This second book of the Morningstar trilogy suffered from middle-itis. The investment I felt in the characters from Book 1 carried me through, but I thought this book was just treading zombies . . . Very military, lots of shooting and blowing things up. Even the conflicts between the surviving non-infected humans were solved with guns. Just once I was hoping someone would try to talk their way out of a bad situation instead of shooting first, asking questions later. What saved the book from being completely tedious was the stellar narration by Oliver Wyman. I really enjoyed Plague of the Dead. While not particularly original, Recht demonstrated a genuine talent for action and suspense, and created a vivid zombie scorched earth that made his characters' fear seem real.Unfortunately I didn't feel the same about Thunder and Ashes. Firstly, Recht's prose came across like a fan-boy describing his Call-of-Duty gameplay. Where Plague had skilful plainspeak, Thunder and Ashes, came across as an early draft of a good manuscript with lots of lazy 'tell' exposition and phrases like 'sniping away'to describe gun battle, which gave the book a silly tone which didn't match the setting.I guess Thunder and Ash does suffer from middle book sag, a difficult trend to avoid given that the book is not only a sequel but a second book in a trilogy, thus needing to save some epic-ness for number three. Nonetheless I found the characters and plot fell unacceptably flat. Recht relies on us remembering who everyone is, some would say this is OK in a sequel, but I argue that sequel characters still need to 'show' their character throughout the story even if they have already been introduced.while there is a small amount of character development, for the most part I found it difficult to tell the difference between the 'slightly bad-ass soldier types' populating this novel and even more difficult to care too much about their fate.The storyline feels like a few challenges were thrown at the characters but nothing nearly as epic at the first novel, and - I hope - what is to come in number three.Don't get me wrong, there are still epic and tense battles, but like the Matrix sequels without being surrounded by a strong plot and characters exciting action couldn't bring this novel above 2 stars for me
Do You like book Aufstieg Der Toten: Roman (2012)?
This second book of the Morningstar trilogy suffered from middle-itis. The investment I felt in the characters from Book 1 carried me through, but I thought this book was just treading zombies . . . Very military, lots of shooting and blowing things up. Even the conflicts between the surviving non-infected humans were solved with guns. Just once I was hoping someone would try to talk their way out of a bad situation instead of shooting first, asking questions later. What saved the book from being completely tedious was the stellar narration by Oliver Wyman.
—angel
Thunder and Ashes is a book about friends and family trying to get to a city where they hear it is safe and find a cure for the infected. This book is full of thrills, drama, and horror. It is an awesome book for the people that love the zombie books or movies. I like this book because it caught my interest with how intense it gets and what goes on between each one of the characters. Only very few survive and one out of the few is immune to the infection. All of the zombies are hungry for the brains of humans.
—bronbee
awesome book. great story from beginning to end
—sujay
awesome book. great story from beginning to end
—karnalismo
