Review: This is a real story-not a thinly disguised survivalist "How to survive the end of the world advice book".
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 03 24, 2013
This is a very well written story on several levels. Firstly; the spelling, punctuation and organisation, is at a professional level. Secondly; the characters are believable, and change as they experience new things. I cared what happened to them and I would very much like to read sequels (not only about the people left behind in the city, but also how they manage to turn a 'hobby farm' into enough to feed themselves).It is well worth reading.But one,suggestion for the author: The scene with the abdominal gunshot wound caused me to drop out of the story as its details are not plausible.You have them going to the doctor's house for the surgery.I'm the wife and mother of country doctors: we don't keep the equipment to do surgery at home; its not just the instruments, its the need for sterility. What we do have, is odds and ends of drug company samples, maybe a few antibiotics, very limited narcotics and an extensive first aid kit.There is a lot more equipment at the rooms, but not instruments for abdominal surgery and increasingly these days, not narcotics.You have the doctor removing the bullet from 'near her kidney'(my dh says one would need to open the abdomen to check and repair any tears to the organs in the gut) He says if they are unconscious from bloodloss, they'd probably die if one did the surgery and if you transfuse them- they wake up and have rigid abdominal muscles and you can't proceed. You wouldn't have the right surgical instruments at home and the infection risks would be dire.Also there is a need for lots of antibiotics and narcotics, where do they come from? As for the transfusion, it would work if the donor is higher than the recipient, but you'd have no way to monitor how much blood is exchanged. It would be better to use a tube with a tap and draw off into a syringe, then simply count the number of syringes filled...but one would have to be quick as the blood would clot.So may I suggest, change this part into a wound in a limb? As you can see this tiny scene was a problem for me, but this book and author have so much potential I have been inspired to write this review.