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At The End - A Post-apocalyptic Novel (The Road To Extinction, #1) (2012)

by John Hennessy(Favorite Author)

2.99 of 5 Votes: 4

languge

English

genre

Horror

publisher

Innovation Today Publishing

review 1: I thought this book had a lot of potential, but really feel like there were a lot of holes. I finally finished it last night, but honestly, I made it half way through the book with the daily thought of "It's going to get better." And then, by the time I was half done, I felt like I had to finish to justify the time I had invested. There were a lot of great ideas and I really liked some of the plot twists, but almost none were really explored or fleshed out. I thought it was strange that the main trio were all saved by aluminum foil but others survived too with only an explanation that the other survivors were left as a source of prey/training for the hunter "alions". Although it was an explanation for the others' survival, I felt it was a weak explanation thrown in to... more show why more than three people survived. The author also seems to rely a lot on future technology (e.g. neo-plastic) to save our heroes regularly. I think the book could have been improved by fleshing out some of the better ideas and explaining some of the things he only touched on (apparently the whole planet has asthma?). The characters were likeable, but I did get extremely tired of the constant jumping around of names and by 3/4 of the way through I mentally punched the characters in the face each time they said "bromigo". When I finished the book, I was notified that this book was book 1 in a trilogy (I overlooked that when I started). The book seemed to finish as well as can be expected and I am not quite sure where the author plans to go with a trilogy. I rarely enjoy trilogies but I am a big fan of dystopian fiction. I may check out the next book to see if any of the plot issues are resolved as I think the author has potential.
review 2: This was an okay story but not one I'll go back to or am overly interested in seeing a series develop from. The story is about a group of friends that have to deal with a world forever changed by the appearance of alien ships over their major cities & the disappearance of over 30million humans in a matter of days. The characters are not ones I felt any real connection with as they were somewhat 1 dimensional. Darrel, aka Jelly, is a wimpy, frightened young man waiting for death after his parents & most of the rest of his neighbourhood have disappeared suddenly in the nights previous. He hyperventilates and freaks out but comes thru in tough situations when he "has" to. Maggy, aka IQ, is the kick ass member of the group who has given her 2 best friends the rather mean/condescending nicknames of Jelly & Tortilla and is definitely the brains of the group. Tension arises when she chooses Felix over Darrel who has had a crush on her for years. Felix, aka Tortilla, the only "main" character we never get a pov chapter from, he seems to be there merely to cause tension when he comes between Darrel's crush on Maggy. The 3 manage to escape their neighborhood and begin to make their way to what they hope will be a safe place and encounter troubles along the way including encounters with other survivors & aliens and also meet new friends and allies. The part of this book that I felt was particularly strong was the author's sense of the near-future - a greener and more sustainable version of the present. His take on the technology along with the problems caused by the current pollution (almost everyone has asthma) is very realistic and he creates the scenery very deftly.The parts of this book I didn't quite go for were the characters that I never much liked and the amount of deus ex machina that it took to wrap the story up. There was simply too much coincidence involved for me to stay with this story as it unfolded. I thought the author did his best but in the end, while I finished the book and didn't hate the story, I don't have any desire to continue to read about these characters. I hope the author continues to write tho as I really do think he has an interesting voice when it comes to this genre. less

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