May 22, 2012.. Blackout has 10953 ratings and 1279 reviews. Damn you Mira Grant, for making me love your world as much as I do, for making me cry for a ..
BLACKOUT is the conclusion to the epic trilogy that began in the.. Mira Grant lives in California, sleeps with a machete under her bed, and highly suggests you ..
Blackout (Newsflesh Trilogy, #3) 4.14 of 5 stars 4.14 · rating details · 10,959 ratings · 1,279 reviews Rise up while you can. -Georgia Mason The year was 2014. The year we cured cancer. The year we cured the common cold. And the year the dead started to walk. The year of the Rising. The year was 2039. The world didn't end when the zombies came, it just got worse. Georgia and Shaun Mason set out on the biggest story of their generation. They uncovered the biggest conspiracy si Rise up while you can. -Georgia Mason The year was 2014. The year we cured cancer. The year we cured the common cold. And the year the dead started to walk. The year of the Rising. The year was 2039. The world didn't end when the zombies came, it just got worse. Georgia and Shaun Mason set out on the biggest story of their generation. They uncovered the biggest conspiracy since the Rising and realized that to tell the truth, sacrifices have to be made. Now, the year is 2041, and the investigation that began with the election of President Ryman is much bigger than anyone had assumed. With too much left to do and not much time left to do it in, the surviving staff of After the End Times must face mad scientists, zombie bears, rogue government agencies-and if there's one thing they know is true in post-zombie America, it's this: Things can always get worse. Blackout is the conclusion to the epic trilogy that began in the Hugo-nominated Feed and the sequel, Deadline. ...more This review is spoiler-free, and safe even for those who haven't read the first two books in the series. Forget everything you ever assumed about science fiction novels or zombie thrillers: the Newsflesh trilogy defies all expectations. The story that began with a turbulent political campaign in a post-apocalyptic Feed escalates here as the blogger journalists from After the End of Times continue their quest to uncover the truth behind the deadly Kellis-Amberlee virus that has decimated civilizat This review is spoiler-free, and safe even for those who haven't read the first two books in the series. Forget everything you ever assumed about science fiction novels or zombie thrillers: the Newsflesh trilogy defies all expectations. The story that began with a turbulent political campaign in a post-apocalyptic Feed escalates here as the blogger journalists from After the End of Times continue their quest to uncover the truth behind the deadly Kellis-Amberlee virus that has decimated civilization--one that is now mutating and spreading faster than ever before. The breakneck action and intrigue in Blackout is intense as a dangerous rescue mission, disease-carrying mosquitoes, zombie bears, tangled family drama, and a mysterious patient known as Subject 7B all complicate what is already hell on earth. It's funny that my favorite zombie series actually has the least amount of zombie action in it, but Newsflesh hasn't ever been about the undead anyway--it's about the human response to it. As with The Reapers Are the Angels and Warm Bodies, this series is fascinating to me because it explores the idea of personal integrity within extreme circumstances. What would you do when the world ends? If you're Shaun and Georgia Mason, adopted siblings whose closeness forms an unbreakable team, you lead your fellow bloggers into an unrelenting search for truth--no matter what the cost. Or at least, that's how their story began. But now that the stakes are higher than they've ever been and those they love most are at risk, the focus has shifted to a very human need to hold onto the connections that matter most. Blackout seamlessly combines medical thriller, political intrigue, and pulse-pounding action sequences with unforgettable human drama. How you feel about this series will very much depend on how you feel about the characters in general--if you love the Masons, Alaric, Becks, Mahir, and Maggie, you'll most likely have a fantastic time with Newsflesh. It doesn't mean the characters are perfect, of course; Shaun in particular is mourning a huge loss, and his reckless, desperate behavior in the second book caused a lot of criticism from a lot of readers. For me, I felt his pain so keenly, however, that his torment became mine--and I understood, too, the unconventional, defiant ways in which he grasped for some semblance of happiness as the world around him was destroyed. In books