Boyd Craven

I loved the whole series!

Somehow, I never read the last couple of books in the series, so I just re-read all of them so I could finish this one. I loved them all, all over again.
The story line is an interesting one to me. While I'm not a hard-core prepper, I do believe in knowing how to do things 'the ol-fashioned way.' Electronics and technology are great, but if something like this were to really happen (one good war is all it would take), there'd be a lot of people caught with their pants down. I like that Boyd writes from some experience; I like it even more that he does some serious research for his stories. He writes from a perspective and voice that is believable and it flows very well. The characters and their back-stories work very well as he introduces new people into the plot.
One thing that I didn't really notice the first time I read this series was that there is almost zero cursing, there is zero gratuitous sex (even with the horrors of what they're going through, it is possible to infer what is going on without resorting to being graphic. Great job!), and while there is religion, it isn't overtly pushed down your throat. It's as clean and (dare I say it?) wholesome as you can get with this subject, while still keeping me interested and pretty much reading non-stop from Book 1, all the way through Book 11! I think I read all of them in less than a week...
Is it too much to hope for just ONE more in this series? Kind of an update to the ending of this one? I need just a bit more closure and need to know what the next year or so brings...
And now I'm off to re-read the first of the Opus series so I can finish them!… (altro)

Set in the same time frame during the same disaster as Craven's earlier novel Good Fences, Northern Lights is the story of a small group of friends who go for a fishing trip in a remote lake area of Canada accessible only by float plane. Unfortunately for them, after the last ferrying trip bringing them in there's a bright flash in the sky and the pilot's pacemaker ceases to function causing him to crash the plane on the way out.

Naturally, one of the friends is a prepper and brought along a bunch of superfluous stuff that later becomes pivotal in their survival, whilst it's awfully convenient for the plot, it's actually framed in a way that gives some background to the character in question as a bit of a social awkward guy. This plays into the story as it develops as one of the friends on the trip is actually married to his ex-wife, the perfect recipe for a stay in an isolated cabin in the woods.

There's plenty of detail spent on the survival aspect of the story, some people may find it over kill however I felt it added a bit of realism to the tale. So whilst it's not particularly long and as I mentioned in my review of Good Fences, this also doesn't really cover any new ground in the genre it is a light and entertaining book, so if what you're looking for is a prepping slash survival book that's entertaining this, like Good Fences, may be the book for you.

I found that the wilderness setting of this installment was a bit more interesting than that of the urban setting in Good Fences, that being said though both settings do have their good aspects to them.… (altro)

Good Fences is a pretty decent novel about the immediate aftermath of an EMP attack on the United States as it specifically relates to one man, his farm and his neighbours.

Whilst it's nothing new for the genre containing the usual fare of I want to help the people around me, but if I help the people around me I'll be over run by hungry mouths and also has the roaming gangs that typically appear in the genre. As well as the miraculous buying of most of the items the character requires to survive just before disaster strikes. It is however written in a way that's engaging and has you rooting for the protagonist Brian Cartwright who has had a rather poor deck of cards dealt to him in life.

So whilst it doesn't really explore any new territory for the genre it is a light and entertaining book, so if what you're looking for is a prepping slash survival book that's entertaining this may be the book for you.… (altro)