Sabina's Adventures In Reading: Children of the Plague

Showing posts with label Children of the Plague. Show all posts

Sunday, September 29, 2013

Book Tour: Children of the Plague - Review

My Thoughts:

A nanite plague hits the world, and very few survive. And then most are turned into husks – empty shells, of once humans, controlled by Hosts. Everything is being controlled by the Con. And then there’re the offsprings… Some of the first victims in the plague, where the unborn children. The ones who survived clawed their way out of their mother, forever changed into something different.

Then we have the ones who survived the plague, children, teenagers and adults. The nanites have infected some of these survivors and altered them. Just like Alex and his twin sister, Lanni. Alex is getting closer to be a Host each day, and Lanni has a shield so strong, the nanites can’t penetrate it. Lannie can manipulate the nanites, stabilize the infected people. This is what she has been doing with a pregnant woman – humanity’s last hope for bringing normal children to life.

But can a fourteen old girl make any difference in this new and dangerous world, where the lines are about to be drawn and the war is coming very close?

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The beginning was a bit confusing for me, I lost track of the timeline, due to some jump in time and place. But once the jumping settled down, I had no trouble following the story, and found it interesting.

The relationship between Lannie and her twin brother Alex is.. screwed. Alex is slowly turning into a Host, and all Lannie can do is sit back, try and stabilize the Con, manipulate the nanites, and then she know it isn’t going to cut it. At some point, she has to make the worst decision and kill her brother. At the same

time, Alexis trying to buy himself and others, some time. A big war is coming, and everyone is needed.

There are so many mysteries in this book that didn’t get solved.

The fight scenes are beautifully made, the characters – well, only the surface has been scratched when it comes to them (in my opinion), and I’m curious about what will happen. All in all, the book is good, the series has great potential, the author is amazing, and I’m curious enough that I want to read the next when it arrives.

About the Author:

Gregory Carrico is a former dental practice management consultant and software trainer. Abandoning his dream of working the daily grind until death, he was forced into the thankless life of a fiction writer. Now an Amazon.com Best Selling horror and science fiction writer, as well as a 2013 HFA Author of the Year Finalist, he finds a small degree of succor in crafting despicable bad guys and then tricking readers into caring about them.

When not creating new worlds and plotting their destruction, he advocates for adopting rescue dogs, and politely urges slower drivers to get out of the passing lane.

Where to find Greg:

Buy Links:

Amazon ~ Barnes & Noble ~ KOBO ~ Smashwords

Friday, September 20, 2013

Spotlight: Children of the Plague by Gregory Carrico

Hello, and welcome to my first stop in Children of the Plague Tour, Hosted by the awesome Penny from Around the Universe Tours. Today I have a spotlight with an excerpt, just to give a small taste of the awesome author Gregory Carrico. Later this month I will have a review up of Children of the Plague. Hope you enjoy!!

Children of the Plague:

In the darkest corners of lower Manhattan, a battle like no other rages. The city is home to a hidden group of survivors of the nanite plague, and a brother and sister born to defend their race. With a touch that can destroy nanites, Lanni, sister of Alex, is their last chance. Can she save her brother? Can she protect mankind's only hope? Or will she be responsible for the destruction of the last humans on earth? It's going to be another long day...

About Greg:

When not creating new worlds and plotting their destruction, he advocates for adopting rescue dogs, and politely urges slower drivers to get out of the passing lane.

Where to find Greg:

Excerpt:

Pete had the same sad expression she used to see on her father when he had bad news to share. Maybe he felt bad for being so candid about it with her. He seemed more affected than she.

The trauma of losing her family, and now learning that so many other people died, too, hadn't hit her yet. She knew she'd be a crying wreck later, if there was time to cry. Until then she'd just keep taking in one shock after another, , filing each tragedy away to be addressed later.

"I think we better get going," she said. She had heard enough, and wanted to act. "What should we do?"

"We find your brother, first. We get him and any other survivors somewhere safe. My mother's house out on John's Island is well-stocked and remote. There's all the fish and crabs you can pull out of the river, too. We can survive out there until things settle down. What do you think?"

"Okay. That makes sense. Let's get going." She wanted to occupy herself with action to keep from thinking about how increasingly grim the future looked.

