pop-culture debuts in, or are closely associated with, the Walking with… franchise. Many are also described as having similar colors and markings to their Walking With. . . counterparts. In particular, most of the marine animals in the second book are taken from Sea Monsters.
- There are also a number of references to Primeval. In the second book, the Rhamphorhynchus flock act very much like the show's Anurognathus, as does the scene where a Hesperornis stabs a man to death. A gorgonopsid very similar to the one in Primeval also appears in the third book.
- Gastrolith's design is very similar to the Corrupted Giga from ARK: Survival Evolved.
- The central premise, a device that allows its users to view prehistoric animals, resembles that of Willis O'Brien's lost film The Ghost Of Slumber Mountain.
- The battle between Susan and the adult Allosaurus is like the climax of Carnosaur, where a construction machine is used against a dinosaur.
- The Australovenator in the third book look and act very much like the Night Feeder from Primal (2019).
- As far as non-dinosaur-related shout-outs go, the recurring Torosaurus and Tyrannosaurus in the third book are nicknamed "Ripley" and "Rambo" by the protagonists.
- Conspicuously absent, however, is any sort of reference to the Jurassic Park franchise. According to the author, this is because he felt that doing so would make it harder for the work to be taken seriously and not be seen as a parody.
- Theme Naming: All of the prehistoric animals have paleontology-related names. A gastrolith is a "stomach stone" found in the skeletons of some dinosaurs, an ichnite is a fossilized footprint, the two Deinonychus Epoch and Eon are named after units of geological time, and a furcula is another word for the wishbone of birds and theropods. Panthalassa was the giant ocean that surrounded Pangaea. Also, the respective protagonists of the books are named Sue
, Stan, and Jane. - Tome of Eldritch Lore: The manual to the Xenoscope. It contains instructions that, if followed, could potentially lead to The End of the World as We Know It, and is a compendium of ancient otherworldly spirits whose very existence defies the known laws of science.
- Undead Fossils: If the Xenoscope is destroyed improperly, all fossil life forms will be brought back to life, and everything currently living will be killed.
- Villain-Based Franchise: With the Xenoscope itself as the "villain". Each book focuses on a completely new set of human and animal characters, with the Xenoscope being the only thing linking them.
Tropes found only in the first book:
- A Boy and His X: Tyler and Furcula become A Boy And His Undead Dinosaur.
- Action Mom: Susan becomes a full-fledged example of this by the end.
- Bastard Understudy: Ichnite is this to Gastrolith.
- Bears Are Bad News: Subverted. A bear shows up to threaten the heroes as they try to escape through the forest, only to be unceremoniously killed by a Gorgosaurus.
- Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: Ichnite is more than happy to betray those who are no longer any use to him. It comes back to bite him when he betrays Gastrolith.
- Co-Dragons: Gastrolith has two— Eon the Deinonychus and Ichnite the Ornithochierus. Eon is loyal to him (albeit in a Yandere sort of way), while Ichnite is absolutely not.
- Construction Vehicle Rampage: The final showdown takes place in a quarry, and during it Susan manages to commandeer a backhoe and use it against the female Allosaurus.
- Cruel and Unusual Death: James's fate, being torn apart chunk by chunk by a pair of Allosaurus hatchlings, taking hours to finally die.
- Dirty Coward: James. He allies himself with Gastrolith mostly to save his own skin. He almost snaps out of it at the end when he realizes that Gastrolith's plans will result in the death of his family, but it's too late, and Gastrolith has him killed.
- Distant Prologue: The prologue takes place in the Cretaceous period, 97 million years ago.
- Face–Heel Turn: James only ever wants to protect his family, but is tricked by Gastrolith into helping him destroy the Xenoscope. By the end of the story, he's an irredeemable psychopath.
- Facial Horror: Aside from being as decayed as the rest of his body, Gastrolith's face is missing its right eye.
- Gorn: Other than Furcula, who's too cute to be scary, the prehistoric animals' bodies have all been in various states of undead decay for millions of years, with most of them missing large chunks of skin, flesh, and bone.
- Herbivores Are Friendly: Played straight by the Argentinosaurus that the heroes encounter, but averted by Gastrolith's Ankylosaurus thug.
- Kids Love Dinosaurs: Tyler is dinosaur-obsessed almost to a fault, something that causes his father no end of frustration. Matthew is interested in them too, but not to the same extent.
- More Teeth than the Osmond Family: The Deinonychus have tongues covered in spiky teeth that can burrow into flesh.
- One-Scene Wonder: The Gorgosaurus and the Eustreptospondylus only show up for a single scene each.
- Police Are Useless: They fail to investigate at first when dinosaurs start rampaging, and when they do appear, they get killed quickly.
- Raptor Attack: Averted. Deinonychus appears throughout the story, but it is correctly shown with feathers.
