An eerie vision of America’s future that deserves more complex characters and restrained prose.
This action-packed novel proves that dystopian thrillers aren’t just for tweens.
It’s the year 2020, two weeks after high-profile billionaire Sherman Gale’s suicide. Seven powerful men gather on Gale’s yacht, supervised by his beautiful, enigmatic daughter, Faith. Through a series of messages recorded by Gale before his demise, they learn that they have all been working with Gale on secret projects that will contribute to what Gale calls “The Plan.” After maneuvering Ralph Osborn, Gale’s preferred candidate for the presidency of the United States, into power, the seven financial, military, media and political leaders will commence Operation Fortress America. American military forces will be withdrawn from stations around the world only to surge through North and South America, lay claim to their land and citizens, and declare Christianity the official religion of the Americas. With the Internet nearly destroyed, a beloved presidential candidate assassinated, and Gale’s security forces—including millions of fanatical Christian Volunteer Corp. volunteers already rampaging across the country—stifling dissent, is there anyone who can stop Gale’s plan? Two renegade law enforcement agents hiding out might be the world’s only hope. Derrick Chu, a swaggering former FBI agent, and Audrey Kunitz, a CIA linguist, struggle to determine how to reboot the Internet, spread the word about Gale’s devious machinations, and prompt the American people to rise up against Gale’s cronies. Creative and current, Andison’s sequel to Death of the Republic (2011) is a quick, well-plotted read. Although the characters are thinly drawn types rather than authentic, quirky people, they do occasionally change allegiances in surprising ways, which keeps the reader interested. Sadly, the dialogue is not as engaging. Andison frequently includes long passages of unrealistic, unnecessary dialogue that slow the action without advancing the plot. And the action sequences are marred by derring-do that is more laughable than impressive. At one point, to get to a seemingly impenetrable building, a character is flung through the air “using only the force of large elastic bands pulled taught with a hand crank,” so that he can scale a wall wearing “a special jumpsuit made from a reflective gold, super friction-resistant fabric.”
An eerie vision of America’s future that deserves more complex characters and restrained prose.Pub Date: June 17, 2012
ISBN: 978-1475263190
Page Count: 332
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Even when King is not at his best, he’s still good.
Two killers are on the loose. Can they be stopped?
In this ambitious mystery, the prolific and popular King tells the story of a serial murderer who pledges, in a note to Buckeye City police, to kill “13 innocents and 1 guilty,” in order, we eventually learn, to avenge the death of a man who was framed and convicted for possession of child pornography and then killed in prison. At the same time, the author weaves in the efforts of another would-be murderer, a member of a violently abortion-opposing church who has been stalking a popular feminist author and women’s rights activist on a publicity tour. To tell these twin tales of murders done and intended, King summons some familiar characters, including private investigator Holly Gibney, whom readers may recall from previous novels. Gibney is enlisted to help Buckeye City police detective Izzy Jaynes try to identify and stop the serial killer, who has been murdering random unlucky citizens with chilling efficiency. She’s also been hired as a bodyguard for author and activist Kate McKay and her young assistant. The author succeeds in grabbing the reader’s interest and holding it throughout this page-turning tale of terror, which reads like a big-screen thriller. The action is well paced, the settings are vividly drawn, and King’s choice to focus on the real and deadly dangers of extremist thought is admirable. But the book is hamstrung by cliched characters, hackneyed dialogue (both spoken and internal), and motives that feel both convoluted and overly simplistic. King shines brightest when he gets to the heart of our darkest fears and desires, but here the dangers seem a bit cerebral. In his warning letter to the police, the serial killer wonders if his cryptic rationale to murder will make sense to others, concluding, “It does to me, and that is enough.” Is it enough? In another writer’s work, it might not be, but in King’s skilled hands, it probably is.
Even when King is not at his best, he’s still good.Pub Date: May 27, 2025
ISBN: 9781668089330
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2025
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
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