and in real life, I respond very strongly to loyalty, honesty, and the determination to do what's right. Shaun and Georgia, as well as their superbly realized supporting cast, embody those traits in a big way. Because they also are slammed with unbelievable suffering throughout these books that require a brutal amount of self-sacrifice, it isn't any wonder that I feel such fiercely protective love for them, as well as for the ideals they represent. The author's writing gets better and better in each book, with well-researched scientific dilemmas and brilliant recaps that engage the reader without resorting to long info-dumps. Her brisk, matter-of-fact style of writing suits the story perfectly, and the sophisticated plot is exceptionally well-paced, with shifts from furious action to moments of stark stillness and contemplation handled beautifully. Whether we're getting worked up over red herrings, watching someone facing her own mortality, or respectfully acknowledging fallen comrades, the emotional pitch throughout the book felt utterly right, which is something that is very hard to pull off when there are so many ethical issues at stake. A few random thoughts with REAL spoilers, because there's no other way to discuss them: (view spoiler)[Subject 7B's realization of who and what she is is totally kickass. I loved how very true to her character this whole scenario was, and how believably all the cloning issues were integrated with our human need to recognize this person. The scenes where 7B looks on the 8s made me really sad. :( I'm so glad that one of the major plot points wasn't rescuing Georgia, because I cannot imagine any situation less likely to happen. The way she escapes and the way everyone reacts to seeing her was pitch-perfect. I am SO happy to have Georgia back. Sheesh, I missed her so much! And it's nice to have a break from all the crazy of being in Shaun's head, hah. I'm glad that Shaun and Georgia got to ride off into the sunset a bit, though I'm still sad for the brave, original Georgia who died in such a devastating way. There were certainly some plot lines that I saw coming, and although I'm a little surprised that we got a HEA, obviously this didn't hinder my enjoyment of the book at all. The way it was handled felt just right. (hide spoiler)] I don't know that I've ever read another series where the emotion it evoked was so intense--Feed left me crying so hard I could hardly see the keyboard, Deadline had me literally whimpering with pain in the middle of the night, and Blackout made me want to scream with excitement and agony and worry all at once. If you'd told me that a science fiction trilogy with zombies could be so searingly emotional or feel so incredibly personal, I'd have told you it was impossible. And I've never been happier to be proven wrong. I know most true fans of this series will race through the pages just like I did, with the same urgency and dread and excitement. While I'm so sad that this particular story is over (although there are two more Newsflesh novellas coming this year) and I dearly wish they could all turn into zombies so this story could live on forever, I'm happy with the way the story ended. I'm sure Mira Grant's new forthcoming novels Parasitology and Symbiogenesis will be absolutely spectacular. This review also appears in The Midnight Garden. An advance copy was provided by the publisher. P.S. For more proof of the power of Mira Grant's writing, read the alternate ending to FEED, Fed, at the bottom of the review on our blog which is ONLY safe for those who have already read the first book. Holy frak, that woman is an evil genius. ...more Here’s a book called Blackout that seems hugely popular with critics and the Goodreads crowd, but that I thought had serious flaws despite a cool premise. Now I’ve written a long review going in depth into what irritated me so much. Hmm… I wonder why I’ve got this odd feeling of deja vu? This is the third book in the Newsflesh trilogy after Feed and Deadline in which Mira Grant* created a future world set about twenty-five years after mutated viruses created zombies. In this future, where dying b Here’s a book called Blackout that seems hugely popular with critics and the Goodreads crowd, but that I thought had serious flaws despite a cool premise. Now I’ve written a long review going in depth into what irritated me so much. Hmm… I wonder why I’ve got this odd feeling of deja vu? This is the third book in the Newsflesh trilogy after Feed and Deadline in which Mira Grant* created a future world set about twenty-five years after mutated viruses created zombies. In this future, where dying by any means causes the dormant