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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
20 of 22 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Not Bad For A Potboiler,
By A Customer
This review is from: Aftermath (Mass Market Paperback)
They (some reviewers, copy on the back of books) always say Sheffield is "the" or "a" top hard-sci-fi writer. Well, that must not be coming from the ones I've read--definitely not this one. This is a good airport novel. That's where I picked it up and read it. It's got a big disaster, plenty of sex, a daring return from a mission to Mars, desperate cancer survivors, a Hannibal Lector type character, a visionary cult leader, and some political intrigue, all thrown together pretty cheesily. It's fun to read but you wont be telling all your friends about it. Most of the characters are one dimensional, and he has a lurid, exagerrated view of politics--the President "runs" the country, and politicians are far more sleazy in interesting ways than in real life, and execute far more bloodthirsty and deft maneuvers than they manage to pull off in real life. Would make a fun trashy cable mini-series.
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Disappointing Ending,
By A Customer
This review is from: Aftermath (Mass Market Paperback)
Mr. Sheffield begins with a novel in which the world has just barley survived a disaster comparable to the impact that wiped out the dinosaurs. But wait, the good old U.S. of A. manages to muddle through with barely an interruption in cable service, while the rest of the world is all but wiped out. Fortunate for the U.S., but too contrived to be particularly interesting in a novel.Honestly, the book began well. Unfortunately, within the first 100 pages, the plot had become a morass of sub-plots, characters and ideas that were never destined to be fleshed out. A big problem was that there were far too many sub-plots that went nowhere as the book progressed. (For example, sub-plots involving either White House aid or that involved a former Presidential mistress that just faded into nothing. Rule: If a sub-plot goes nowhere, kill it.) However, even when a sub-plot was played out to the bitter end, it concluded with a contrived yet feel good device. (The escape of Dr. Death.) Worse yet, the main plotline involved the President of the U.S. and even that ended with a device stolen from any of a hundred 'B' movie made in the fifties. The problem seems to be that Mr. Sheffield lost track of what he was writing about some half-way through the novel. Perhaps he was thinking series but only got paid for the one book. With so much going on and less than 50 or so pages used to tie it all together, Mr. Sheffield is forced to fall back on some very weak devices to get it done. If the last 70 or so pages were cut from this book and re-written as a sequel, Mr. Sheffield would have produced a much better work. As it is, the ending is far too contrived to be satisfying. Overall, Mr. Sheffield took on an idea that was far bigger than the book he produced, inevitabley leaving the reader a bit disappointed.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
After taste is more like it,
This review is from: Aftermath (Mass Market Paperback)
I enjoyed the first third of this book when the disaster was unfolding. Once the people moved front and center it was still interesting, if a lot less exciting. But, while the premise held promise (if no scientific credence),things started going downhill rapidly when the focus turned more to diddling than disaster. Am I the only one who finds pages devoted to whether two old guys get laid a bit out of place here? And, as we started running out of pages, I realized I was going to have to buy ANOTHER book to find out how it ends. That may make the author rich but it's patently unfair to the reader. I bought a whole book; I expect a whole story. Lucifer's Hammer is, hands down, one of the best. This is, hands down, not.
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