Under a Graveyard Sky

John Ringo has written another good yarn, and if I counted correctly he only went out of his way to insult liberals three times and one of those was pretty stealthy. I liked a lot about this book, starting with the zombies not being “undead” just being severely sick with something that causes them to lose their minds and bite people. Even the eating of people seems somewhat ancillary; they're just doing it because people are available food that they don't have to work too hard for. As usual, there's lots of gun porn with names and measurements that non-gun nuts won't understand or really care about. Fortunately, he does a good job of letting those of us with that affliction know when the ammo is supposed to rip you in half or just sting a little.

There was one scene that cost this review a whole star, and when it happened I put the book down for a minute and said “that's the stupidest thing ever written.” It might not be, but it's definitely the stupidest and most inconsistent plot point I've ever read. At the end of the first half of the book, when all of our main characters have been drawn off their cozy boat and into the middle of NYC in the beginning of the zombie apocalypse and all the grown-ups (and the kids too) know that it is just seconds away from hitting the fan, they decide to go to a concert in Central Park. Seriously, wtf? No reasonable adult that knows the truth of the situation is going to be persuaded to go into NYC to see a concert because one of their kids whines that she's never seen a concert before.

The other star was lost because there's no ending. There's a little bit of a crescendo of action, but nothing gets resolved. I know it's a trilogy, and the last words are “to be continued,” but there has to be some end to the story.

Other than those major quibbles, it's a fine fun story.