virus to go active and turn any corpse into a potential brain eater, large parts of the world have been ceded to the undead while the so-called safe zones are made up of fortified locations and rigid security measures. * A pen name for Seanan McGuire. Bloggers have become the most trusted source of news since traditional media did nothing to inform people about the danger or what to do during the initial zombie uprising. The story revolves around some of these on-line journalists who got thrown in the middle of a vast political conspiracy that has cost them dearly. To find an example of one of my biggest problems with these books I need to look no further than the zombie bear in this one. In Grant’s version of the future, the large mammals like horses, cows and bigger dogs can also turn into zombies, and we get the potential for an awesome scene when a couple of the main characters run across a zombie bear while traveling, and they have no choice but to take it down. If you’re the kind of person who has dedicated a significant amount of time to reading over 1700 total pages of a zombie story, the idea of a fight with a zombie bear should fill you with glee and anticipation. What Grant does is some foreshadowing about the appearance of a zombie bear, then has the zombie bear show and get two characters all revved up to fight it. They grab their guns and jump out of their vehicle to take on this goddamn zombie bear, and then…… She cuts to the next chapter where something else is going on. Later on we get a brief blog post from one of the characters saying that he killed a zombie bear and it was fun. This incident makes me pretty sure that Mira Grant isn’t from Missouri. You know, the SHOW-ME STATE. If there was one of the fifty that was a I‘LL-STRONGLY-HINT-THAT-SOMETHING-AWESOME-IS-ABOUT-TO-HAPPEN-REPEATEDLY-BUT-NEVER-QUITE-PAY-IT-OFF STATE, that’s where Mira Grant would be from. (But that motto would probably be tough to fit on a license plate.) I gotta a lot of other problems with this book and the entire trilogy. In order to maximize my bitching, I’ve broken them into these categories that are spoiler free: The Grant Repetition Principle - Apparently Mira Grant thinks all of her readers have the same condition as Guy Pierce in Memento and that none of us are capable of producing short term memories because she repeats shit constantly to either remind us of things or reuse the same plot points, scenes or dialogue over and over again. If the Internet hasn’t completely devastated your attention span, this gets annoying in a hurry. This repetition causes the other issues I had with the book to become even more irritating because if she does something that annoys you once, you can bet it’s going to happen about fifty more times over the course of the three books. Mira Grant Wants To Suck Your Blood! - If I had a nickel for every blood screening that happens in these books, I could make Bill Gates my pool boy. Yes, this is a society locked down and living in fear because of a virus, but that doesn’t mean that the details of all those tests have to be repeated. Even worse is that Grant gets stuck on certain phrases and descriptions. The subject almost always “Slaps my palm on the panel.” and then they wince as “The needles bit into my skin.” First off, if it’s a blood test with needles, why would you ‘Slap my palm on the panel’? Why not “Place my palm gently on the panel.”? Secondly, I’ve got a cat with diabetes who has required two injections of insulin a day for five years or so. That means I’ve injected him over 3600 times. In all of those, I have never once ‘bit’ him with a needle. I’ve ‘jabbed’ him with a needle. I’ve ‘poked’ him with a needle. I’ve ‘pierced’ him with a needle. I’ve ‘stung’ him with a needle. But no ‘biting’. It’s called a thesaurus, Mira. Look into it. Or better yet, just cut down on the blood tests. Have A Coke And A Smile - I’m pretty sure that Coca-Cola must have paid some kind of product placement fee because there’s no other way to figure out why it seems like someone is drinking one on every other page. Since Mira is also assuming that none of us can remember what a Coke tastes like, she lets us know how sweet it is every time. Particularly bad was this exchange on page 511 which I think is Coke # 2465 in this book: “How are you feeling?” “Exhausted. I need a Coke.” I was never going to get tired of hearing those words. That’s when I realized that Mira Grant has got to be fucking with us. Where Are All The Zombies? And What Do They Look Like? - Blackout has 632 pages. Of this, only about 40 actually feature any kind of encounters with zombies. That’s about 6% of the book, and that ratio is