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astrilde's review against another edition
4.0
We follow a couple of Manchester fellas on a blokes trip to the Big Apple, but midway over the Atlantic they are hit by turbulence. Afterwards, things go from bad to worse as they land despite no contact with ground control to a seemingly desserted JFK.
readerxxx's review against another edition
3.0
Eh....it was ok. Started off great but the premise fell into an unrealistic sci fi jumbo jumbo. Probably wont continue this series.
quirkey's review against another edition
2.0
I'm giving this 2.5 stars, though it only grabs that last half star because I thought the story had a lot of potential, which was very frustratingly not realized.
Let me start from the beginning. You've got Harry and Jack, two British army veterans heading over to New York for their yearly vacation when a wave of turbulence disrupts their journey. Communications go down and after a shaky landing our dynamic duo enter JFK to find utter carnage as waves people lay dead, their bodies butchered by whatever it seemed was in reach. Cue survival horror and all of the delicious conspiracy theories.
As a premise? No issues. Great even! A nice switch up from zombies and a good mystery to carry the plot when people aren't defending themselves to the death. Everything solid so far.
Unfortunately, the book just doesn't pull it off.
I'll start with the good. I liked how Twitter played such a part in communication initially because I felt that's exactly what would happen IRL. I liked the initial mystery, which was well introduced as the authors dropped crumbs among their pages, as well as the set up of the story and the scenes in JFK.
And that's about it tbh.
My first issue is with the characters. Jack at least has a bit of spunk to him with his fiery temper and obvious love of bar brawls. But everyone else is utterly bland. And even Jack's temper eventually fades into the background and you forget he had anything distinguishable about him from his brother by the end of the book.
And the other brother, Harry, who is the POV of our tale?
*facepalm*
Aside from being utterly boring (and in the middle of an apocalypse no less), he functions more as a some kind of omniscient narrator, instantly telling me every other characters ticks and thoughts a second after they've said or done anything. I never have to second guess what anyone might mean, or come to my own conclusions about the characters cause Harry is too busy telling me EXACTLY what they mean. Half the fun of books is getting to know the characters, I can't do that if the authors are shoving everything about them in my face. It reduces them to ink on a page as opposed to people I should care about, worry about in the midst of the disaster that is their reality.
Which is exactly what caused the next problem. All of the characters could have suddenly spontaneously combusted and I wouldn't even have blinked as I turned the page, cause I didn't care about any of them. Hell, I didn't even remember that the POV's name was Harry until about a third of the way through the book.
The "villains" of the tale as well just dumbfounded me. They were all two dimensional try hard evil doers. I wanted to reach out and pat them on the heads cause bless their cotton socks but they came across as evil as a Monday morning (which, admittedly, is pretty evil. Just not apocalypse evil). They talked the talk but I never believed they could walk the walk. Where were my villains that part of me agrees with? The ones that make a little bit of me secretly wish the heroes would fail? Or the ones that have my toes twisting every time they speak, for their cruelty and twisted minds disturb me, even as they stay locked within a book?
Nonexistent unfortunately.
Also, no spoilers, but what started out as an intriguing mystery kinda fizzles out into clichés by the end. I kept waiting for the authors to say "GOTCHA!" And whip something out but, as other reviewers have said, the ending comes out of nowhere and the book just abruptly finishes. It doesn't even deserve to be called an ending.
But the most aggravating part about this book is that there's still some part of you that wants to like it, in my case at least. It felt like this was story the authors really wanted to tell, and put a lot of effort into, but the writing just really let it down. I kept looking for reasons to enjoy it, but they had disappeared by the last twenty pages.
I'm not writing these authors off my list, but Im afraid won't be picking up the next in this series.
Let me start from the beginning. You've got Harry and Jack, two British army veterans heading over to New York for their yearly vacation when a wave of turbulence disrupts their journey. Communications go down and after a shaky landing our dynamic duo enter JFK to find utter carnage as waves people lay dead, their bodies butchered by whatever it seemed was in reach. Cue survival horror and all of the delicious conspiracy theories.
