Review: Mixed feelings
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 08 11, 2011
For post-apocalyptic fiction, I think this is a fairly good story. It is a long novella-length work that spends a lot of time setting the stage for the second disaster which defines this book. Possibly too much. The premise that a virus that causes cancer is loose and will kill the majority of people on the planet within the next few months I found plausible. There are some grammar errors that need attention, such as turning the noun "hymn" into a verb. I guess one of the things that bothers me the most is that the main character, Martin, has plenty of warning that society is going to fall a part, yet it seems as if he lets events just kind of push him along for most of the book. He leaves the city to try and see his parents, but misses them at their rural beach house. Instead of hunkering down in a good location and laying in supplies or putting in a garden for food, he goes back to the city. Maybe if you are city born and bred it makes sense, but I just didn't understand why and had trouble sympathizing with the character as the story progressed. Still worth reading.