Lights Out

Right off, I have to say I am baffled why a book that is written by someone from the UK, with obvious British terms and colloquialisms, would have an american narrator?! It doesn't fit at all, and creates dissonance for the reader/listener. I have read/listened to so many great books with British narrators, I am just at a loss.<br /><br />In terms of the book content itself, this was a superficial, and barely developed story-line. The characters were not believable because they had no depth. The one guy messes around on his girlfriend, has never been able to settle, but suddenly realizes (for no known reason) in the midst of an apocalypse, that she is all that is really important in the whole world...oh, and Aunt Jean's cat. Come on. Oh, and everyone 'deals' with the whole world coming to a stop over the period of...an hour? It was painful. I can barely finish it. For someone who loves science fiction and especially dystopian fiction...I'm disappointed.

<strong>Lights Out review</strong><br /><br />Lights Out is the first fast paced post apocalyptic survival book in the Surviving the EMP series written by author Ryan Casey.

Yes yes yes yes yes. This is EXACTLY the apocalyptic fiction I’ve been looking for. No flowery, religious anecdotes, unrealistically long spans where the characters have time to reflect on the philosophy of the situation, and most importantly- no cheesy romance! <br /> <br />That’s not to say I hate all of those things, but when it comes to an apocalypse, especially an EMP (as in this series), there is no time for any of that. It’s about survival and the present moment. I want the nitty, gritty, realistic action, no matter how heart or gut wrenching. I want characters to show us what it takes to keep powering through these situations on their own or in small groups; I really think that the whole “our town/large group is coming together to survive!” plot is just not realistic, especially at the start of something like this. It’s going to be every man for themselves for quite a while.<br /> <br />The characters were realistic and I liked the variety of personalities and situations. At first it was a little hard to keep up with who was who, but I got used to it about halfway through. I also could have done without some of the emotional thoughts about ~who they are~ towards the end.<br /> <br />I also always love a book that takes place in one day. You feel so much more connected to the characters and more equipped to handle whatever the books situation is if you follow along with them through the entirety. I actually plan to work on an EMP-apocalypse series too some day, and I’ll definitely also make the first book take place just in the first day. I think you just have to for this kind of story. <br /> <br />I devoured this audiobook in 2 days! Never got sick of it. Sadly I have to wait until Sept. 1st to listen to the next one, as my Hoopla monthly quota is out. Womp womp. Will definitely figure out how to read more series from this author as well (as you’ll see if you follow me I rarely actually buy books, and when I do they’re used). <br /> <br />4 stars from me! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Well, here goes. I don't review a lot of books, but I can't get this one off my mind, so I am writing it all out. This book wasn't terrible. It flowed relatively well. Easy to follow and interesting and engaging enough to do so. The author, who I presume lives in the UK, really seems to be forcing that point. Not just with the setting and normal variances in phrases and words, but with a seemingly forced way of pushing as much evidence that this is occurring in England as possible, but though exposition-type lingo. Here's my problem; it feels like the author is that kid who did a study abroad or mission trip to another country and then suddenly the first 20 years of linguistic training and practice are shoved aside by the more exotic, novel lingo. "Does anyone want a burrrrrito? Oh, sorry, while I was in México on Spring break, I really assimilated to the culture there and now I just naturally roll that double 'r' or 'erre' as we call it." I don't know anything about the author, so he may be native to England, and if so, he has a knack for inserting every conceivable proof of it, but my bet would be that he is from somewhere else, like the US, but at some point moved to England and is trying really hard to make sure everyone knows he lives in England. Could be totally wrong, but it totally seemed forced. <br /><br />The characters....they are all the same person. I know they aren't really, but tell me if this sounds familiar: "I live a certain way based on bad/traumatic experiences from my past, but now that the EMP happened, I have learned in this single day that I need to be who I truly am, not who I was pretending to be." Guess whose story that is...you're right, all the main characters'. <br /><br />One thing that was done really well was that he made me hate the antagonists, such as the cops, store owner, escaped psych patients, etc., but I felt like a little reason or logical explanations from the protagonists could have solved a lot of problems, but the antagonists that are so annoying and easy to hate are so dense that it might have been futile to try to actually clearly explain anything to them. Either way, the author put in some ridiculous ways to get into or out of trouble, which made it impossible for the antagonists to see the simple facts and use common sense. <br /><br />There wasn't a whole lot of depth to the characters, but I realize this is really just a set-up for the next books, but then maybe this should have just been the first part of a bigger book. <br /><br />The book is set in pretty modern times, and I felt like that was casually placed in there without trying to hard to make it obvious or relying on some overt exposition, so, well done there. <br /><br />Overall, not a bad story, just not a great one. I like post-apocalyptic themes because it's kind of fun to think about what we would have to figure out if all our basic conveniences were unavailable. The same story could basically have happened with a handful of other scenarios (not exactly, but the basic story), so there wasn't a whole lot of exploration into the scenario, but I'm sure that will happen in further books, too. Go ahead and read it if you want. It's not very long, so there's little investment for an adequate return. <br /><br />I may come back and review my review, but for now, those are my thoughts.

