Review: Easy and engaging read which runs out of puff towards the end
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 03 10, 2014
Picks up where Book One leaves off.  Three Stars equals a Satisfactory rating with all the strengths of the first book carried over but with a discernible fall off in impact in the final third of the present work.Why I took two stars off:1. Zach develops more of a god-complex as though he's The One with all the answers to rebuilding civilization.  Some may approve.  (The ending where everyone goes round the table giving Zach the Big Stroke is so particularly cringeworthy it's almost satire.)2. A significant increase in the number of characters means that the overall story line begins to soften and bottom out from about half-way and becomes noticeably once-over-lightly in the final third of the book.  The final section of the book is very rushed and superficial as though a deadline was looming and the remaining word budget fast evaporating.3. The way all the nubile women are made to compete for Zach's sexual favors is overdone.  Interesting too how the author focuses on the male characters and stays generally away from developing (or projecting into) the females...a pity.4. Once the zeds and Bad Guys are out of the way and sustainable supplies are generally sorted there's actually little left to do except pad the story out with soap opera sidelines like finding Andie a partner and making lone trips across country and running into random survivors.  Interesting but not gripping...more could have been made of the "evolving" zeds.5. Rowdy is a complete joke.  A cartoon character who should never have been retained.  Irritating...really irritating.All of the above are personal carping peeves...of course.  However I think you'll find the central story does progressively droop as the author rolls out more and more extra characters.  This is a classic faux pas in zombie novels.  In my opinion the ideal number for an action yarn of this type is a core cast of four central characters...everyone else should be kept as dress extras.Setting aside the above criticisms, there's a lot to like in Z14 and it's an excellent value-for-money page turner.  You need to buy both books in order to follow the overall story.  Would I buy Book Three?  Yes,  No question.