phungus's Full Review: E. E. Knight - Tale Of The Thunderbolt
Tale of the Thunderbolt is the third book in author E.E. Knight's excellent Vampire Earth series. This book is a little different from the first two, but I liked how it took the story in a slightly different direction. Fans of the series will surely enjoy this book and want to continue reading about the adventures of David Valentine.
The Vampire Earth series is set in the very near future, after the world as we know it has been overrun by an alien race that likes to suck out people's ‘life aura' like a vampire would draw blood. The people of the earth called them vampires, simply for lack of a better term. The main character in this series, David Valentine, is part of a small group of human resistors who travel the country finding ways to fight back against these aliens and give other humans a bit of hope. He's like a cross between Rambo and Robin Hood.
This book starts out in New Orleans where Valentine goes, posing as an officer, to steal a ship. He runs into an old friend who has started helping the aliens, and has to kill him because of it. Soon after that, he winds up on a big fight on board the ship, and eventually travels to Jamaica with some pirates. Most of the story, save for the last couple of chapters, takes place in Jamaica.
I did not think this book was as good as the first two because the story slowed down a little bit on the island. Rather than delivering a bunch more action, the author decided to fill in a lot of the backstory on how the aliens took over, so this novel is more informational than entertaining, but it still has some surprises. Among them is the discovery of a new weapon that can devastate the Reapers, which are the blood-sucking henchmen of the alien invaders. Some things happen in the last couple of chapters that blew my mind.
Since there isn't as much action, there is a good bit of character development. Valentine has been fighting in this war for a few years now, and he's already seen things that might have made a lot of other men give up the fight. It was interesting to see how he works with new and old soldiers that he meets along the way, plus there's even a love interest for him.
I've already ordered the next two books in this series and will begin reading them as soon as they come in the mail. I like that the author decided to change things up in this book, and I honestly have no idea where he is going to take the Valentine character in the future. Because of that, I have tried to avoid reading anything about the other books, for fear of spoilers.
If you like a good science fiction apocalyptic type story, you would definitely love the Vampire Earth series, and Tale of the Thunderbolt really moves the storyline along well.
As the Resistance attempts to overthrow their vampiric alien masters, elite Cat force member David Valentine embarks on a terrifying journey in search...More at HotBookSale
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