As a premise? No issues. Great even! A nice switch up from zombies and a good mystery to carry the plot when people aren't defending themselves to the death. Everything solid so far.
Unfortunately, the book just doesn't pull it off.
I'll start with the good. I liked how Twitter played such a part in communication initially because I felt that's exactly what would happen IRL. I liked the initial mystery, which was well introduced as the authors dropped crumbs among their pages, as well as the set up of the story and the scenes in JFK.
And that's about it tbh.
My first issue is with the characters. Jack at least has a bit of spunk to him with his fiery temper and obvious love of bar brawls. But everyone else is utterly bland. And even Jack's temper eventually fades into the background and you forget he had anything distinguishable about him from his brother by the end of the book.
And the other brother, Harry, who is the POV of our tale?
*facepalm*
Aside from being utterly boring (and in the middle of an apocalypse no less), he functions more as a some kind of omniscient narrator, instantly telling me every other characters ticks and thoughts a second after they've said or done anything. I never have to second guess what anyone might mean, or come to my own conclusions about the characters cause Harry is too busy telling me EXACTLY what they mean. Half the fun of books is getting to know the characters, I can't do that if the authors are shoving everything about them in my face. It reduces them to ink on a page as opposed to people I should care about, worry about in the midst of the disaster that is their reality.
Which is exactly what caused the next problem. All of the characters could have suddenly spontaneously combusted and I wouldn't even have blinked as I turned the page, cause I didn't care about any of them. Hell, I didn't even remember that the POV's name was Harry until about a third of the way through the book.
The "villains" of the tale as well just dumbfounded me. They were all two dimensional try hard evil doers. I wanted to reach out and pat them on the heads cause bless their cotton socks but they came across as evil as a Monday morning (which, admittedly, is pretty evil. Just not apocalypse evil). They talked the talk but I never believed they could walk the walk. Where were my villains that part of me agrees with? The ones that make a little bit of me secretly wish the heroes would fail? Or the ones that have my toes twisting every time they speak, for their cruelty and twisted minds disturb me, even as they stay locked within a book?
Nonexistent unfortunately.
Also, no spoilers, but what started out as an intriguing mystery kinda fizzles out into clichés by the end. I kept waiting for the authors to say "GOTCHA!" And whip something out but, as other reviewers have said, the ending comes out of nowhere and the book just abruptly finishes. It doesn't even deserve to be called an ending.
But the most aggravating part about this book is that there's still some part of you that wants to like it, in my case at least. It felt like this was story the authors really wanted to tell, and put a lot of effort into, but the writing just really let it down. I kept looking for reasons to enjoy it, but they had disappeared by the last twenty pages.
I'm not writing these authors off my list, but Im afraid won't be picking up the next in this series.
ziwxbhld's review against another edition
3.0
Not bad as a debut. Short and punchy, with a fair few instances of slightly clumsy sentences and dialogue, but the plot is interesting enough. The neat idea of the killers is interesting, and the mystery drives the first half of the book nicely through your standard survival horror which pays homage to the first book of The Strain Trilogy, and David Moody's Autumn series without being too derivative.
That said, having settled the reader comfortably into this post-apocalyptic world, the characters' moral compasses suddenly swing a neat 180° half-way through the book, which means the second part of the book is jarringly different; gone are the feelings of paranoia and mistrust - we're into straightforward sneaking-about-with-guns territory. It also ends a little abruptly and not particularly clearly. Maybe it's supposed to be ambiguous, but it comes across more as unclear. Still, it'd be nice to see some more writing in a similar vein.
That said, having settled the reader comfortably into this post-apocalyptic world, the characters' moral compasses suddenly swing a neat 180° half-way through the book, which means the second part of the book is jarringly different; gone are the feelings of paranoia and mistrust - we're into straightforward sneaking-about-with-guns territory. It also ends a little abruptly and not particularly clearly. Maybe it's supposed to be ambiguous, but it comes across more as unclear. Still, it'd be nice to see some more writing in a similar vein.
urlphantomhive's review against another edition
3.0
Read all my reviews on http://urlphantomhive.booklikes.com
I'm afraid of flying, so whatever drove me to read a horror book with a plane on the cover right before boarding a flight beats me. Luckily for people like me, the flying is certainly the safest mode of transport in First Activation. It's when they reach their destination that things become, slightly weird, as everyone feels the need to murder-suicide themselves. It's here that veteran brothers Jack and Harry are trying to survive.