- Ridiculously Cute Critter: Furcula is adorable!
- The Quisling: James becomes this, aiding Gastrolith in exchange for (supposedly) his family's safety.
- Sewer Gator: When the kids try to escape from the Sinclair mansion through an underground tunnel, they worry about alligators. It turns out there's something even worse down there— a Eustreptospondylus.
- The Starscream: Ichnite, who plans to betray Gastrolith after obtaining the Xenoscope.
- Supernatural-Proof Father: Inverted— James is the first adult to become aware of the Xenoscope and its abilities.
- These Are Things Man Was Not Meant to Know: The reason Dr. Sinclair hid the Xenoscope and its manual.
- Tough Armored Dinosaur: Gastrolith has an Ankylosaurus in his army that he uses as a battering ram.
- Uncanny Valley: The Deinonychus seem to have this sort of effect on anyone who see them, since they look so much like birds that the differences— teeth, long tails, and clawed hands— become disturbing. Several characters compare them to giant, toothy vultures.
- What Measure Is a Non-Cute?: Furcula is an adorable, fluffy Yi, and not coincidentally the only named dinosaur who isn't a violent monster. The Deinonychus also have feathers, but they're anything but cute. The other named prehistoric creatures— Gastrolith and Ichnite— are even further on the "non-cute" side.
- You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Gastrolith pulls this on James at the climax. Ichnite likewise attempts to do this to Gastrolith, with much less successful results.
Tropes found in the second book:
- Actionized Sequel: While the original was more of a horror story that happened to involve dinosaurs, the sequel has more of an adventurous air about it.
- Adventurer Archaeologist: Stan is more or less an Adventurer Paleontologist, having discovered the remains of the Xenoscope on one of his expeditions. He does do plenty of academic work, but spends a lot time traveling to exotic places to look for fossils.
- Animal Jingoism: A Rhamphorhynchus carries on the grand tradition of pterosaurs being attacked by marine reptiles, courtesy of a Liopleurodon.
- Animal Nemesis: Captain Tory, the fisherman the heroes befriend, is missing one leg thanks to Panthalassa, and he is obsessed with hunting her down.
- Buffy Speak: Beth's boyfriend, Hayden, has quite a bit of trouble pronouncing scientific names, and ends up coming up with his own versions, like "Flipper" for Ophthalmosaurus.
- Contrasting Sequel Main Character: James, the father character in the first book, couldn't care less about fossils, while his kids are dinosaur enthusiasts. Stan, on the other hand, is a paleontologist himself, and his daughter Beth thinks his work is boring.
- Cool Boat: Captain Tory's tricked-out two-mast fishing boat, the Salty Lady.
- Dinosaurs Are Dragons: The Tanystropheus is shown with a fleshy crest on its back and catfish-like barbels, giving it a dragon-like appearance.
- The Dreaded: The Shonisaurus. Everything else in the ocean, including Panthalassa— a Liopleurodon— is terrified of him, and his mere presence is enough to send the other sea reptiles fleeing.
- Evil Egg Eater: Hallux, a Struthiomimus, is introduced trying to steal Stan's fossilized dinosaur egg, and is established as a sleazy, morally repugnant backstabber.
- Father Neptune: Captain Tory.
- Friendly, Playful Dolphin: Not an actual dolphin, but Tethys the Ophthalmosaurus certainly fills all the stereotypes associated with them.
- Genre Shift: Like its predecessor, Return of the Xenoscope is still essentially a horror novel about undead prehistoric animals, but the action mostly takes place at sea and it heavily involves Mesozoic marine life, giving it more of a Jaws feel.
- Handicapped Badass: Captain Tory.
- Hazardous Water: The ocean near Palmetto Point essentially becomes a slaughterhouse thanks to the prehistoric predators in it.
- Moby Schtick: Captain Tory is a clear Expy of Captain Ahab, and he is obsessed with hunting down a giant Liopleurodon.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Luring the Shonisaurus away from the beach results in Panthalassa's army of sea reptiles running rampant.
- Only Sane Man: Kevin, Captain Tory's first mate. He's the only one who doesn't want to hunt for the "monster" that bit off Tory's leg, and insists that he stay on shore. He ends up getting killed by Panthalassa.
- Papa Wolf: Stan is, for better or worse, very protective of his daughter, which eventually comes back to bite him when it ends up getting in the way of stopping Panthalassa.
- Plot-Irrelevant Villain: The Ramphorhynchus. They don't have much to do with the main villains, and mostly just serve as dangerous obstacles.
- Revenge of the Sequel: It's called Return Of The Xenoscope.
- Sea Monster: In multiple different flavors! The waters around Palmetto Point are home to plesiosaurs, ichthyosaurs, pliosaurs, and pretty much every prehistoric sea creature you can think of.
