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Die Asche Der Erde (2011)

by Eliot Pattison(Favorite Author)

3.41 of 5 Votes: 3

languge

English

genre

Mystery & Thriller

publisher

Aufbau

series

Hadrian Boone

review 1: BEWARE OF SPOILERS: I DON'T HIDE OR PROMOTE MY REVIEWS.The story's set somewhere on the southern "coast" of the Great Lakes. As my hometown is on one of the Great Lakes, I was flattered when the author, Eliot Pattison, identified the region. I also appreciated his author's note explaining that a spot on the Great Lakes would be advantageous for survival in a post-nuclear era, due to the supplies of water, fish, timber, forest life, farmworthy soil, naturally occurring minerals including coal, copper and oil, etc. (the Rockefeller oil dynasty started when a forefather started acquiring small oil operations around Cleveland).But the setting is not why I picked up the book, nor why I read it through.The author has thought up a number of reasonable propositions that could occu... morer among survivors of a nuclear blast or over-exposure in the U.S.: reversion to steam-era technology, re-formation of guilds representing basic trades (agriculture, milling, fishing, etc), slow establishing of small communities and trade relations; salvage of materials from formerly urban areas, once radiation levels have dropped to relative safety.I was touched by some of the more intangible ramifications that Pattison also proposes: suicidal children who think of the bygone era (which they never knew) as Paradise; rise of "Angel Polish," a fish-oil-based product for women to hide mottling of skin caused by mutations; bitter competition for rare salvage items; return of diseases that had, in the old world, practically been eradicated; reinvention of the manufacture of addictive drugs to soothe all the wearied souls; loss of faith in God accompanied by a rise in stature of the hard-to-come-by works of Shakespeare.As the subtitle indicates, the book contains a mystery. But to categorize this book as a mystery is to shortchange the powerful themes. The mystery at hand is just part and parcel of the challenge to continue living -- to seek morality and pleasure and justice -- when so many have lost so much.I never cared that the author chose not to detail precisely which agents set off which nuclear catastrophe where or why, giving rise to his post-apocalyptic America.
review 2: I don't know what I expected from this book but whatever it was, I did not get it. There was a murder mystery to be solved but it seemed to become a secondary plot in the story. The main story was about the rebuilding of society after a nuclear apocalypse only to have society break down again. "A Canticle for Liebowitz" was an excellent version of this theme. "Canticle for Liebowitz" made me gasp at the premise that we could again so easily destroy ourselves. In "Ashes of the Earth" I felt disappointment because of the multi-layers of corruption. less

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