(Note: I wrote this a long long long time ago and just noticed that my blogger dashboard thingy says it's unpublished. So boom. Published.)
WHEN WILL I LEARN??? I finished this days ago and already lent the book out AND NOW I REMEMBER NOTHING.
Ummm.
Here is a better synopsis than I care to write: Tada!
Something that bothers me: in the first book, they act as if jumping into books is this novel thing that no one knows about. When she goes into Jane Eyre, no one there mentions Jurisfiction, the Great Library, or the Character Exchange Program. When she's in that world it's just like ours, basically. Fforde treats it like going back in time, sort of. But now in this book characters jump from book to book, they communicate through footnotes, they make small alterations to stories as needed, and it's like between books Fforde had this idea of a world behind the pages and decided to write it out even though it doesn't really make sense when compared to the first one. It's a wonderful premise, but it doesn't fit!
That's my only problem.
Sunday, April 26, 2015
Mark Tufo
I just finished book 5 of the Zombie Fallout series by Mark Tufo. The series started out kind of funny, kind of interesting. The main character, Michael Talbot, is pretty crazy, has pretty bad luck, and somehow surrounds himself with zany, wacky characters. Also, Tufo has little problem putting his main characters in danger, which is refreshing. So often as a series goes on it can get pretty routine, because you know the main guys aren't going anywhere. So Tufo is a welcome change. Or was.
Book 5 (Alive in a Dead World) was a bit of a bore. Also, I've started to notice some repetitiveness that could be forgiven in, say, a Stephen King book, but in this mediocre writing is a big distraction and annoyance.
Michael and his brothers all call each other "brother". In this book it's mainly Michael and one brother, but he's done this when speaking to all his brothers, one on one, in the past books and I bet it gets pretty confusing when all 4 of them are in the same room. Also, none of them are Hulk Hogan so they should just stop. If it was just the Talbots, maybe I could forgive it, but the two main bad guys of the book, Tomas and Eliza, also call each other brother and sister. Nope, Tufo, I'm not buying it.
In previous books sometimes Michael (or less frequently other characters) would include a story from the past into their narration. In book 5 Tufo takes this to a whole 'nother level of distraction by having one guy be reminded of an incident in college WHILE FIGHTING A ZOMBIE. In this middle of this fight, we as the reader are treated to the entire college thing in excruciating detail. Honestly, it had absolutely no bearing on the fight. It was a distraction that had zero point. It's like Tufo just wanted to shoehorn that in somewhere and picked a spot at random.
"Oh, the zombie is chasing me! I better hold this door closed. Oh, that reminds me of the time in college we did blah blah blah........."
........30 minutes of narration later "and that's how that happened. Anyway, oh yeah, gotta hold this zombie out"
We were also treated, elsewhere in the book, to the time Michael and two friends went to a concert one weekend and got really really super drunk and also high on the weed and the mushrooms. This one had the added bonus of Michael, a father of 3, driving whilst very drunk and endangering the lives of his friends and EVERYONE ELSE.
This was the second story of the book that included these same friends going to a concert and drinking a lot. The first story ended with a car crash and all 3 on the hospital. As teenagers. This taught them nothing, obviously.
This book would have been probably 2 hours shorter if people stopped getting distracted by their own memories. I think Tufo was just trying to cram in extra shit so it would seem like an actual book and not just self-published crap.
Another way he has of filling up pages is to have his characters ask leading questions so other characters can explain the plot in great detail to each other even though we as the readers are way ahead of them. Oh and also he has them ask shit just so he can throw in useless info, like what "run flat" tires are. Like it's not totally evident in the name. Like you would even ask this question as you were rushing your dying husband to a doctor. (This was in an earlier book. Mike had just literally died and then miraculously came back to life, and he's being transported to a military base with his wife in a humvee, and she hears one of the guys say "run flat" and asks what that is and then we have to listen to the answer along with her, and it's like no, Tufo, she doesn't need to ask. She knows what it is. We all know what it is. Let's focus on the fact her husband was shot and his heart stopped beating and now it is again. No need to try to hold our attention with tire talk)
And lastly!!! Tufo hates cats. The scene with the cats was disturbing. You don't even have to be a cat lover to be bothered! Just care a little about animals at all and I swear this part will disappoint you. In case you're wondering, Mike's friend Paul is a complete doofus who just barely escapes zombies, and ends up with a broken leg and a sprained ankle, and gunshot in his foot THAT HE PUT THERE HIMSELF, in a house where several dozens of cats have been trapped since the apocalypse has started. They do what cats do. It's not pretty, but it's understandable. Mike finds his friend's body, and the cats, and reacts very violently. Look, I have 2 cats. I know that if I die on Monday they'll have started eating me by Wednesday. But they're animals and they can't open doors or order pizza, so I accept that fact. I wouldn't hate them for it.
