Paperback, 236 pages
Published November 12th 2011 by Permuted Press
ISBN 13: 9781934861851
Source: Tour, for the purpose of an honest review
Genre: Zombie Apocalypse
Series: The Becoming, book #1
Stars: 2
I enjoyed the mix of characters the most. They come from
various walks of life and bring many different things to this tale. From the
very beginning I thought Cade would bring the most badassery to the book. I was
wrong on this. It took her a little while to draw me in to think of her as a
strong heroine. Brandt a Lieutenant in the US Marines seems the most level of
the group, which considering some of his actions is not saying a lot. He also
saw the beginning of the fall. He was one of the many people at the site of the
first quarantine. That fact alone leads me to believe that he knows something
or at least has seen stuff that he is not sharing with the group. The group continually
grows throughout The Becoming.
Readers start following two and by the end of the book there are seven.
Readers follow this ever growing rag tag group of survivors
from the very beginning of the outbreak. I had some doubts about their
reactions, while believable for some types of people it didn’t fit with some of
the members of this group. Cade and Ethan are best friends and neighbors. They
are together from the beginning of the fall of Memphis. They even make the
decision together to leave Memphis which is where this book really gains it
momentum.
I found some of the characters actions very contradictory.
It mostly has to deal with guns and the characters reactions involving guns.
Ethan, a cop seems to not want them around the group. He also has issues with
acquiring more, he didn’t seem to like Cade’s choice in firearm and was overly
concerned about permits. Cade, Israeli Defense Force sharp shooter keeps all
guns in her home unloaded, locked in a safe, hidden, all not easy to use for
defense purposes. Cade may have had these precautions due to the kid in her home.
I am curious on that, where would the guns had been had her niece not been
staying with her. I found myself wanting to explain ‘the end of the world’ ‘zombie
apocalypse’ ‘self preservation’ and ‘martial law’ to the characters on too many
occasions.
I am curious about where Jessica is going with this trilogy.
I’ve noticed with most zombie apocalypse books I have read there seems to be an
overall goal or plan for the survivors the tale follows. I have no idea what
this groups big picture plan is. I will most likely move on with this series. I
liked the characters. I want to know more about how they plan to survive in
this world. I also want to know more about the zombies. The group is
discovering more about them. They have some interesting characteristics and
abilities. I want to know more on that.
***Ethan drives a Jeep!***
Jessica in all of her awesomeness is giving away 2 eBooks of The Becoming! Comment with email address and tell us what your favorite zombie movie is. You can also comment on the interview to be entered in the giveaway as well.
Excerpt
Brandt Evans’s scuffed
black combat boots struck the wet pavement heavily as he ran down the
rain-dampened street. His heart hammered wildly against his ribs, as if it were
trying to beat free from his chest. His breathing was loud and harsh. His hands
sweated and shook uncontrollably. His whole body was on edge.
He had been running
for over half an hour.
Brandt ducked into an
alley without slowing his pace. He dropped down beside a smelly, overflowing
green dumpster to hide. Leaning back against the cool brick wall, he felt the
solidness of it, the rough stones scraping against his back through his thin
t-shirt. He closed his eyes and struggled to breathe. His lungs burned. His
eyes hurt.
He was a rabbit trying
to outrun a fox. Hunted. Desperate.
He just needed a
moment to rest. Just one moment. He could spare a moment, couldn’t he?
Brandt leaned forward
and peered at the alleyway’s opening. He took in a deep breath of the sharp,
cold January air and rubbed his hands over each of his arms in turn to ward off
the chill. He’d lost his jacket at some point during the chase, and he
desperately wished he still had it as he hunched over and shivered. He held his
breath until his chest ached, and then he slowly released it. It clouded the
air before his face.
Brandt thought he
might have lost them, but he didn’t want to take any chances. There was no way
to know how many had followed him, how many had caught his scent. He had to
assume that it wasn’t just one or two. He had to assume that he was being
pursued. Always pursued. If he let his guard down…
Brandt wiped his
sweating palms down the thighs of his camouflage pants and leaned back against
the wall again. He knew what would happen if he were caught. He’d seen many of
his fellow soldiers succumb to the plague. He knew that if he were caught, it
would all end in blood and pain and death. It was not the end he had envisioned
for himself when he’d taken this mission, and he refused to let it turn out
that way.
