Download The Great Collapse fb2

I've been on a post-apocalyptic bender for several months, and this ranks as a good "classic" stlye of p-a novel. It's well written for the most part, with a few problems: too many commas, using 'setup' instead of 'set up' and one bad continuity typo (p. 183) that appears to indroduce "General Montgomery" then change him to "General Manning". Otherwise, quite imaginative, with likeable characters, though I would have preferred/expected a bit more evil in the world. And a bit more violence. But the goodness was refreshing, too.

Well, you've read the other reviews so I won't spend time giving you a 'book report' but I might save you some reading time and money. I honestly think some of the people that wrote positive reviews on this book are getting paid to do so. I have read most every similar 'collapse' book out there and this one is the only one I couldn't even finish. The author has no knowledge, nor did he do much research on EMPs and the circumstances are simply not believable. Far too many issues for me to even start noting them. The biggest disappointment is the author, clearly a very religious person, appears to have written the book to push his religious point of view on us. Nothing wrong with religion, but I didn't buy the book to get preached to. Book has no realism, no excitement, no factual, survival, or real-world knowledge to gain from. I've read halfway through and I don't even remember one single 'character'; none got my attention enough to care about. Spend your money elsewhere. I loved Lights Out, One Second After, as well as both Rawles' Patriot books.

Its difficult to describe this book without delving too deeply in the story and giving away key details, so I will try to stay generalised in this review and not actually name so many names in incidents I mention.
Initially I thought this was going to be a tad slow for me and perhaps a little too political, but upon getting further into the book you realise the beginning politics explanations are setting the scene for what happens next, why it happens and how people respond to it.
The beginning is the story of the EMP being made, yet not fully tested, and Politicians and the like wanting to rush the process, the EMP is then stolen by the worst people possible, terrorists who plan to use it against America. However when they use it a natural phenomenon is occurring which intensifies the EMP and Solar Flare that causes the whole world to lose electricity. All electricity is destroyed by the EMP and Solar Flare Effect. Everyone goes to bed one evening where things are normal, then the next day there's no electricity, then a couple of days after there's no running water, shops close and are looted for what little they have in them.
The Great Collapse is a very thought provoking book, could you live without electricity and batteries? Do you realise that water stations use computers/electricity to get the water to your tap? Its the unseen/unnoticed electricity uses that we would all miss the most. Sure you may live near a river/lake but would you know how to purify the water to drink it safely? Could you hunt and kill animals to eat? how would you survive with little medical care? There's no central heating to keep warm or air conditioning to keep cool. What about there being no police force any more as there's no communications network left.... its literally every man, woman, and child for themselves. Would you stay in your home? How would you get food? Would you travel to the rural areas with rivers and lakes and water? Would you survive?This book deals with these many questions and even more. It follows certain main characters and their efforts to in some cases fight their way back to their families and try to get to a safe place before the real madness begins!
The book has tales of kindness a former jail-mate who because of the EMP has escaped to take revenge on the man who in his opinion betrayed him to the law, so you would say this man is a bad man yet he does kindnesses along his journey, you follow his change within his physical journey.
The book also shows the bad where grown men hold knives to a young mothers throat for the food and water she has just found for her children.
You certainly see the good and bad in society.
You also follow the journey of the President of the america and his attempts with other men religious and theologists to save books and knowledge for the future when the EMP and The Effect has finally passed, though no one can truly say when that will be.
As you get further into the book you follow a group of people who have literally "met along the way" from escaping the city who are trying to build a homestead which by sheer luck really ends up turning into a small community.
I loved the descriptions, the characters, the suspense and danger. the feud between two characters that ends sadly. I loved the hope within the community that is in the processes of being built when you leave the story at the end of the book.
Would I recommend it YES! Would I read bk2 YES, WOULD LOVE TO.
I really enjoyed the feel of holding the decent sized paperback book that I had won from Librarything whilst reading this book. sure I enjoy kindle too, but you still yearn to hold an actual book!
I hope bk2 is not set too far in the future that you don't get to catch up with the people you have learnt to love in bk1,or their descendants, though obviously for "the effect" to have gone bk2 will have to be set quite a way ahead..... I still wish to read bk2 though to know what happened and what is still set to happen.

New author Jeff Horton debuts his first novel The Great Collapse with an eye-opening experience that should jump-start your heartbeat only to be reawakened with a new outlook on what the world could be in for if the path of technological invention does not slow down. Horton's innovative story presents earth in the very near future, when a military experiment gone wrong causes the entire planet to be wiped out of electronic technology all in a split second.

The US Military was working on an advanced weapon device that could be used in times of war that would disable an enemy's electronic communication systems and general electricity uses. Before scientists could perfect the device in order to keep the effects stable, the Iranian government steals the device out of retribution seeking revenge against our country. Not knowing the device was not ready to deploy, they launch the EMP weapon (Electromagnetic Pulse) via satellite and engage the device when it positions directly over the United States. At the precise moment that the weapon is engaged, a major solar flare also bursts causing the EMP weapon to not only wipe out electricity on our own country, but sends all electronic technology on the entire planet into oblivion. The duo clash of both the solar flare and the EMP effect cause the Pulse to catastrophically be trapped in the earth's magnetic field, an effect that could take a hundred years or more to dissipate.

Within the blink of an eye, earth has been shut down. Civilization as we know it, is gone. Strange nightly appearances of an Aurora Borealis-like light show brightens the now dark evening skies. There is no electricity, anywhere. No cell phones, no computers, no heat, no air-conditioning, no water. All transportation vehicles with electronically driven components cease to operate. Airplanes suddenly crash, cars run off the road, trains derail; in a nutshell, modern technology simply ceases to exist and throws the inhabitants of planet earth back into what our history books called the Dark Ages.

Once the impact of the Pulse becomes reality, Horton introduces a large host of characters. Scientists, engineers, doctors, theologians, military officers, and general civilians that become the key core group survivors of the Pulse. Alternating chapters for each character that will in the end join forces, Horton paints us a very vivid and shocking picture of what life would be like if this really happened. The author presents the reader with some hard questions; scenarios that would have to play out when people are instantly forced to return to living off the land to survive. While turning the pages of this riveting story, readers will be begin to ponder; do we know how to hunt for food, build a log cabin, dig a well for water? Do we of this technologically advanced race even know how to make a fire, read by candlelight, create our own methods of entertainment without CDs, DVDs, T.V, cell phones, computers and video games? Can we defend ourselves against humanity gone mad? Can we imagine a world gone hungry and thirsty within days after all grocery stores run out of food?

The Great Collapse is a finely written post-apocalypse novel with an excellent view point that the world should be introduced to. It is shocking, thought-provoking, and yes...very scary. But, Jeff Horton has an uncanny way of showing us that even with chaos and a cataclysmic event that can only bring great suffering and death, there is strength in numbers, there is hope if people unite to work together for a better tomorrow. Ingredients of sci-fi, action, religion, history, endearing characters, and philosophy blend together for a winning combination. I really loved his creative story and eagerly await book two in the Pulse series. Bravo Jeff for a wonderful new book!