about the same for the other two. And whenever zombies do show up, there is an almost complete lack of description of them. They are just ‘zombies’. No mention of age, gender, clothing, state of decay or anything else. I know that giving detailed descriptions of zombie hordes would be impossible, but if you don’t describe at least a few of them, then it’s just this nebulous vague threat. Maybe if we could have had a few less blood tests and Cokes, there would have been time for some more zombie fightin’ action and maybe a couple of descriptions to let us know what they looked like. Are You Threatening Me? - Our heroes love to threaten people. They threaten both their enemies and friends constantly. Following the Grant Repetition Principle, most of these threats are pretty similar. Someone is always A) Going to get shot. Or B) Going to be punched in the face. These threats are doled out in conversation and in the blog posts that lead off every chapters, but don’t worry if you get told that you’re going to be punched or shot. These guys talk a good game, but they never really follow through on anything. In fact, they are given to make bold pronouncements of how they’re about to unleash hell on somebody. Never happens. Probably because they all appear to be manic depressives as illustrated in our next category. Game Over, Man! Game Fucking Over! - When not telling everyone how they’re gonna shoot them or punch them in the face, our heroes tend to get pessimistic. Once again, we can look to the Grant Repetition Principle to get countless instances of someone confidently asserting that they’re all going to die soon. It does not so much build up a state of fear and dread for their future as it bores the shit out me. Here are more categories with spoilers. I am giving up major plot points from all books as well as the ending of this one so do not read if you don’t want to know. (view spoiler)[ Send In The Clones - One of the strongest moments of the series was when our first person narrator George was deliberately infected with the virus which forced her brother Shaun to shoot and kill her as she made her final blog entry. That scene pushed Feed up several notches for me as well as making me think that Mira Grant may have some pretty bold tricks up her sleeve. Turns out the trick was to have a clone of George introduced in this one. That dropped my opinion of the entire story because now George’s ‘death’ was just emotional manipulation of the reader that had no true consequences. So there’s both a tragic death to let everyone break their hankies out, but still a happy ending to cheer. Bullshit. Shaun Mason Is A Douche Bag - I don’t know if Mira Grant has ever actually talked to any men or not, but if this is her view of what we’re like, then I feel like our entire gender has been insulted. As the daredevil Irwin who ‘pokes dead things with sticks’ (Yet another example of the Grant Repetition Principle), Shaun was just a loyal but brainless minion to George in the first book. George’s death could have forced him into being an interesting character in the second one. Instead what we got was a self-absorbed abusive fuck who would punch his own employees if they dared mention his sacred sister’s name in a way he disapproved of and who preferred to go crazy town banana pants rather than deal with the here and now. Fuck him. Oops, I didn’t mean literally, George! Incest! - I gather there’s a bit of controversy about the whole thing of George and Shaun being lovers. Since it was well established that they were adopted and not related by blood, then I didn’t have a problem with it. What I did think was beyond creepy was that they continued to refer to each other as brother and sister rather than girlfriend, boyfriend, lover, sweet patootie, etc. Yeah, I know George’s bullshit explanation about how they had to keep it secret because of their public image. Uh…No. Have a little press conference and explain that you fell in love with the person you’ve known and trusted longer than anyone and stress that you are not actually related. Most people would probably be cool with that, but if they find out you’re sleeping with someone you constantly refer to as your brother? Yuck. The Romeo And Juliet Factor - So George was dead for a while and it made Shaun into an asshole as well as crazy. We’re told over and over (The GRP again.) how he was always meant to outlive George, and how when he finally settles up with the vast conspiracy, he’s going to go off and just live with Ghost George in his head and be completely shit-your-pants-crazy. When George comes back from the dead, she mentions several times that they always thought that Shaun