- Surfer Dude: Hayden.
- Trophy Room: Captain Tory's house is filled with trophies from his fishing exploits. He has a special spot cleared over his fireplace for the head of the "monster" that bit his leg off.
- Would Hurt a Child: When Beth arrives to save her father, Tory draws a gun on her, and would have shot her had Panthalassa not capsized the boat.
- Zerg Rush: A Rhamphorhynchus flock attacks a party boat this way.
Tropes found in the third book:
- Air-Vent Passageway: The protagonists try to escape from the AeroSEC compound through one of these, only to be ambushed by the Australovenator.
- All Cavemen Were Neanderthals: Averted, at least in the stereotypical sense. The Neanderthals who show up in the third book look not so different from modern humans
- Amphibian at Large: Koolasuchus appears, and is described as a "newt from hell" the size of a crocodile.
- Atlantis: The civilization that invented the Xenoscope is implied to have given rise to legends of lost civilizations such as Atlantis, Lemuria, and Mu. It's also implied, though not stated, that they were their own Human Subspecies distinct from both modern humans and Neanderthals.
- Back for the Finale: Tyler Marley from the first book returns in this one, as an adult paleontologist.
- Black Speech: The Xenoscope's creators spoke a language with no close modern equivalent. Using it is the only way to destroy the Xenoscope permanently.
- Chupacabra: When a flock of Coelophysis attacks a ranch and kills several of the cattle there, the attacks are blamed on the Chupacabra.
- Corporate Conspiracy: While the last two books focused on the danger posed by the various prehistoric beasts themselves, the third focuses on one of these.
- Corrupt Corporate Executive: Percival McKnight II, the CEO of AeroSEC, who sees seeks to weaponize the mystical forces the Xenoscope uses.
- Cosmic Horror Reveal: While the first two books were Lovecraft Lite, the third embraces its Cosmic Horror traits and runs with them.
- Doing in the Scientist: The previous two books danced around the question of whether the Xenoscope was truly supernatural, or whether it was simply science we had no understanding of. The third book establishes that it is, in fact, supernatural.
- Eldritch Abomination: The Xenoscope's creators apparently worshipped an entity called "The One Within", and claim it was responsible for the Xenoscope's powers. If what we see of them is any indication, it was surely one of these.
- Gladiator Games: In a flashback, a group of Neanderthal warriors ( one of which goes on to become a main character) is captured by the civilization that created the Xenoscope, and forced into this. Their opponent? An undead Tyrannosaurus, summoned by the Xenoscope.
- Greater-Scope Villain: The One Within, the evil deity worshipped by the Xenoscope's creators, who is responsible for all the events of the series..
- Hellish Copter: AeroSEC has quite a few helicopters at their disposal, but their efforts to use them against the dinosaurs don't end well.
- Honorable Elephant: Kamchatka, the matriarch of a woolly mammoth herd, fits this trope perfectly. She does, however, have a deep distrust of humans due to the fact she was killed by them, but is willing to help the heroes.
- Magic Is a Monster Magnet: It's established that the Xenoscope itself tends to draw prehistoric animals to it from far and wide. This was foreshadowed in the first two books, with animals from various places and times all attacking the heroes.
- Magitek: AeroSEC ultimately hopes to produce this, using the Xenoscope as a guide. Unfortunately, they're far out of their league when it comes to dealing with the forces that control it.
- No One Sees the Boss: Unlike Gastrolith or Panthalassa, the true identity of Patagium, the self-proclaimed "servant" of The One Within, is kept a mystery for most of the story. Only at the climax is he revealed to be a monstrous, demonic Quetzalcoatlus.
- Nothing Is Scarier: The Australovenator, full stop. At first, the characters don't even know what they are, only that they hide in the shadows and slice their victims in two with their massive claws. Even when they do get a good idea of what they are, they never get a good look at them.
- Outside-Context Problem: For the three Neanderthal hunters in the flashback, being captured by a civilization far more advanced than themselves— one that can perform actual magic— and forced to fight an undead T. rex qualifies as this.
- Panthera Awesome: A Smilodon is the first prehistoric mammal Jane and her friends encounter.
- Science Hero: Geologist Jane Epps.
- Temper-Ceratops: "Ripley", an aggressive and borderline sadistic Torosaurus who attacks the heroes several times. Ironically, she ends up saving their lives when she's tricked into goring a T. rex that also has its sights on them.
- The Unfought: The One Within is never truly defeated by the heroes. The most they can do is permanently destroy the Xenoscope so its power can no longer affect the world of the living.
- Xenomorph Xerox: Downplayed. While they're still clearly dinosaurs, the Australovenator owe a lot of their traits to this idea, with their dark color, their uncanny ability to hide, their massive claws, and their ability to climb up vertical walls and through narrow spaces.
