Review: Decent Set Up for Future Volumes. Short-Story Length. Errors Abound.
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 12 10, 2012
Perkins' initial installment of Renewal plays opening act to what has yielded 10+ additional novellas. I'm new to the series and, having only read part one, I am not overly impressed as yet. This post-apocalyptic America takes what was expertly done already in William R. Forstchen's novel One Second After and gives it a bit of a toning down. The characters aren't quite fleshed out yet, so I'm really not sure how they'll progress, but I am confident that there won't be that many surprises. There is a wind of predictability, and Perkins seems a little too eager to hand-feed his audience. A little subtlety goes a long way, but is absent here. Terry is a bit less shocked than he should be, and a little too accepting of a magnificent paradise right up the road. Bill is a bit too amazing and cocksure for believability, as was his father before him. Yet, the little snippet of reading that it was has entertainment value, and it has me somewhat curious. I'll give the second installment a shot and see if I can be hooked into a third one. It must be mentioned that the errors are significant, glaring and continuous. In one single paragraph near the end of the story, we are treated to "They waved sent cheerful greetings" and "By now the sun high enough" and "with and occasional asphalt shingle." These kinds of editing mishaps are frequent and quite distracting. Beta readers would have helped shore up these mistakes and made this more enjoyable for the buyer.