"Which one of y'all is older, you or your brother?"

Pete seemed like a decent sort of guy, but something in Lanni's head wouldn't let her give her full trust so quickly. She didn't really know him from Adam. He must have noticed her hesitation.

"You don't have to tell me anything. I just want to recognize him if I see him first," Pete said. "It's okay if you don't trust me. In fact, I'd say that's pretty smart of you. Whether you trust me or not, I only want you and your brother to be safe. As long as I have anything to say about it, I won't let anyone or anything hurt either of you. You have my word."

"We're twins," she said. Pete's patience was reassuring enough to earn at least that much trust. "We kind-of-look alike. At least we did before he got sick. His hair is thin now. He's lost a lot of weight. Pale skin."

Describing Alex upset her. Aside from forcing her to acknowledge his illness, it made her realize she hadn't seen him since the Scout. She assumed he'd brought her here, but in truth, she didn't know.

~ Children of the Plague by Gregory Carrico

Buy Links:

amazon ~ Barnes & Noble ~ KOBO ~ Smashwords

Thursday, September 12, 2013

Book Tour: Shadow of the World by Gregory Carrico

My thoughts:

Wayne has a really, really bad day. Not only was he just recently discharged from jail, after been in for three years, the sand (“blackouts”) is returning with a vengeance, he’s in more trouble than ever before, and to top the day off? He’s is sitting in his old precinct – but on the “other” side, as a broken man, a man who have lost everything, and can’t remember what he has been doing, all he knows is that his daughter and her son are missing, and he needs to get out of the precinct to help find them. The only way out is to remember what really happened, and the one who can help Wayne with that is Elaine. But what happens when the door is slowly and painfully being opened for his past? Does he truly want to remember?

In the Shadow of the World, we are following Wayne through a, quite extraordinary day in his life. We meet him just as he’s been fired for the second time in a week, his friend is trying to help him calm down until Elaine can reach him. But he can’t concentrate. In the past three months, he’s been without a blackout, and now when he finally got out of jail, they start coming like pearls on a string.

Shadow of the World concentrates on Wayne and his blackouts (or Sand as he calls it), his daughter and grandson that went missing, his battle to reach them in time to save them from a sick killer. All he has to do is remember what happened during the day.

There are a lot of back and forth in this book. The focus point, the starter point, is in the room, where Wayne is sitting cuffed to the table/chair, talking to Elaine and Sam who is standing quietly in the corner. This is our anchor. And then we’re off, following Wayne through his day with everything weird happening, how he discovers that he can in a way control the Sand – to smallish degree, his hunt through town and along the way, more and more is being revealed about Wayne, about his past. The more he remembers, the more we’ll know. I like this. Noting is handed to you, but it is being unwrapped slowly, packed into action, drama and urgency.

I was caught up in this tale. I liked the “time-jump”, to get little bits revealed about Wayne’s day along the way, and still when I got to the end, everything wasn’t delivered on a silver platter. The journey through the book was catching, I didn’t want to put it down, and when I was done reading, all I wanted to do was to get the next and continue. I was so caught up in the story, and everything leading up to the end was amazingly written – I WANT to know what happens next!

If you haven’t read anything by Gregory Carrico before, I’ll definitely recommend Shadow of the World. I know I will look into some of his other books as well.

Blurb:

In this gritty “Dark Knight” meets “The Wire” superhero series, an ex-con tries to overcome his blackouts and memory loss with the help of his prison psychiatrist. Along with his returning memories, he finds evidence that his daughter and grandson are in grave danger from a brutal killer with a grudge. But he also discovers a side to his personality that only comes out during his blackouts: a superhero with telepathic powers. As he finds himself in a complex world of betrayal, dangerous alien biotechnology, and a dimensional rift to a world of waking nightmares, can he bring together the fragments of his broken mind in time to save his family, or is everything he thinks he knows just another figment of a deluded killer’s imagination?

About the author:

When not creating new worlds and plotting their destruction, he advocates for adopting rescue dogs, and politely urges slower drivers to get out of the passing lane.

Where to find Greg:

Buy Link:

Other books by Gregory Carrico:

Apocalypstick

Tales of the Mist

Children of the Plague