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A review by charliwebb7
Cold Storage by David Koepp
dark
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.5
An interesting end-of-the-world scenario which bears some resemblance to The Last of Us.
I honestly didn't know what to expect when this arrived in a book subscription box and thought that the pages inside had gone mouldy, but I was intrigued regardless. A lethal fungus is discovered which has the potential to completely destroy mankind and everything it loves and when locked away for years, it finally poses a modern day risk in 2019, leaving a group of unlikely heroes to save the day.
The novel begins with a great deal of scientific jargon. It did seem a bit like reading Dutch at times, but it did its job and built up the tension by making me feel like a genuine idiot and pointing out that hey, you wouldn't really know what to do in this scenario. Written by the screenwriter of Jurassic Park, I expected this book to have a lot of dark humour, a sarcastic and witty protagonist, and lines that could be quoted repeatedly out of context. It's clear that some characters do draw on these tropes, but I never really gelled with any of them, apart from the sarcastic 4 year old daughter who likes to remind her mother about her recent grief. The back stories given to them jolted me out of the narrative and took away from the tension that Koepp had created moments before.
That being said, I finished the book very swiftly. I probably wouldn't do a second read-through, but I can see this being a brilliant film or TV show.
I honestly didn't know what to expect when this arrived in a book subscription box and thought that the pages inside had gone mouldy, but I was intrigued regardless. A lethal fungus is discovered which has the potential to completely destroy mankind and everything it loves and when locked away for years, it finally poses a modern day risk in 2019, leaving a group of unlikely heroes to save the day.
The novel begins with a great deal of scientific jargon. It did seem a bit like reading Dutch at times, but it did its job and built up the tension by making me feel like a genuine idiot and pointing out that hey, you wouldn't really know what to do in this scenario. Written by the screenwriter of Jurassic Park, I expected this book to have a lot of dark humour, a sarcastic and witty protagonist, and lines that could be quoted repeatedly out of context. It's clear that some characters do draw on these tropes, but I never really gelled with any of them, apart from the sarcastic 4 year old daughter who likes to remind her mother about her recent grief. The back stories given to them jolted me out of the narrative and took away from the tension that Koepp had created moments before.
That being said, I finished the book very swiftly. I probably wouldn't do a second read-through, but I can see this being a brilliant film or TV show.