false 2 0 false false Mon Jun 01 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Fri Jun 12 06:01:19 -0700 2009 Sun Jun 21 04:19:53 -0700 2009
The problem with a set up like this - which isn't a fantasy, but a future of our own world - is that you want to know more about it. How does the infection start? How does the world end up completely infested by zombies? All interesting stuff, but the one snippet we get about the past is a New York Times article which doesn't tell us much at all. It makes the current scenario much less enthralling when it's so disconnected from any idea of our present.

Mary is rather disconnected as well - obsessed with her mother's stories of an ocean she has never seen, her dream is to make it beyond the village to the ocean. It's not really enough - I understand the evocative call of an unending stretch of water to a girl who grew up in an enclosed village, but honestly - people die around Mary, she fights her way out of terrifying situations, rather too often she flirts with suicide (it's too often because you know nothing's going to come of it, she's done it before) and all through it, all she thinks about is getting to the ocean. Her companions tell her it's all a dream, what's she going to do when she actually gets there, if she gets there, and Mary has no answer. It seems like a rather pointless quest (and the ending, while it sets us up for a sequel, doesn't make the quest seem any less pointless really).

So, an interesting set-up that didn't come off, for me. I'd probably pick up the sequel out of interest because I want to know the backstory of this world, and I'd like to see if Mary becomes any more interesting. She just wasn't a strong enough character to carry this story.
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