DWD's Reviews

The Story Continues... Published in Blackstone Audio in 2015 Read by Bronson Pinchot Duration: 9 hours, 51 minutes Unabridged In this sequel to the bestseller One Second After , Forstchen continues to tell the story of what happens to a North Carolina community called Black Mountain after the United States is attacked by multiple EMP attacks from nuclear weapons. All of the modern technology is fried (computers, modern cars, the electrical grid, anything with a circuit board) and America reverts back to a pre-industrial technology level. *********SPOILER ALERT************* An Apache helicopter This book starts one year after the ending of the first book which ended one year after the attack. The main thrust of the story is that the federal government has returned in the guise of an appointed administrator working out of Asheville, NC. It is unclear exactly who is in control of the federal government, but they are drafting most of the able-bodied soldiers of the communit

A Review of the Audiobook Published in 2009 by Blackstone Audio Read by Joe Barrett Duration: 13 hours, 21 minutes Unabridged When this book was first published, it made a sensation of sorts, which is pretty tough to do if you are a science fiction book. As the book's promoters are proud to point out, excerpts from this book were even read into the Congressional Record from the floor of the House of Representatives as a warning about the dangers of an Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) weapon to the United States. An EMP happens as a by-product of the explosion of a nuclear weapon. In short, a nuclear weapon detonated high in the atmosphere can generate this pulse and fry almost all modern electronic circuits by overwhelming them much like a lightning strike will due when it hits someone's home. The pulse can be generated from high enough in the atmosphere that the bomb itself does not cause an explosion on the planet's surface or even cause a radiation danger. In this bo

Audiobook version published in 2014 Performed by DJ Holte Duration: 6 hours, 19 minutes. Set in a future America with strict caste system, Going Shogun is a buddy story and a heist story with a bit of romance thrown in.  Chris and Forklift are waiters at Wishful Thinking, a trendy restaurant that mixes odd combinations of flavors like gravy-flavored ice cubes, banana mustard and wintergreen tomato popsicles. The customers can't seem to stop coming in and business booms every night. But, Chris and Forklift (especially Chris) want to move up in in this strict caste system and they think they have developed the perfect plan - steal the recipes from their boss, sell them online and use their new found wealth to "ascend" and maybe take the hot waitress with them on the way up the social ladder. But, this is more complicated than you might think. Everything, including the internet is tightly regulated so Chris and Forklift have to find a hacker to get them online bef

Cormac McCarthy's Pulitzer Prize winning The Road is literally a book about not much (as some other reviewers have noted) and it is a book about love, fear, despair, hope and sacrifice - which is everything a great book should be about. It is both bleak and engrossing. Set in a post-apocalyptic world of death and destruction that makes Mel Gibson's iconic The Road Warrior look like a hopeful romp along Sesame Street, The Road is bleak and spare, but I was driven to keep reading because I wanted to know two things: what caused the world to end and what happens to this boy and his father. I plowed through it in near record time and only one of my questions was answered. I rated this book 4 stars out of a possible 5 and it can be found on Amazon.com here: The Road by Cormac McCarthy . Reviewed on June 11, 2010