OK, I lied, I did manage to read one book this week. I don’t know how but I did.
One Second After by William R Forstchen
4 stars
(Excerpt from Good Reads) New York Times best selling author William R. Forstchen now brings us a story which can be all too terrifyingly real…a story in which one man struggles to save his family and his small North Carolina town after America loses a war, in one second, a war that will send America back to the Dark Ages…A war based upon a weapon, an Electro Magnetic Pulse (EMP). A weapon that may already be in the hands of our enemies. </I>Months before publication, One Second After has already been cited on the floor of Congress as a book all Americans should read, a book already being discussed in the corridors of the Pentagon as a truly realistic look at a weapon and its awesome power to destroy the entire United States, literally within one second. It is a weapon that the Wall Street Journal warns could shatter America. In the tradition of On the Beach, Fail Safe and Testament, this book, set in a typical American town, is a dire warning of what might be our future…and our end.
On a typical day, in Black Mountain, NC, John is getting ready to celebrate his youngest daughters 12th birthday. Just before the party, he is talking to his friend in Washington when suddenly they lose power. But it’s not just power. Cars, cell phones, anything with a computer chip in it is dead. John has a feeling that he knows what’s going on. Years prior he did a project on the affect of an Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) being set off. An EMP would basically fry anything electronic.
Chaos breaks out. Of course, people panic and start looting. Then they try to take control of the older vehicles that are still running. There is also martial law, which some people take too far. After the initial panic, people start dying from medical problems that need urgent care that there is none. After that, people will start dying from lack of food. Then there are the raveling gangs that are starting to circle. All of this happens with little work from outside the mountains and no help expected soon.
I admit that I started reading this on 9/11. This book got a lot of hype but I really didn’t know much of what it was about, beyond the EMP going off. I did like the book. It does well in describing what is going to happen if everyone is cut off. I will say that it was rather tame about what people are going to do. For example, if you look at the behavior of people after Katrina, this was a relatively tame story.
It was heart breaking how this affected John’s family, yes I was crying a couple times. I did like how it told about how easy infections and illnesses were going to be. Also how lack of medicine is going to affect other people. I think this is one area that most people don’t think about when a disaster happens. Everyone is more worried about food and water. But what happens when you need antibiotics, insulin, and Prozac.
My complaint comes from the interactions of people. Yes, there was the looting, rape, and cannibalism. But for the most part it was like because they were in a small town, where everyone knows everyone else, they just along semi peacefully. Something just irked me about that. I guess because human nature is nothing like that in the real world.
Anyway, this is a really good book. I think people should read this to get an idea of what is going to happen. And not just because of an EMP going off, but because of a natural disaster or even an invasion.