would die first, and after he did, she would bury him and then kill herself. Obsessive, unhealthy love affairs that end in madness and/or suicide are not what I’m looking for in my zombie books. The CDC Needs New Locks - In Deadline Shaun and company make two long and dangerous journeys to confront the CDC in two different cities. Both times end in disaster. In this one, they actually have a plan that makes some sense, but have to turn around and come back to Seattle before completing any of it. And then they break into the CDC again. Seriously, Mira? The Stupidest Conspiracy Story Since The X-Files Went Off The Air - So the evil CDC was controlling the President by holding his wife and kids hostage while giving him a clone wife for the cameras. George was cloned by the CDC so that a programmed version could be used to manipulate and betray Shaun, but the underground elements led by the Vice-President used that to get a ‘good’ George and break the story about the virus to the world. Because George’s credibility is so fucking awesome that even showing up after being dead in a world full of blood thirsty zombies, people would instantly believe her. The first stage of the plan? Have the president’s family freed in ten minutes by using secret elements the good guys already had in position.(Another action that we’re only told about, but don‘t get any details on.) George gets a gun and goes to the room with the Prez and evil CDC guy, tells everyone that the jig is up and then a Secret Sevice guy kills the CDC dude. After escaping the zombie outbreak, the files get sent out by their news site and George does a video telling everyone to listen to the President who tells everyone what’s been going on. Sooooooooo…… Why exactly were George and Shaun so important again? Supposedly their credibility was vital to the plans of both sides. Maybe if instead of fucking around for over a year while trying to clone George, the VP and the loyal Secret Service agents could have just freed the President’s family, which apparently could have happened at any time since it was so easy that it was done in ten minutes after one phone call, and then just put him on TV to say that the CDC is EEEEVVVIIIIIIILLLLLL! No one would have listened to the goddamn President of the United States if he said that his family was held hostage by the CDC? The only person that anyone in the world will believe is Georgia Mason? Christ, if people are that cynical in 2040 than just go ahead and clone Walter Cronkite to break the news. I guess that wouldn’t work because…. George & Shaun Mason Are The Only People That Matter In The World! - Yeah, there’s some lip service paid to other people on their team, but by shifting the first person narration between two people who really only care about each other, it makes the books completely about them. And if you’re trying to create a story that involves a vast political conspiracy and a worldwide plague of zombies, the scope needs to be wider than two people utterly obsessed with each other. Part of the reason that I don’t buy the idea that George is the only journalist in the world who will be believed is that we never once saw what kind of impact her writing had. Yes, we were once again told how it got the President elected and all that, and they sometimes talked about their high ratings in Feed, but we never got a viewpoint from anyone else as to what their reporting meant to anyone reading it. Over the course of these books, Oakland got firebombed and Florida was supposedly lost to hurricanes and zombie mosquitoes, and yet all of it was told to us third hand. Somewhere in these 1700 pages there should have been room to let us know what people outside of the George & Shaun bubble thought was going on. (hide spoiler)] I’ve spent so much time breaking this down because these three books ended up seeming like a wasted opportunity to me. Mira Grant came up with an intriguing twist on the zombie genre. Despite the flaws, she’s also got a compulsively readable style at times. When she remembered that she was writing a zombie novel and threw in some action, she actually did a pretty good job of it. There’s two tense and action filled conflicts with the undead in this that are top notch, but as I’ve pointed out here, that made up a very small portion of the overall story. Instead of delivering on the potential of the world she created, she focused instead on the inner lives and emotional state of a couple of characters that became boring and irritating when she couldn’t think of enough stuff for them to do and just repeated the same crap over and over again. Here endth the rant. ...more Originally reviewed on The Book Smugglers **WARNING: THIS REVIEW CONTAINS UNAVOIDABLE SPOILERS FOR FEED AND DEADLINE. If you have not read the first two books in the trilogy and want to remain unspoiled, look away! YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.