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timinbc's review against another edition
2.0
There are chunks of this book that are quite good, and some interesting ideas are presented. But there are just so many things wrong with this book.
I don't care if Barnes is a right-winger. He doesn't try to hide it and it has a minor effect on the overall story.
Comments follow, Loaded with spoilers, you were warned.
Shaunsen. Wow. Anticipating Trump by five years, Barnes produces a total wacko who slithers into the presidency. But really, he was just so silly I laughed several times. Jar Jar Shaunsen.
So here's the problem. Barnes needs a crisis so he can set up a discussion about Directive 51. Fair enough. What does he give us?
First, a couple of million soft-headed Democratic Internet hippies all fall for a giant collection of memes. They share techniques on how to destroy civilization. Somehow they form a network of nodes, and agree that on date X we'll Bring Down The Man. This meme system is so powerful that not one single person even thinks "WTF, this might not end well." And outside the system, not one person notices that sales of Liquid PlumR must have gone up about a million percent in a few months. Let's think for a moment just how BIG the USA is, and how many people it would take, each making a local impact, to bring down most of civilization. Let's not think about whether this also happened in the rest of the world. But not ONE person outside the Daybreaker set ever noticed anything odd. Not ONE Daybreaker ever went "oops, aarggh!" with their Stuff. No one's mom ecer said, "Jimmy, whatcha doing down there 'n' why's it smell so bad?"
Anyway, let's suppose we're past that. The USA (maybe the world) is in trouble. But not enough for Barnes's plot. So, in 2024, just 14 years after the book appeared and maybe 15 after it was written, we have people all over the world who can quietly assemble ginormous fusion bombs - in a world that's falling apart because of the hippie goo. And boom. There. NOW we can discuss Directive 51.
Not enough? OK, let's have a big rock fall from the sky, and some EMP pulses. Whoa! Whodunit? Someone asks that. The answer is "robot bases on the Moon" and the bigwigs in the room are all "oh yeah, huh, so what's for lunch?" Later on they test a hypothesis about the pulsemaker, and discover that the pulses didn't come from Earth (and imply that it wasn't the Moon either). Again, everyone's "huh, well, staple my shoes and call me a slowpoke. More coffee?"
Then it's all trains and horses and raids. I expected zeppelins at any moment. Instead I got dreary meetings and philosophy - necessary to the plot but dull nonetheless.
I really liked the part where they tied a message to a kite and had it picked up
No discussion yet of how Daybreak managed to zombify the critical faculties of millions while not at all impairing their ability to do things. A simple reference to the FoodBabe and Dr. Oz and a couple of homeopathy and anti-vaxxer and Obama-birther sites would have sufficed. This part of the book is ridiculous except it isn't because it's happening in real life.
Anyway, I was disappointed in how much resolution of plotlines was left for the next volume. It's enough to make me think there will be a volume 3, and maybe 4, and ... sigh.
So - a good idea for a book overall; good storytelling at the micro level, but way too much handwaving at the macro level to set it all up. I wish I'd read something else instead.
I don't care if Barnes is a right-winger. He doesn't try to hide it and it has a minor effect on the overall story.
Comments follow, Loaded with spoilers, you were warned.
Shaunsen. Wow. Anticipating Trump by five years, Barnes produces a total wacko who slithers into the presidency. But really, he was just so silly I laughed several times. Jar Jar Shaunsen.
So here's the problem. Barnes needs a crisis so he can set up a discussion about Directive 51. Fair enough. What does he give us?
First, a couple of million soft-headed Democratic Internet hippies all fall for a giant collection of memes. They share techniques on how to destroy civilization. Somehow they form a network of nodes, and agree that on date X we'll Bring Down The Man. This meme system is so powerful that not one single person even thinks "WTF, this might not end well." And outside the system, not one person notices that sales of Liquid PlumR must have gone up about a million percent in a few months. Let's think for a moment just how BIG the USA is, and how many people it would take, each making a local impact, to bring down most of civilization. Let's not think about whether this also happened in the rest of the world. But not ONE person outside the Daybreaker set ever noticed anything odd. Not ONE Daybreaker ever went "oops, aarggh!" with their Stuff. No one's mom ecer said, "Jimmy, whatcha doing down there 'n' why's it smell so bad?"
Anyway, let's suppose we're past that. The USA (maybe the world) is in trouble. But not enough for Barnes's plot. So, in 2024, just 14 years after the book appeared and maybe 15 after it was written, we have people all over the world who can quietly assemble ginormous fusion bombs - in a world that's falling apart because of the hippie goo. And boom. There. NOW we can discuss Directive 51.
Not enough? OK, let's have a big rock fall from the sky, and some EMP pulses. Whoa! Whodunit? Someone asks that. The answer is "robot bases on the Moon" and the bigwigs in the room are all "oh yeah, huh, so what's for lunch?" Later on they test a hypothesis about the pulsemaker, and discover that the pulses didn't come from Earth (and imply that it wasn't the Moon either). Again, everyone's "huh, well, staple my shoes and call me a slowpoke. More coffee?"
Then it's all trains and horses and raids. I expected zeppelins at any moment. Instead I got dreary meetings and philosophy - necessary to the plot but dull nonetheless.
I really liked the part where they tied a message to a kite and had it picked up
No discussion yet of how Daybreak managed to zombify the critical faculties of millions while not at all impairing their ability to do things. A simple reference to the FoodBabe and Dr. Oz and a couple of homeopathy and anti-vaxxer and Obama-birther sites would have sufficed. This part of the book is ridiculous except it isn't because it's happening in real life.
Anyway, I was disappointed in how much resolution of plotlines was left for the next volume. It's enough to make me think there will be a volume 3, and maybe 4, and ... sigh.
So - a good idea for a book overall; good storytelling at the micro level, but way too much handwaving at the macro level to set it all up. I wish I'd read something else instead.
jmoses's review against another edition
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 against another edition
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 against another edition
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
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 against another edition
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.
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
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 against another edition
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 against another edition
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 against another edition
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.
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.