Now a little bit about the author himself, Mark Tufo. He was born in Boston. Oh, so was Michael Talbot. He was a marine. So was Micheal Talbot!! He has 3 children and two English bulldogs. SO DOES MICHAEL TALBOT HOLY SHIT TALBOT IS TOTALLY TUFO'S MARY SUE.
I only just found that out when I linked to his Amazon author page. I don't know why a Mary Sue character is such a pet peeve of mine, but it is, and now that I've seen more evidence to support what I've kind of suspected, I'm not even sure I can give Tufo even one more chance.
Well, actually, I will because I still have one more book I've already paid for, so I'll finish it out of spite.
Book 5 (Alive in a Dead World) was a bit of a bore. Also, I've started to notice some repetitiveness that could be forgiven in, say, a Stephen King book, but in this mediocre writing is a big distraction and annoyance.
Michael and his brothers all call each other "brother". In this book it's mainly Michael and one brother, but he's done this when speaking to all his brothers, one on one, in the past books and I bet it gets pretty confusing when all 4 of them are in the same room. Also, none of them are Hulk Hogan so they should just stop. If it was just the Talbots, maybe I could forgive it, but the two main bad guys of the book, Tomas and Eliza, also call each other brother and sister. Nope, Tufo, I'm not buying it.
In previous books sometimes Michael (or less frequently other characters) would include a story from the past into their narration. In book 5 Tufo takes this to a whole 'nother level of distraction by having one guy be reminded of an incident in college WHILE FIGHTING A ZOMBIE. In this middle of this fight, we as the reader are treated to the entire college thing in excruciating detail. Honestly, it had absolutely no bearing on the fight. It was a distraction that had zero point. It's like Tufo just wanted to shoehorn that in somewhere and picked a spot at random.
"Oh, the zombie is chasing me! I better hold this door closed. Oh, that reminds me of the time in college we did blah blah blah........."
........30 minutes of narration later "and that's how that happened. Anyway, oh yeah, gotta hold this zombie out"
We were also treated, elsewhere in the book, to the time Michael and two friends went to a concert one weekend and got really really super drunk and also high on the weed and the mushrooms. This one had the added bonus of Michael, a father of 3, driving whilst very drunk and endangering the lives of his friends and EVERYONE ELSE.
This was the second story of the book that included these same friends going to a concert and drinking a lot. The first story ended with a car crash and all 3 on the hospital. As teenagers. This taught them nothing, obviously.
This book would have been probably 2 hours shorter if people stopped getting distracted by their own memories. I think Tufo was just trying to cram in extra shit so it would seem like an actual book and not just self-published crap.
Another way he has of filling up pages is to have his characters ask leading questions so other characters can explain the plot in great detail to each other even though we as the readers are way ahead of them. Oh and also he has them ask shit just so he can throw in useless info, like what "run flat" tires are. Like it's not totally evident in the name. Like you would even ask this question as you were rushing your dying husband to a doctor. (This was in an earlier book. Mike had just literally died and then miraculously came back to life, and he's being transported to a military base with his wife in a humvee, and she hears one of the guys say "run flat" and asks what that is and then we have to listen to the answer along with her, and it's like no, Tufo, she doesn't need to ask. She knows what it is. We all know what it is. Let's focus on the fact her husband was shot and his heart stopped beating and now it is again. No need to try to hold our attention with tire talk)
And lastly!!! Tufo hates cats. The scene with the cats was disturbing. You don't even have to be a cat lover to be bothered! Just care a little about animals at all and I swear this part will disappoint you. In case you're wondering, Mike's friend Paul is a complete doofus who just barely escapes zombies, and ends up with a broken leg and a sprained ankle, and gunshot in his foot THAT HE PUT THERE HIMSELF, in a house where several dozens of cats have been trapped since the apocalypse has started. They do what cats do. It's not pretty, but it's understandable. Mike finds his friend's body, and the cats, and reacts very violently. Look, I have 2 cats. I know that if I die on Monday they'll have started eating me by Wednesday. But they're animals and they can't open doors or order pizza, so I accept that fact. I wouldn't hate them for it.
Now a little bit about the author himself, Mark Tufo. He was born in Boston. Oh, so was Michael Talbot. He was a marine. So was Micheal Talbot!! He has 3 children and two English bulldogs. SO DOES MICHAEL TALBOT HOLY SHIT TALBOT IS TOTALLY TUFO'S MARY SUE.
I only just found that out when I linked to his Amazon author page. I don't know why a Mary Sue character is such a pet peeve of mine, but it is, and now that I've seen more evidence to support what I've kind of suspected, I'm not even sure I can give Tufo even one more chance.
Well, actually, I will because I still have one more book I've already paid for, so I'll finish it out of spite.
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