** At the conclusion of Deadline, there have been some rather drastic revelations: Shaun is immune to Kellis-Amberlee, Georgia has been cloned by the CDC (oh, yeah, and the adopted brother and sister have had a longstanding sexual relationship). Blackout opens with Originally reviewed on The Book Smugglers **WARNING: THIS REVIEW CONTAINS UNAVOIDABLE SPOILERS FOR FEED AND DEADLINE. If you have not read the first two books in the trilogy and want to remain unspoiled, look away! YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.** At the conclusion of Deadline, there have been some rather drastic revelations: Shaun is immune to Kellis-Amberlee, Georgia has been cloned by the CDC (oh, yeah, and the adopted brother and sister have had a longstanding sexual relationship). Blackout opens with a bang, much in the same way as its predecessor. Georgia finds herself an unwitting patient of the CDC, and while she knows immediately that she must be a clone (given the memory of her death and the fact that she no longer has retinal KA), she doesn't know why she has been cloned or what the CDC's endgame is. All she knows is that it must have to do with her brother, and it must have to do with a truth that someone very desperately wants to keep covered up. Not so far away, Shaun and the After the End Times team (Mahir, Alaric, Mags, and Becks) are dispatched on a crazy dangerous mission - Kellis-Amberlee has mutated and now can be carried by insect vectors, and after the last tropical storm deadly zombie-making mosquitoes are now on the large and the entire state of Florida is nanoseconds away from being declared officially lost. Shaun - still mourning for his lost sister and hanging onto sanity by a mere thread - and the crew must save Alaric's sister, capture a live mosquito sample for testing, and figure out why the virus mutated - be the cause natural, or manmade. Alternating points-of-view between Shaun's narrative and Georgia's, Blackout chronicles the last chapter of the Newsflesh trilogy as the Masons paths collide and together they fight to rip the lid off of a conspiracy so huge, it will rock the foundation of the post-Rising world. I am kind of at a loss when it comes to Blackout. I *loved* Feed. I loved the heavy exposition, the fascinating medical procedural tied to the political thriller. I loved Georgia's frank narration, and I loved how honest and forthright she was throughout. I loved this vision of a post-apocalyptic, zombie-filled world, and the steps humanity has taken to adapt, survive, and to rise. Needless to say, when I got through Deadline, I was a little less enthused. I still loved the world building and the underlying main storyline, but so many of the things I was so enamoured with in the first book were absent in the second. Most glaringly, Shaun is not half the narrator his sister was. There was also a ton of repetition (not just of pointless story exposition that leads nowhere, but also of key phrases - Shaun drinking a coke, muttering to himself/Georgia's ghost, grinning like a maniac and wanting to punch people in the face, etc) that detracted from the overall efficacy of the story. The political and medical thriller, the underlying conspiracy, is pushed to the backburner in favor of Shaun's (very quickly tiresome) glib narrative as he grapples with grief. In Blackout, I wanted so desperately for the book to return to the series' Feed roots, but alas. Blackout is better than Deadline, but failed to wow, shock or awe. I liked the alternating narrator conceit, tying the first two books together nicely in an attempt to bring both Georgia and Shaun back together again. That said, I found myself wanting to skip Shaun's narrative entirely - as to me it felt largely pointless and filled with the same tedious repetition I had to slog through in Deadline. The good news is that Georgia's narrative is as wonderful as I remembered from Feed but this time is rife with more internal struggle as she fights to form and understand a sense of self and identity within her new flesh, whilst simultaneously fighting and exposing the Umbrella Corporation-esque corruption of the CDC, and finding a way to escape and get back to her brother. As far as narrators go, Georgia remains one of the coolest, smartest, most capable protagonists I have had the pleasure of reading in a good long while. With regard to the other characters, my main complaint is how similar the majority of the