I have a been a busy webmaster for the last two months.
First updating the Naomi Novik website for her new book release, Tongues of Serpents. Then redesigning and updating the Terry Brooks website for his new book release, Bearers of the Black Staff.
And here I am, working on Labor Day. The nerve!
Anyway, one of the new additions I’ve installed on Terry’s website is the ability to follow his reviews on Goodreads. He gets asked what he’s reading all of the time—on the road, in online chats, on Ask Terry, and on Facebook—and we thought it would be a great thing to start posting what he’s reading along with his reviews.
First up is a book I have yet to read, but both Terry and his wife Judine are yammering at me to get on it so we can all talk about it.
The book in question? The Passage by Justin Cronin.
Here is Terry’s review:
“Even thought I am not a fan of vampire books in general, I am going to give a strong recommendation to THE PASSAGE by Justin Cronin. It is a big book with lots of characters and a bunch of plotlines, and it is absolutely riveting. I know you’ve heard this before, but I could not put it down. This book reminds me of The Stand by Stephen King. It is a sprawling, end-of-the-world type of tale in which a small group of Humans have been genetically altered by a clandestine branch of the US Government to create a sort of all purpose soldier of the future but end up as creatures which infect or kill virtually the entire population of the world.
This is Mr. Cronin’s first long work of fiction, and I think he has found a home. Two more in this series are promised, and I will be first in line to read them. He has done things with time sequence and characterization which are unexpected and compelling. I don’t want to say any more because you won’t like it if I give anything away. But there is much to discuss, and I think you will be doing so with others who read the book.
Ever wonder what it would be like if the entire world was populated by vampires and only a few Humans remained to stand against them? Neither did I, but I do now. Give this book a read. You won’t regret it.”
There you have it. The first Goodreads review by Terry Brooks. Terry is fairly discriminatory when it comes to what he reads and what he lauds, so it’s safe to say that The Passage is a great book.
And now I have to go find out for myself. Hope you do too!
Until next month!
I have read The Passage, and I agree with Terry 99.9%. There are interesting plots turns and new characters arriving as old characters leave (perhaps only for a while). However, I was bothered by an event near the end of the book that is explained in a mystical way (don’t want to say more, in order not to spoil the story for others). I am hoping a better explanation will occur in the second book (which is coming out when?), but I have my doubts. Oh well, one minor odd note in a complex great novel — the rest is a great read.
I recommend The Passage to everyone who asks me for a good recent book recommendation, no matter if they love sci-fi fantasy or not. The vampire/virus stuff is super cool of course, but overall it’s just an incredibly well-written, literary epic of a novel. You get totally sucked in to the different sets of characters and their plights. I can’t wait for the next book in the series to find out what happens.
I like the cover; winter forest draw me in and since Terry recommends it, I’ll have to check it out after I’m done reading the Bright Empires: The Skin Map. That comes first so I can yammer with Twyrch-Jeremy-and Tegid. I’ll recommend it on The Stephen Lawhead forum after.
I didn’nt know what I was getting into when I started to read this book. The story line really drew me in to a certain point and then I turned a page and thought I was reading another story. I was really dissapointed because I spent money on this book and I will never get the time back I spent reading it. My opinion? Total waste of time.
What the hell happened to Amy? What happened when the group got to Roswell? It seems everyone died. Did they? The ending just seemed weak after all that struggle.