City of the Dead by Brian Keene
This is the sequel to The Rising, one of the better zombie novels of the past few years. The Rising was an average book, with lots of borrowing from classic post apocalyptic tales. Especially McCammon’s Swan Song. Keene’s zombies are unique, in the fact that dead rise because they are being possessed by cross dimensional demon’s that were accidentally released in a failed science experiment. These zombies are relatively intelligent and able to work together. City of the Dead is an upgrade from the first book. The characters are more fleshed out, and less whiney. They’ve had the time to adjust to the new world, and are starting to figure things out. Keene takes the opportunity to look at human evil and human triumph in this tale, and expand the spiritual concepts the first book only hinted at.
Grade: B
Terminal by Brian Keene
Keene takes a shot at another clichéd story type here. That is the desperate but good man finds out he’s dying so he decides to rob a bank to leave something behind for his wife and kid. Pretty typical, but well executed with an interesting paranormal twist. Yet, what really stands out in this book is Keene’s portrayal of a dying man living within a dying Pennsylvania manufacturing town. He adequately captures the feeling of desperation and of dying dreams. At times the story utilizes some very overused literary tricks, but in the end you feel the pain of the main character, no matter how stupid he is.
Grade B
The Darkening by Chandler McGrew
With a name this corny, it has to be good! Right? Nah, not really. The book is an interesting psuedo-religious twist of the rapture theme (mass disappearances) with elements of secret society paranoia. The book starts out developing the two main characters that unknowingly are destined to save the world. There are some interesting religious themes developed here, but this is far from a christian book. While the characters are interesting and well thought out, the action scened get bogged down and confusing and the thrills and spills become a bit mundane. It’s worthwhile reading, and at times an interesting story, buit don’t expect great literature here.
Grade: C+
Symphony by Charles Grant
Another on my list of Post Apocalyptic tales, Symphony is the first book of a four part series dealing with the four horsemen of the apocalypse. While the characters are interesting, the story is filled with subplots and tangents that just go nowhere. The writer has a penchant for placing characters in interesting situation, then leaving you to assume you know what happened. Yet, at many times, you guessing, which is not good. Grant takes an interesting course with humanizing the horseman, this time War, but this was done much better in Gaimen and Pratchett’s Good Omens. Here, it basically humorless. The book’s ending is ambiguous at best, and while this may be OK for some series, here it just makes you want to avoid picking up the next installment.
Grade: C-
Time Storm by Gordon R. Dickson
I found this 70’s science fiction tale among the crowded stacks of of my favorite used book store. It’s theme of mass disappearance of humans due to a disruptions of time interesting, so I grabbed it thinking it would be nice light reading. Well, it’s far from light. Here Dickson takes us on a 70’s head trip of physics and philosophy. Ther first half of the book is a strong Post Apocalytic tale of a man, a teenage girl and a leopard traveling through a broken, disjointed land where Time Storms have switched large chucks or land with land of the past and the future, and where traveling Mistwalls threaten to displace the travelers themselves. The second part of the book is hard science fiction where the main character battles the very physical forces of nature which are causing these problems. In the end this book is a tale of love, and finding what’s inside a person by stepping out of their own body, and their comfort zones and looking at things in a way one would never conceived. Beware of some weird 70’s new-age corniness, but enjoy.
Grade: B+
Nature’s End by Whitley Strieber and James Kunetka
The writing team that brought you the classic Post Nuclear psuedo-autobiography Warday, team up again to tackle another potential disaster, this time it’s pollution gone wild. In this ecological disater tale, Strieber and Kunetka use some of the devices they used during Warday, particularly Government Reports, Newspaper Articles and witness interviews to give the feeling your reading a true story. Yet, unlike Warday, this not a “fake documentary” but a good, action filled story with so very well drawn characters. I’m not sure of the science behind the whole situation that the writers use, or whether this cautionary tale is even remotely likely, biut as a story, it works. Here they uses some classic science fiction themes reminiscent of Phillip K. Dick, and they do it well.
Grade B+
One Rainy Night by Richard Laymon
Blah… I don’t know why I keep reading Laymon. He has intriguing ideas, but then it basically turns into teenagers groping each other, an obsession with breasts, and people getting stabbed, shot, impaled, eaten and raped. If you like that kind of stuff, without anything deeper, go ahead. This is basically horror for horror’s sake, soulless and shallow.
Grade: D
One More Sunday by John D. MacDonald
Even if I found the Travis McGee series a bit trying at times, I always believed that the late John MacDonald was one of America’s finest mystery writers. Some of his stand alone books, especially Condominium and The Executioners (the novel Cape Fear was based on) were top notch action packed tales. In One More Sunday, MacDonald takes on a new target, the Mega-Church. While uncovering the sexual escapades, hypocrisy and financial misdeeds of his characters, he also paints a portrait of many good meaning and faithful people who truly have the best intentions, but get carried away in there execution. Religious figures can be easy targets, but MacDonald looks beyond the bad to show you both sides.
Grade: B
The Family Trade by Charles Stross
This is the first book In the Merchant Princes Series, and while the topic has been done before, a women from our world transplanted into a new world, Stross puts an interesting new spin on it. While many have compared this to Zelzaney’s Amber Chronicles, this is more in line with Donaldson’s Mordant’s Need series, except for our heroine here is not a neurotic women with no sense of self, but a competent and strong women who knows how to handle things on her own and doesn’t need some big strapping man to give her a sense of worth. Stross, typically a Science Fiction writer, invents one of the more interesting fantasy conundrums in recent history. He installs a sense of reality based ethics into a fantasy world, and maybe not intentionally, creates a interests counterpoint to many of the financial shenanigans we see in our modern world.
Grade: A-
I’m not sure if this covers everything I’ve read this summer, but it’s most of it. Right now, my To Be Read list includes Diary by Chuck Palahniuk, Magic Time by Marc Zicree and Barbara Hambly, Childhood’s End by Arthur C. Clark, and the second Frankenstein book by Dean Koontz. I was recommended The Time Travelor’s Wife by a few people, including Kim here, and I was able to snag that at Newtown Record and Books. Also, the sequel to S. M. Stirling’s Dies the Fire series The Protector War comes out on Sept. 6th, I’ll probably be reposting my review to Dies the Fire, in honor of that book, which appeared on another journal.
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