Reviews

Directive 51 by John Barnes

kimlynn77's review

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ugh. too much jargon to be enjoyable.

jmoses's review

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3.0

Not quite what I expected, but interesting. I enjoyed the first half of the book more than the latter, but both halves were acceptable. Idk I have more thoughts about this but nothing coherent. I'll at least read the next one in the series.

zaphod46's review

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3.0

Sort of a sci-fi mash-up of [b:It Can't Happen Here|11371|It Can't Happen Here|Sinclair Lewis|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1309210011s/11371.jpg|1296784] and [b:Empire|7955|Empire|Orson Scott Card|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1312044905s/7955.jpg|1234312]. Decently engaging, but not spectacular.

tobinlopes's review

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4.0

Picked it up because I saw the second book on the featured shelves at the library. This is a good one. Real people. Good, flawed people working in untenable situations. It's not zombies. It might be better.

Recommended for anyone who likes scenario planning, apocalyptic tales, and disaster tales.

I gave it 8.5/10 on my personal scale.

-tpl

lyrrael's review

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3.0

You know, I really liked how this book started off. I was really itching for a good apocalypse -- let's burn this whole thing down! And we got into the book, and it was good. It all burned. Good riddance to civilization.

And then we got into constitutional politics. Honestly, truly, I love politics, and I think the political bodies that the country would break up into if our communications and transportation broke down would be interesting. I'm just..not all that interested in following it.

Read it for the first half. If you're into it, continue it for the second. I don't think I'll be reading further into the series because the majority of the BURN IT DOWN BURN IT ALL DOWN AHAHAHAHHAAH is already over. Darn.

echan's review against another edition

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hopeful mysterious tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

readerxxx's review

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4.0

Post apocalyptic fiction at its finest. I thought the story struggled at times in the political discussions, but the story kept me intrigued enough to finish it. The only reason that I didn't give it a 5 star review is that i felt that the author didn't do a great job of keeping the dialog associated with specific characters. I found myself having to reread sections that I was reading because I thought one character was speaking when in fact a different one was speaking.

csdaley's review

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3.0

This book was maddening. Some parts of it were really good. Others dragged on forever. The whole book had the feel of setting up the rest of the series. I will probably give the next one a chance but it won't get much of a chance. This felt like a near miss.

sling's review

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2.0

I liked the premise of this book but the execution was left a bit lacking. The story and action carried me halfway through this book but then I had to force my way through the rest.

It started to dawn on me that I constantly felt the author was cutting away right before the really interesting stuff was happening and returning after it had happened. It is not the author's fault that I don't like multiple story lines or the point of the view of the "mind of the killer". I kept imagining the author yelling "Cut!".

Some of the characterization was nice but a lot of the people seen close up for only a brief period were caricatures, rather than characters.

I really wanted to like this because, as I said, the premise is great, it's a series, and some of the characters were ones I'd like to follow. Unfortunately I won't be seeking out the rest of the series.

dlemos0313's review

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Even thought this book is a little to patriotic for my taste, I liked the story. I think the author should had spent a little more time describing the world after destruction, but that is just my opinion.