Book 1 Down

As predicted, I wrapped The Rising last night.

I was thoroughly enjoying myself until I read a sentence pairing which drove me up the wall and seemed to bring all of the faults of the book to the forefront making my continued enjoyment a bit more difficult. I don't have the book with me so I can't relate exactly what it was but it was something along the lines of "A great eagle slammed into the glass, once a symbol of freedom and liberty, it was now a symbol of corruption and decay."

I rolled my eyes at that and through out the rest of the book, I noticed more poor word choices along those lines things which could have been cut back a bit by an editor.

A few other things that I didn't like were the pacing. At about page 150, the story picks up to such a degree that it doesn't stop and most of the nice touches of characterization which make the first parts of the story so enjoyable are kind of tossed out for numerous interchangeable nasty national guardsmen whose sole pleasures in life are raping and pillaging lead by a colonel who could have been made to be more menacing by fleshing him out a bit more. It would have been the perfect opportunity to paint him in a bit more sympathetic light to make his actions far more reprehensible.

The latter half of the book has some absolutely wonderful flourishes though, like the return to science facility which spawned the whole situation, the redemption of Frankie and the establishment of her humanity, the preacher Martin (who I feel becomes the strongest character in the book).

There is one thing which may annoy many readers in that the book doesn't end, but rather it just stops. I was absolutely fine with the ambiguity of the original end, but I also picked up City of the Dead (the book's sequel) and read the opening paragraphs to see what happened.

Overall, I enjoyed it. I liked the mythology, I liked two of the three main characters, there are some excellent set pieces and some neat ideas that are handled well. I'd have loved to had stronger characters from the National Guards and particularly their commander. I also would have liked about 50 more pages to break up the pacing problems.