I liked the first half of the book best, because it was reading really fast and felt like I was watching a movie. It was the right amount of confusing, gross and enthralling, just what I needed at that moment. About half-way, the pace slows down quite drastically and it is much less about survival and much more about the why and who behind the sudden urge to kill. I was still interested in the story, but things started to get really convenient and unlikely, which was a slight let down.
Since I already had a copy of the sequel, I've started it already. Curious where the Second Activation will bring everyone.
Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for providing me with a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!
I'm afraid of flying, so whatever drove me to read a horror book with a plane on the cover right before boarding a flight beats me. Luckily for people like me, the flying is certainly the safest mode of transport in First Activation. It's when they reach their destination that things become, slightly weird, as everyone feels the need to murder-suicide themselves. It's here that veteran brothers Jack and Harry are trying to survive.
I liked the first half of the book best, because it was reading really fast and felt like I was watching a movie. It was the right amount of confusing, gross and enthralling, just what I needed at that moment. About half-way, the pace slows down quite drastically and it is much less about survival and much more about the why and who behind the sudden urge to kill. I was still interested in the story, but things started to get really convenient and unlikely, which was a slight let down.
Since I already had a copy of the sequel, I've started it already. Curious where the Second Activation will bring everyone.
Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for providing me with a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!
gguerra8225's review
1.0
Premise is great; the writing.... Couldn't skim fast enough to get away from it. Flat flat flat. I kept looking over this book's shoulder at my reading queue to see "who else I could talk to". Finally drifted away, bored, at the exciting denouement.
thefictionaddictionblog's review against another edition
1.0
The story opens with a terrifying premise, that (almost) everyone is suddenly motivated by a chilling urge to kill one person and then kill themselves. The narrator and his companions are trying to stay alive, and trying to figure out what could be happening. It's a brilliant premise for a scifi or supernatural thriller.
Unfortunately, the novel falls very short. The characters were underdeveloped and lacking, to the point that I didn't much care when characters died. Long descriptions of who took first watch at night or how a room was barricade resembled a role-playing campaign. (Actually, a post Activation game would probably a better use of this clever premise than a third-rate novella.)
Probably the last quarter of the book reads like it was rushed for a deadline, with half-baked dramatic revelations coming fast and thick.
A chilling and intriguing premise, but a really disappointing book.
Unfortunately, the novel falls very short. The characters were underdeveloped and lacking, to the point that I didn't much care when characters died. Long descriptions of who took first watch at night or how a room was barricade resembled a role-playing campaign. (Actually, a post Activation game would probably a better use of this clever premise than a third-rate novella.)
Probably the last quarter of the book reads like it was rushed for a deadline, with half-baked dramatic revelations coming fast and thick.
A chilling and intriguing premise, but a really disappointing book.
tarheel99's review against another edition
4.0
I really enjoyed this one. The writing style is a bit odd. Some of the things the characters say just sounds funny when you think about it, but I don't know if it's because the authors are English or not. That said, it doesn't take away from the story, which I really enjoyed. A book that doesn't give you any information from the start, just puts you in the thick of it right with the characters and doesn't telegraph the big "twists" from a mile away is something that seems hard to find sometimes. I look forward to book 2.
jayishino's review against another edition
2.0
I thought this book started out strong and it was compelling, but it kind of dissolved on the way to the end and by the actual ending of the book I was thinking "what...?!?!?" It seems like there was a rush to end it and the ending seemed forced and abrupt. Like others I think this book would make a great film, but I think the story would need to be strengthened a little. It was okay. interesting at first but sadly fizzled at the end. I'll leave this one up to you.