The faces of the other
soldiers flashed through Brandt’s mind, and guilt settled heavily over him. Even
he had known the exact moment when the quarantine failed, when the
mission fell apart. But rather than acknowledge the abject failure of the
mission and order a retreat, those in command had continued to bark orders at
those under their charges to fight and to die.
The guilt of surviving
would plague Brandt for the rest of his life.
Brandt had to get out
of the city, as soon as he possibly could, if he expected to stay alive. He had
to run. He had to get ahead of the infection, flee, and find a safe place to
hide. He didn’t care that he’d abandoned his post. His post didn’t exist
anymore, as far as he was concerned. Half of the military didn’t. They’d all
died or turned within the past several hours. All except for him.
A faint noise echoed
from the alleyway’s entrance. Brandt’s heart jumped into his throat and choked
him. Brandt leaned to peer around the edge of the dumpster again, and his hand
wandered to the military-issue Beretta M9 handgun at his hip. He drew it and
ejected the magazine to look inside. It was empty, as expected. He pulled back
the slide. He already knew what he would find: a single bullet, the one he’d
carefully counted ammunition to save. Just in case.
But Brandt was nothing
if not a survivor. Even with the lone bullet in his possession, he’d never have
the will to use it on himself. He snapped the magazine back into the gun as
quietly as he could. The sound was too loud to his ears, and he worried that
the simple action would draw unwanted attention to him.
As if on cue, a
shuffling noise came from the other side of the dumpster. A quiet snarl
followed it, along with an odd snuffling sound. Brandt closed his eyes and
instinctively pressed his back more firmly against the brick wall. He became
the rabbit again, shrinking back among the loose trash that skittered about in
the stiff, cold wind; he hoped against hope that he wouldn’t be sniffed out.
Another jolt of adrenaline pumped into Brandt’s veins as an ominous chill ran
down his spine and raised the hair on the back of his neck. He could have sunk
into the bricks and hidden inside them.
Brandt’s instincts
whispered that there was not going to be an escape from this one. Brandt wasn’t
sure how much more of this he could take. The idea of being chased, of being
caught, was slowly driving him insane. He had to do something, anything
to alleviate the awful sensation.
Brandt took a deep,
steadying breath and stood abruptly. His head swam at the sudden movement; his
vision dimmed, and the alleyway spun around him. His heart lurched in his
chest. Brandt shook his head and caught his hand against the dumpster to steady
himself as he lifted the gun. The weapon felt incredibly heavy, and the barrel
trembled. He swallowed and curled his finger to depress the trigger.
Time slowed to a
crawl.
The last bullet left
the gun with a loud bang. The bullet whipped past the blood-covered man who ran
down the alleyway toward Brandt. It embedded into the wall with a splatter of
brick. Shards of red stone sprayed the man and cut into his cheek. He seemed
unaffected as he continued his pursuit of Brandt.
Brandt stumbled back.
The emptied Beretta fell from his limp hand to the pavement. Brandt looked left
and right frantically. Thoughts blazed through his mind in a flurry, faster
than he could catch them. His shot had missed? How had it missed when the
target was so close? He was an expert marksman, for Christ’s sake! He wasn’t
supposed to miss!
Brandt’s dark eyes
alternately darted from the man to the alley walls on either side of him.
Should he try to run past the man? Should he fight and kill him? Either way, he
was likely dead.
Brandt swore under his
breath and mentally inventoried the weapons left on his person. There hadn’t
been much to begin with: just the sidearm that now lay expended on the pavement
and a rifle Brandt had abandoned once he’d run out of ammunition for it. The
extra weight of the spent weapon had been a hindrance to his flight. He took a
couple of steps back and remembered the one weapon he had left.
