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thistlechaserBook #13: Horde by Ann Aguirre
Rating: 2/disliked (1/hated-5/loved)
When last I posted about this book, I described the scene where a man named Thornson gave his mortally wounded son a "quick" death by drowning.
I'm starting to think that man just likes killing people.
They come upon a woman mostly eaten by not-not-zombies (yes, a new class of creatures, different than the not-zombies, yet still zombie-like). The scene:
Then the woman, who was half devoured from the waist down, opened her eyes and whispered, "Kill me."
"Let me," [Thornson] said.
Then, nevermind that they all have guns and have been using them up to that point (so no worries about noise), he kills her with a hatchet:
...so he strode across the blood-smeared floor, and with a clean stroke of his hatchet, ended her misery.
Yeah, so. This book was a lot worse than the first two. There was way more lovey-dovey stuff between the two main teenage characters (or maybe I had less patience for it). One of them, Deuce, was unrealistically overpowered in this final book. The not-zombies are top-level predators, meant for hunting humans, yet 15 year old her repeatedly fights and beats four to five of them at a time. Not to mention wins over armies of men and whole towns to believe in her (and eventually saves the world).
The science is also questionable in an amusing way. One scientist kept a not-zombie to study, and made a vaccine:
"I can't make more without Timothy [the not-zombie] since it came from his reproductive glands."
Yes, Mr. Scientist, I'm sure you were playing with not-zombie balls to get the "vaccine" out.
Good points of the book:
- The rapist and his victim did not become a couple. He did die defending her (which was reasonable with the build up). I would have stopped reading if they had become a couple.
- It's finished. I skimmed the second half of it because I have much better books waiting. I agreed to review a book called Loki's Wolves (caught my attention because of the title), and David J. Normoyle The Treacherous Path just came out this morning. I'm dying to read Path, but I have to read Loki's Wolves first because that one has a deadline.
- The final section of the book is titled Terminus. That amused me, since that's a thing in The Walking Dead, too.
Too many things annoyed me about this book to list them all.
The author (and main character) was obsessed with a story: The Day Boy and the Night Girl, to the point where she quoted multiple pages in a row from it. She used it as opening quotes for the book as well as chapter headers -- I'd have been fine with that if the main character hadn't been equally obsessed with the story.
I'm a little sorry to not have read the last half of the book, it looks like it took some interesting turns, but there was just too much I didn't believe or didn't work for me.
I did email the author to ask why Thornson drowned his kid. I'll be interested to see if she writes back.
Next up: Loki's Wolves.
After that: The Treacherous Path.
After that:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
loupnoir's new book if it's out, and her first book if not (I'd really like to reread it before the second.)
Rating: 2/disliked (1/hated-5/loved)
When last I posted about this book, I described the scene where a man named Thornson gave his mortally wounded son a "quick" death by drowning.
I'm starting to think that man just likes killing people.
They come upon a woman mostly eaten by not-not-zombies (yes, a new class of creatures, different than the not-zombies, yet still zombie-like). The scene:
Then the woman, who was half devoured from the waist down, opened her eyes and whispered, "Kill me."
"Let me," [Thornson] said.
Then, nevermind that they all have guns and have been using them up to that point (so no worries about noise), he kills her with a hatchet:
...so he strode across the blood-smeared floor, and with a clean stroke of his hatchet, ended her misery.
Yeah, so. This book was a lot worse than the first two. There was way more lovey-dovey stuff between the two main teenage characters (or maybe I had less patience for it). One of them, Deuce, was unrealistically overpowered in this final book. The not-zombies are top-level predators, meant for hunting humans, yet 15 year old her repeatedly fights and beats four to five of them at a time. Not to mention wins over armies of men and whole towns to believe in her (and eventually saves the world).
The science is also questionable in an amusing way. One scientist kept a not-zombie to study, and made a vaccine:
"I can't make more without Timothy [the not-zombie] since it came from his reproductive glands."
Yes, Mr. Scientist, I'm sure you were playing with not-zombie balls to get the "vaccine" out.
Good points of the book:
- The rapist and his victim did not become a couple. He did die defending her (which was reasonable with the build up). I would have stopped reading if they had become a couple.
- It's finished. I skimmed the second half of it because I have much better books waiting. I agreed to review a book called Loki's Wolves (caught my attention because of the title), and David J. Normoyle The Treacherous Path just came out this morning. I'm dying to read Path, but I have to read Loki's Wolves first because that one has a deadline.
- The final section of the book is titled Terminus. That amused me, since that's a thing in The Walking Dead, too.
Too many things annoyed me about this book to list them all.
The author (and main character) was obsessed with a story: The Day Boy and the Night Girl, to the point where she quoted multiple pages in a row from it. She used it as opening quotes for the book as well as chapter headers -- I'd have been fine with that if the main character hadn't been equally obsessed with the story.
I'm a little sorry to not have read the last half of the book, it looks like it took some interesting turns, but there was just too much I didn't believe or didn't work for me.
I did email the author to ask why Thornson drowned his kid. I'll be interested to see if she writes back.
Next up: Loki's Wolves.
After that: The Treacherous Path.
After that:
loupnoir's new book if it's out, and her first book if not (I'd really like to reread it before the second.)
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no subject
Date: 2014-03-27 12:29 pm (UTC)I'm curious too. :)
Also, "half devoured from the waist down"?! She'd be long dead of hemorrhage and shock. Probably a quicker death than the kid who was so lovingly drowned. *shakes head*
no subject
Date: 2014-03-27 01:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-03-28 01:45 am (UTC)In summary, don't let me hold up your reading. I'm in one of my non-reading phases, which I find a little scary and sad, so let me enjoy your reviews as a sort of vicarious reading.
no subject
Date: 2014-03-28 02:07 am (UTC)That seems to happen in everything I enjoy. I guess sometimes we just need a break, even from things we like? That doesn't make sense, but seems to be the way of things.