Dies the Fire

This is the first in a post-apocalyptic series taking place in my home, the Pacific Northwest. An excellent read, although this first book gets a little gritty in the details. Stirling's characterization is phenomenal - he's very good at writing anti-heroes, flawed heroes, and generally people who seem real - there's always some facet of their personality that you just know you'd hate about them if they were real.

Characterization aside, this is a great series. There's generally very little set in the Pacific Northwest, and knowing the places adds a fun element to reading this series. I'm hooked - I can't wait for book 4 to move to paperback!

A very good book about the end of the world. You have to buy in that some sort of “event” made some of the laws of physics change, but once you resign yourself to that it's smooth sailing. I'm not a huge fan of poetry in my prose or trying to puzzle out how to pronounce a foreign language not even remotely related to my own, so Juniper's parts were sometimes daunting. The other “main” character, Mike, is a bit of a Gary Stu, but even he has exceptions.

I didn't like any of the characters and especially disliked Mike Havel, one of the main protagonists. I'm not quite sure why. Maybe it was all those annoying internal observations he made.
The whole Wiccan angle was annoying too......maybe because of Juniper.
I was not drawn in emotionally at all and also found the writing itself of mediocre quality.
Too bad; I had high hopes for Dies the Fire.