Brandt knelt and
pulled his KA-BAR knife free from the sheath strapped to the outside of his
right boot. It wasn’t much, and he wasn’t sure how much damage the seven-inch
blade could actually cause, but it was all he had left. He stood just in time.
The man launched himself at Brandt, hands extended, hatred in his red-rimmed,
bloodshot eyes.
Instinct guided Brandt
as he lifted the knife sharply upwards and stood from his kneeling position. In
one smooth move that should have been deadly, Brandt slammed the knife’s blade
into the fleshy underside of the man’s lower jaw.
To Brandt’s dismay,
the man’s gnarled hands closed in tight fists on Brandt’s shirt. The man shook
his head violently to free the knife from his jaw. Trapped, Brandt struggled to
pull himself from the man’s grip, but the man was stronger than he looked.
So Brandt did the only
thing he could. He wrenched the knife roughly from the man’s jaw and slammed it
with all the strength left in his limbs directly into the man’s left temple.
Shock invaded the
man’s features as the blade struck home. His forward momentum carried him a few
more steps after Brandt struck the fatal blow. He leaned heavily against Brandt
and then fell to the pavement, hard.
Brandt backed away from
the body, shuddering as nausea welled up in his throat. He shook the sensation
off and took his first real look at the man who had attacked him. He wasn’t
anyone Brandt recognized, which was the best news Brandt would get all day.
This man was too old to have been a current member of the military. He was
around seventy years old, thin and bony and wrinkled with age, hair white and
sparse on his head. His body was clad in dirtied sweatpants and a bloodstained
white bathrobe, his feet bare and torn from running without shoes on the cold,
unforgiving streets and sidewalks of Atlanta. The elderly man was definitely a
civilian, possibly from one of the local nursing homes. Judging by the crusted
blood under his lengthening, yellowed fingernails, the man had been ill for at
least four days.
Brandt leaned down and
grasped the hilt of the knife, pulling it free from the man’s temple. It slid
away from the bone and flesh with an indescribable sound that made Brandt
nearly drop the weapon as he shuddered in disgust. He took a moment to wipe the
blood from the blade onto the edge of the dead man’s bathrobe. He had no desire
to continue his examination of the dead body before him. Brandt looked instead
to the Beretta lying on the wet pavement. The weapon was empty; it wouldn’t do
him any further good. The chances that he would find much suitable ammunition
for it in a city under siege were slim, and searching for it wasn’t worth his
time. The general populace had days before raided the gun shops and sports
stores in the city for anything usable that had been left behind by the
military, and all of the ammunition stores were most likely bare. Regardless,
he scooped the gun up and jammed it into the holster on his belt.
Brandt looked around
the darkening alley. Night had begun to fall, the dusk settling over the alley
and making it difficult to see. He tried to center his mind and figure out
where to go, what to do. He couldn’t stay on the streets in the dark; it
increased his chances of being killed tenfold. The city still crumbled around
him, so he needed to move fast. His options were severely limited.
Brandt turned in a
slow circle and spotted a red ladder hanging at the end of the alley, almost
invisible in the dark. A fire escape, he realized. It at least offered an
alternative to returning to the street. He glanced over his shoulder to make
sure nothing else was coming in his direction. Then he returned the knife to
its sheath on his boot and jumped up. He caught the bottom rung of the ladder
and hauled himself onto it, his biceps bulging as he dragged himself up. He
began to climb as quickly as he dared.
The metal rungs were
slick with rain and ice, and they bit into Brandt’s palms and fingers as he
trekked up the ladder. His boots slipped on the icy rungs more than once and
sent his heart faltering in his chest. It was only through his own reflexes
that he didn’t fall from the ladder and to the pavement below. The thought of
breaking bones and leaving himself helpless was enough to keep him on his
guard. There would be no salvation for him if he ended up with a broken leg in
a dirty alley in downtown Atlanta. In that situation, he could just slap a sign
on himself that said “dinner” and lie back to wait for his end.
