Joe Ledger is a badass cop who's about to become a badass FBI agent. He has some issues due to some terrible stuff in his past - if I remember right, something about him, when he was a teen, being forced to watch his girlfriend get gang raped, after which they both entered therapy and she eventually committed suicide. But he's found a way to turn his issues into assets. He's in perfect control of himself, and nothing and no one can take him in a fight.

But then he kills a terrorist, after which he's brought to a shadowy guy named Mr. Church. Mr. Church has him take part in a test that involves restraining a man...who turns out to be the same terrorist Joe thought he killed, only now the terrorist is a biter and stinks like rotting flesh. Joe is asked to join Mr. Church's shadowy government organization, which is trying to stop a terrorist group bent on making the United States ground zero for a zombie pandemic.

The good: As usual, I enjoyed Ray Porter's narration. This book made me wonder just how many accents he has under his belt - he got to use a lot this time around and my only real complaint was that it occasionally took him a while to get a proper handle on how some of the characters sounded (the one I'm most thinking of here is Joe's friend and psychiatrist, Rudy). The battles were usually pretty good - my favorite was probably the part at the crab processing plant. Maberry's science-based explanation for the zombies was intriguing (prions + genius mad scientist), and the new zombies introduced near the end of the book were interesting. And I was mildly amused by Mr. Church's ever-present plates of Oreos and vanilla wafers.

The bad: For a military thriller featuring zombies, this was surprisingly boring. So boring that I came very close to not finishing it in time and was forced to speed the narration up, even though I really like Ray Porter's regular narration speed. It took at least half the book for most of the action to get started.

The characters were either giant cliches or forgettable. Or both. I got tired of hearing how amazing a fighter (oh sorry, "warrior") Joe was. As much as he'd claim to not be perfect, or not be as experienced or knowledgeable as other men Mr. Church could have brought in, all evidence indicated that he was this world's number one combat machine. Grace was his enormously obvious future love interest - the one thing that surprised me was that Maberry didn't include cringe-worthy on-page "confirming we're alive" sex between Grace and Joe, just a quick mention that they'd ended up in bed together (meanwhile, I was thinking about Joe's fridged girlfriend). The book does have cringe-worthy sex between two of the villains, though.

The villains were awful. The bulk of them were stereotypical Islamic terrorists. There was also a sexy female scientist who could apparently turn men's brains to jelly with a look, and an idiot who was bankrolling the terrorists and couldn't see the flaws in his plans to get rich via religious fanatic-created zombies. The one villain who marginally interested me was Toys (no idea if I'm spelling his name right), the idiot's employee and the closest thing he had to a friend.

Also, one thing I wish Maberry had done was mention the First Lady's name sooner. Or the vice president, or president. I don't remember what the First Lady's name was, but I do remember that it confirmed that neither she nor the president were real-life people. I suspect that the entire Liberty Bell ceremony scene would have gone over a bit better with me if I had read it when this book was originally published. The thought of Mr. Church's group answering directly to the current president made me shiver with horror.

I'm glad I finished this, so there isn't even the tiniest of nagging voices in my head, wondering how things turned out. But I have zero plans to read the next book.

(Original review posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)

Interesting and full of suspense. Some of the descriptions about financial options can get a little tedious.  All in all a very good book. Action carries the plot with the need for vulgar language or sexual content.

"Next book" feature on fictfact ... love/hate.

Off Armageddon Reef - David Weber is a series I've been meaning to start forever.  (A favorite author but after deciding to wait to start until series farther along it somehow slipped through the cracks).

I'm submitting a librarian correction for ISBN 9780553897821 (http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/78804/dune-house-atreides-by-brian-herbert/9780553897821 ) because that ISBN is actually for "House Atreides," the first book in the Dune prequels.  I'm pretty sure I read at least this first one before but another series I stalled on (not for content, just because got tired of waiting and paying for hardcover sequels then lost track).

Sunday Soup - Betty Rosbottom just browsing because fall and winter makes me think "soup" and am looking for interesting recipes.

I love to travel, but I hate airplanes and fear "traveler's diarrhea." I also am risk-averse, and know that, realistically, I will probably never work up the guts to travel to the more politically dangerous areas of the world even if I could scrounge up the money and vacation time to do so. It's because of this that I love books like this one, in which a knowledgeable guide takes me deeper into a place than I could ever go on my own.

In a country like Iran, this is even more important -- not only because authentic Iranian voices rarely reach the U.S., but also because the "news" we receive about the Middle East is little more than propaganda and sound bytes, when we receive news at all.

I'm so glad Moaveni has written about her experience living in Iran after growing up as part of the Iranian immigrant community in the United States. I wish everyone who worked for a sensationalist news outlet (not naming names) would read books like this, which provide a more nuanced and complicated picture of life in Iran. Yes, there are cumbersome rules about the wearing of the veil, but there are also women who paint their toenails, drive, and have careers. This does not in any way "soften" the reality of living under a repressive regime -- the stories Moaveni told about the "morality police," the "torture next door" and the celebrations broken up by violence were truly chilling. I cannot imagine living in a place where having your boyfriend beat when you go out together is a regular occurrence. But by sharing the conversations Iranians were having around their dining room tables, as well as those she experienced at the hands of a frequent "interrogator" of journalists, Mr. X, I could get a little closer to understanding Iran not only as a place of oppression, but also as a place that thousands still call home.

This book is well written but can be dense in places, requiring a slower, more thoughtful pace. I sometimes had trouble keeping characters straight, especially when they had similar names. The book left me overall with a somewhat haunted feeling, as if I had just journeyed somewhere very far from home that will take me a long time to process. In a way, I have. That may be why I am having so much trouble articulating my reaction to this book.

But it was powerful, with an ending that was as satisfying as a book about such an unsatisfactory situation could be.

http://subversiveliving.blogspot.com/2015/03/an-alternative-perspective.html