This was a fairly standard EMP type story. Everyone surprised, people separated from loved ones, violent prisoners on the streets. Society in this story deteriorated within a few hours of the event, including a shopkeeper who became immediately sadistic and violent. That did not seem to be too realistic to me. I struggled with most of the characters all of whom had some prominent flaws, including their ability to make safe decisions and it made me hope that I would not ever run into people like them if a real disaster occurred. Even the "prepared" character allowed himself to be constantly drawn away from the issues at hand, though I'm glad he "woke" to his better human instincts. The writing is decent overall but the story just seemed rather disjointed and I struggled to connect with it. I may read book 2 to see what happens and if it improves.

<strong>Good story</strong><br /><br />This author did a wonderful job of interweaving the different characters in this apocalyptic tale. It is a surprisingly upbeat story of the end of the world as we know. I would like to read more stories by this author.

Have not ever read British post apoc fic

Stories that unintentionally piss me off ALSO deserve one star and one finger. And you know which finger I mean! <br /><br />Stuff in the book that grated on my nerves: <br /><br />The characters are introduced “amongst” a smorgasbord of British terminology, which annoys me. But that’s actually my bad: I had assumed the story takes place in the United States, like 99 percent of all the post apocalyptic survival stories I’ve read, but—the story doesn’t take place in the United States at all. So then why did the publisher hire an American narrator who sounds JUST LIKE Mr Rogers? I realize that the author didn’t select the audiobook narrator, but I just have to mention it. A survival story narrated by Mr Rogers? That’s as unimaginable as Bob Ross painting some happy little clouds on Guernica. <br /><br />But really, the major thing that pissed me off is the writing: a layering of appositives and repetitions, over and over again. The sentence fragments. That restate the same thing over and over again, so that a sentence worth of experience gets dragged out to occupy an entire chapter. I don’t know. Maybe that is actually an admirable writing style? After all, the narrative in The Hatchet (sorry-no embedded link) flows in similar chunks of repetition, and it won a Newbery Honor award. But speaking of children’s lit, I’ve chatted with elementary school children capable of more depth, complexity, dignity, and sensitively nuanced language than is in this book. <br /><br />Even though the narrative prose put me off so much, I did check to see how the author handled the ending. I don’t like this current trend of authors ending a book with a manipulative “Hey you gotta buy the next book” cliffhanger. Which, of course, is how he ended the book.

I found the tremendous 180 degree personal growth and profound epiphanies every character experienced in the timespan of a single day to be pretty unbelievable. Honestly, this ruined the book for me. I am a fan of multiple plot lines in books, but in this instance it felt like none of the plot lines were ever really developed.

An EMP of unknown origins hits England and completely knocks out the power and anything electrically powdered for much of the nation as far as anyone can tell. When the EMP hits, cars crashed, trains slammed Into one another and planes dropped from the sky. Much of the country is devastated. With the loss of communication, even the military, police and Government are out of commission. People are left to deal with the chaos in the best way possible. The story follows 5 different main characters as they try to navigate these treacherous circumstances. <br />I’m having mixed feelings about this book. On the one hand I really enjoyed the multiple characters with multiple points of view. Each of the characters experiencing the EMP in a different way. One was in a plane crash. One was in a train crash . One was in prison. One was on a bus trying to escape school. One is just in his car but he is a survival nut, is aware of what an EMP is, and is assuming, pretty accurately, what is going to happen next. I really found it interesting that the book covers such a very short timeframe. It’s only a half a day. There’s already a lot of chaos going on.<br />Another thing I am surprised about was even though there are five main characters with each character having supporting characters around them I don’t feel overwhelmed by the amount of characters that there are. Each of the main characters are unique and interesting. Well actually, two of the girls are kind of blending a little bit and I’m having a hard time telling the difference between the two of them but the other main characters stand out and they are already starting to grow, even in the first installment of the series. <br />The thing that I didn’t like and didn’t enjoy as much is this series is a bit more gritty than most books that I regularly read. It is very realistic but more geared towards a negative aspects of humanity and life. For instance several escaped prisoners try to kidnap a young teenage girl and it was implied that they weren’t going to do anything nice to her. Luckily she’s rescued by one of the other main characters. Three other prisoners kidnapped another main character and a boy she is taking care of. A bunch of other traumatic stuff happens to these two as well. I didn’t really enjoy those aspects of the story. There is a lot of violence that feels very real. The various accidents felt very real. People are breaking bones and suffering other major injuries. There’s no ambulances, no hospitals to take the injured to. Instead there’s just people on the street trying to help each other. While all of this violence and chaos was very well written I did not enjoy it. I do not like books that are dark in this way. I want my books to be an escape and not to be mired in the more negative aspects of humanity.<br /><br />Triggers and Rating <br />Triggers- It is implied that a girl may be raped. Stabbing. Hitting people with things like bats, clubs and hammers. People lose teeth. A dog is injured. A young boy is kidnapped and threatened with a knife.<br /><br />Rating - <br />R - There Violence is prolific and graphic. There is a lot of it. There is a lot of swearing. Simmer if it is British swear words.