characters sound to each other. Most everyone is a smarmy, fast-talking wiseguy with a mile-wide melodramatic streak, from the doctors to the Newsies. I like the additions to the cast this go-around, but the lack of distinct voices makes for a monotonous reading experience. [1. What's that old adage? When everyone's a wisecracking snarkist, no one is.] On the story and actual writing front, Blackout also leaves a girl wanting more. Well, actually, wanting less. The biggest issue with Blackout is its unnecessary length - the underlying conspiracy that runs through the trilogy, the truth that Georgia, Shaun and the gang are fighting so desperately to unveil? WE'VE KNOWN ABOUT IT SINCE BOOK 1 (and the beginning portion of book 2)! There is absolutely no need for the book to be half as long as it is, chock-full of repetitive action, driving scenes, medical tests, and so on that have no baring on the actual progression of the story or development of the characters.[2. Especially coming off reading such a fantastically taught and expertly written short novel in Nancy Kress's After the Fall, Before the Fall, During the Fall, Blackout's many excesses were all the more glaring!] Even the little epigraphs preceding each chapter - and I shouldn't call them "little" because there are at least 2 each time, and usually span at least a paragraph a pop - became tiresome and repetitive.[3. On a side note, that's a shame because some of the epigraphs were actually pertinent and reveal more to the story at large - but because 90% of them are pointless filler, the tendency is to want to skip them altogether.] That said, the actual conspiracy itself is a fantastic twist (well, not so twisty since we've kind of known about it for a while), and once the action and story proper actually starts moving along, Blackout becomes a much more enjoyable read. I can't write this review without addressing the two other significant detractors for me, personally, though. These are the two huge Jump the Shark moments from Blackout: 1. The Relationship between Georgia and Shaun; and 2. The Cloning/Pseudoscience/Shaun's Immunity Revelations. First, regarding the relationship between brother and sister, I simply cannot buy it. Not even in this book, not even with Georgia's 'explanation' (which feels very much like an editorial response to criticism of book 2 and that revelation). I don't care if the nature of their relationship is something that Georgia and Shaun never wrote down - the fact that we are living inside both Georgia and Shaun's heads for the full trilogy means that at some point, in Feed, Georgia could have/should have made some sort of reference to her very intimate, soulmate bond with her non-biological brother. I simply do not buy it (your mileage may vary, of course, but to me this revelation and attempt at rationalization felt inauthentic). Regarding the second, Shaun's immunity to KA and Georgia's cloning are also 'explained', and while these explanations are within the realm of possibility (this IS a zombie novel, after all), I still can't help but feel a little, well, unhappy with the way things turn out. The reason why Feed was such a powerful, resonant novel is because of its grounding in more tangible science, its taut political relevance, and the medical thriller aspect to the book. We lose that in Deadline and Blackout, which turns to fringe scifi with neural/synapse photography/memory imprinting and cloning of a fully grown human (still not sure how that worked so quickly). Mira Grant does a phenomenal job with making these applied phlebotinum technologies and sciences work, but it's a far cry from the more sturdy applications in Feed (again, your mileage may vary). All these criticisms voiced, I still finished Blackout and enjoyed the experience, for both the novel and for the series as a whole. The Newsflesh books have tremendous crossover genre potential - I hesitate to label them zombie books because the zombies play such a tangential, minor role to the characters and the true villains of the piece (not to mention the virus itself). While I wasn't wholly satisfied with the way things turned out, and Feed is clearly the vastly superior novel of the trilogy, Blackout is a solid read. And if you've come this far in the trilogy, you're gonna have to finish it. Right? Recommended...albeit with reservations. ...more “It's the oldest story in the world. Boy loves girl. Boy loses girl. Boy gets girl back thanks to the unethical behavior of megalomaniacal mad scientists who never met a corpse they wouldn't try to resurrect. Anyone coming within a hundred yards of my happy ending had better pray that they're immune to bullets.” I