Brandt reached the
roof easily enough and gained his footing on the flat graveled surface. From
there, he took a few moments to look out across the city and plan his next
step. Smoke billowed on the horizon, close to the edge of the downtown metro
area. A tornado siren blasted its monotonous refrain from somewhere in the
city, warning Atlanta residents to get to a safe place. Gunfire rang out too
close to Brandt’s position for comfort. Screams echoed faintly through the
streets nearby, but Brandt didn’t dare check out the source. An ambulance siren
played its part in the symphony of a city falling in on itself.
Brandt dropped to his
knees, suddenly overwhelmed by the trauma he’d experienced that day. He ignored
the gravel digging into his skin through his pants and covered his mouth as he
fought off the bile that rose in his throat. The horror he’d faced throbbed in
his brain even as he closed his eyes. The things Brandt had seen that day were
worse than anything he’d ever dreamed of seeing overseas in combat; the images
would stay with him forever. It was all Brandt could do to remain upright in
his kneeling position as he fought to choke back the sickness in his mouth and
in his soul.
Brandt couldn’t hold
it back, though, and he hunched over the gravel and vomited. His throat burned
and his eyes watered as he gripped the edge of the building and dug his fingers
into the stone. His chest heaved as he coughed up the remains of his last meal.
Brandt rocked back on his heels, wiping at his mouth with the back of his hand,
and cleared his throat. The taste in his mouth was awful, but it was the last
thing on his mind. He felt at his face, testing his own temperature as best he
could. Brandt couldn’t tell if he was running a fever or if it was just heat
generated by his climb up the fire escape ladder. He was sure he would be
feeling the symptoms by now if…
Brandt shook his head,
clearing his throat once more as he took in the view. “A virus did all of
this?” he whispered hoarsely. He looked upon the city once more. The city in
which he’d grown up. The city he had loved more than any other city he’d seen
in his time in the military. It was like nothing Brandt had ever witnessed
before. It was the beginning of the end of civilization, and the thought
terrified him. “How can this even be possible?” he asked out loud to no one.
Derek Rivers was
wrong. Derek Rivers had to have been wrong. The man who had warned him of this
very possibility was long dead, one of the early victims of the viral outbreak
that, even now, swept over Atlanta and beyond with a speed to rival the Black
Death itself. Brandt had thought that Derek had exaggerated in his tales of
test subjects and viruses and drugs. But Derek hadn’t exaggerated. Indeed,
Derek hadn’t gone far enough in his description of the total devastation that
the virus could visit upon the city. Brandt doubted that the man had ever
thought it would get this far, that he had ever thought his worst-case scenario
would come so terrifyingly true.
“Which way, which
way?” Brandt whispered. He forced himself to his feet once more. It wasn’t time
to be puking on a roof and reminiscing about men who were likely dead. He
slowly surveyed the rooftop, searching for an escape route and a plan. He
looked in every direction, uncertain which way would be safest. None of them,
really. Safety was a foreign concept to Atlanta now.
Before Brandt went
anywhere, however, he needed weapons. He needed food. He needed water. And he
needed a place to hide for the night.
Be sure to check out the other blogs participating in this tour!
- Alison Groen, Rosie Discovers 05/27/2012 Review
- Reena Jacobs, Ramblings of an Amateur Author 05/29/2012 Bio/Excerpt
- Rea, Rea's Reading and Reviews 05/30/2012 Bio/Excerpt
- Vanessa Romano, The Jeep Diva 05/31/2012 Interview
- Teressa Morris, Window on the World 06/01/2012 Review
- Jessica Mason, Wickedly Bookish 06/02/2012 Review
- Gwen Perkins, A Few Words 06/03/2012 Guest Blog
- Kriss Morton, Cabin Goddess 06/05/2012 Guest Blog
- Suzie, Books Reviewed by Bunny 06/06/2012 Interview
- Susan Peck, My Cozie Corner 06/08/2012 Review
- Kimberley, Turning The Pages 06/09/2012
Wonderful excerpt!
ReplyDeleteI like Dawn of the Dead. Thanks for the giveaway.
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This giveaway is now closed.
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