David Morrell is an author who deserves more recognition. Best remembered for creating the character of John Rambo in his novel ‘First Blood’ I think modern readers may have the impression that he writes the kind of gung ho action typical of the later Rambo movies. In fact his work is much more subtle, tense and interesting than that.
‘The Totem’ is no exception, a dark, suspenseful horror novel about weird series of deaths in a small town. It pits a mismatched duo of typical 70s thriller stalwarts (a cop and a journalist) against an unknown horror that gradually ramps up and comes into focus as the book progresses. 
The book has a slightly fragmentary style, skipping rapidly between scenes that are sometimes no longer than half a page. This may in part be because this 70s version of the novel was a cut down one (Morrell published a much longer version years later), but it works, keeping the reader constantly off balance. It’s tense and compulsively readable stuff, with a very 70s sense of paranoia and uncertainty that works brilliantly.