freaking loved it! IT was just fantastic, amazing and utterly badass! This trilogy must not be ignored, it MUST BE READ. trust me on this - i gave all three books Final rating: ★★★★★/★★★★★ “It's the oldest story in the world. Boy loves girl. Boy loses girl. Boy gets girl back thanks to the unethical behavior of megalomaniacal mad scientists who never met a corpse they wouldn't try to resurrect. Anyone coming within a hundred yards of my happy ending had better pray that they're immune to bullets.” I freaking loved it! IT was just fantastic, amazing and utterly badass! ♥ This trilogy must not be ignored, it MUST BE READ. trust me on this - i gave all three books of this trilogy 5 stars. And it was worth it. I will so going to miss these books. Especially because of the characters. After all, this series proved to be great in characterization and good in story. I loved how the story concluded. I was not disappointed and now i am utterly happy. Anyway, do not read this review if you haven't read Feed & Deadline...(p.s. stuff under spoilers can be really heavy) I just knew it from the start that George and Shaun were in relationship, real one. I approve of that because they were not blood related but it also saved Shaun's life (view spoiler)[ he is immune because he had sex with Georgia........hm......nice (hide spoiler)]. That was the one thing we never wrote down—the one thing we couldn’t write down, because no file or server is ever totally secure, and it would have gotten out. No one would have cared that we weren’t biologically related, or that we’d gone in for genetic testing when we turned sixteen, just to be absolutely sure. No one would have cared that we didn’t trust anyone else enough to let them be there while we slept. No. The media loves a scandal, and we’d been raised as siblings in the public eye. It would have destroyed our ratings, and then the Masons would have destroyed us, for blackening the family name. There were a few people who’d guessed over the years. I’m pretty sure that Buffy knew. But we never, never wrote it down. I loved all of the people from After the end Times, especially Becks and Mahir. Dave was cool too :D I am just said that Becks didn't get any chance with Shaun, when she clearly was in love with him. I liked her a lot. (view spoiler)[I was really said when she decided to blow herself up to save them all T_T (hide spoiler)] “Last guy I was interested in turned out to be an incestuous necrophiliac," she said. "So no, not currently dating, and definitely not doing any more shopping in the 'sociopath' category” The ending was just what i wanted it to be. Concluded and explained. Thankfully they didn't bore with politics and they more focused on Kellis-Amberlee and other events. spoilers for the end of the book => (view spoiler)[ In the end, we conclude that government wanted to control people with a zombie apocalypse, through fear. And all because they couldn't find the cure. Even though they knew that people with Retinal KA were starting to get immune to virus, they killed them to hush that. It was really wrong and i am glad that that solved at the end. Also Shaun & Georgia getting a happy end too. If only Mira Grant made another chapter with what they are doing, IT WOULD BE AMAZEBALLS (hide spoiler)] ____________________________________________ ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ____________________________________________ MY NEWSFLESH REVIEWS: ◉ Feed (Newsflesh Trilogy, #1) ◉ Deadline (Newsflesh Trilogy, #2) ◉ Blackout (Newsflesh Trilogy, #3) ◉ How Green This Land, How Blue This Sea (Newsflesh Trilogy #3.5) This review can be found on my blog: infinity-of-time.blogspot.com also known as... ...more
Welcome to MiraGrant.com, the home of horror author Mira Grant. Mira Grant is the author of the Newsflesh Trilogy (Feed, Deadline, Blackout), published by ..
Blackout is the third book in the Newsflesh Trilogy, a science fiction/horror series set after a zombie apocalypse, written by Seanan McGuire under the penname Mira Grant, and published by Orbit Books.
Book Three: BLACKOUT. The year is 2041, and the investigation that began with the election of President Ryman is much bigger than anyone had assumed.
The explosive conclusion to the Newsflesh trilogy from New York Times bestseller Mira Grant. Rise up while you can. -Georgia Mason The year was 2014.
Blackout Mira Grant Cover.jpg.. Author, Seanan McGuire (writing as Mira Grant) .. written by Seanan McGuire under the penname Mira Grant, and published by ..
Apr 24, 2012.. At long last, it's the third book of Mira Grant's Newsflesh trilogy. We're proud to present the first chapter of Blackout, the final chapter in the ..
