Review: Dead Town

image by Gordan Jovic via sxc.hu
image by Gordan Jovic via sxc.hu

Introduction
Dead Town is the last book in Dean Koontz’s Frankenstein Series and picks up right where Lost Souls left off. All throughout Rainbow Falls bands of resistance to Victor’s Communitarians have begun fighting back thanks to KBOW radio getting the word out about Victor’s plan to wipe out the town. In this book several of the story lines converge as the end comes in sight.

Victor Leben alias Victor Immaculate is so self absorbed that his hubris leads to his ultimate end. Honestly his arrogance was even more than the original Victor’s and it was fun seeing his comeuppance at the end.

The Good
Overall I liked this book. It was trilling and held my interest throughout the story and there were several oh shit moments when characters were put in danger by the nearly unstoppable Builders.

At first I wasn’t a fan of the subplots but Koontz tied them together in such a way that it ad you on the edge of your seat waiting to see what would happen next. I was especially surprised with the resolution of Nummy O’Bannon and Mr. Lyss’s story line. Also I liked how you didn’t know until the end who would win.

The Bad
While I liked this book I did have my issues with it. Overall there were too many happy coincidences that led to characters getting out of tough spots with the Builders, by them malfunctioning for unspecified reasons or just plain dumb luck.

I also wasn’t a fan of Victor in this book. He was an almost nonentity and posed zero threat to anyone unlike the original Victor who didn’t mind getting his hands dirty when the situation called for it.

Instead of keeping abreast of the goings on of his war Victor was content with walking the corridors of the Hive and this ultimately led to his downfall.

I also wasn’t a fan of the final confrontation between him and Deucalion. It was down right hokey and made zero sense and was rather anticlimactic. Without spoiling the ending lets just say it was too happily ever after for my taste and leave it at that.

The Verdict
Overall this was an enjoyable read though for the reasons stated above it could have been better and I can’t help feeling the series should have ended with book three as every book after that, while enjoyable just didn’t live up to the previous books in terms of plot.

Overall I’d give the series a 3.5/5 and would recommend it to anyone who enjoys sci-fi thrillers full of action.

Review: The Last Command

Introduction

Picking right back up where The Last Humanity left off, The Last Command ratchets up the action and is a real page turner. A common theme for this book is all roads lead to the Ancient City.

First Bray and company make it to the Ancient City and take refuge in the remains of a museum. William sneaks off in the middle of the night and Melora follows after him only to get lost and is saved by Ivory, who just returned to the Ancient City.

Meanwhile William is confronted by Jeremiah and commands a horde of the infected to kill him.

The Good

I really liked how all the story lines converged to the Ancient City and how it was all wrapped up nicely. I was also pleasantly surprised when my hypothesis about William was confirmed. The way I see it he’s becoming like Jingo and won’t lose his mind to the spores.

I was also shocked when Father Winthrop lost his mind and killed General Blackthorn. I didn’t see that coming and found it a little hard to believe. I also found his delusions about being a war god laughable and down right pathetic.

The bad

I was thoroughly disappointed with the resolution of Oliver’s pot to kill Father Winthrop. After all that build up and him growing as a character just to wimp out at the last minute and run up under the skirt of Minister Beck.

Honestly had Oliver just killed Winthrop it would have saved everyone a lot of heart ache later on, but no. Instead Oliver chickened out, allowing Father Winthrop to kill Blackthorn and turn most of the blue shirts to his side.

I was also disappointed in the resolution of the coup to oust Tenbrook. Even though he just assumed power he had the Dunlow Twins, and their family ,tortured and burned at the pyre along with Scholar Evan and the other conspirators.

The Verdict

Overall this was a good read and i suggest to give it look if you’ve enjoyed the other books in this series thus far.