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A Catch in Time
In one moment a global blackout occurs, and six billion humans become unconscious. During a brief yet seemingly eternal three-minute sequence, a series of catastrophic events occurs, and minds collide with truths hidden beyond the physical realm. With the reawakening comes a drastically and horrifically altered worldpopulations decimated and social order gutted. No one seems to remember the truth that has been revealed or that this discovery could destroy the human raceexcept Laura. Though even she has no knowledge of why the postblackout births are mutations or what is so wrong with some of the survivors.
551 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2010
3 people are currently reading
36 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
March 13, 2015
Title: A Catch in Time: Flash Forward mixed with The Stand
The Setup:
-Note-: If you don't like even tiny spoilers, stop reading at conclusion 1.
It's a normal day and everyone is going about their daily live when suddenly everyone on the planet blacks out for a few seconds. Some didn't experience anything at all, or they don't remember, while others experienced a great truth. When everyone comes to, the world has changed. Many people simply vanished, didn't wake up or were killed in various accidents that occurred as the result of the Blackout. The “Blackout” as it comes to be known also had a few side effects that no one can explain. The first is that for some unknown reason all births post blackout, including animals and plants, have some kind of mutation, often fatal. The second is that there is a strange madness that is spreading through out the world, making those inflicted almost feral and addicted to any kind of violence. As the dust settles the people of the world try to hold onto the crumbling remnants of civilization, in a world that will never be the same.
The Story:
Lara was one of the few that experienced the “truth” during the Blackout. Not that she knows what it means or anything, she just knows that it should have been a good thing. Instead she wakes up to a world that that is much more chaotic and confused than the one she was in before she blacked out for a couple of seconds. All she knows is that the world is different and that her and her unborn child are now on their own. Luckily Lara soon finds others that survived the initial chaos of the Blackout and they form a small group that begins to search for a new place to call home.
Mack, Lara'a fiancee, is also on a journey, though it's not the one that he started out on pre-blackout. Along the way he runs into Conrad, Lara's brother, and a young boy who's family was killed in the chaos that followed the blackout. While Conrad just wants to get back to his family and return to whatever passes for normal life, Mack has other plans. You see Mack also found another sort of truth when he came to. In time all that come in contact with it will learn to fear it and him.
As nature becomes more corrupted and the people of the world look to find hope where ever they can get it, there is still one question that no one can answer. What caused the blackout and how can its effects be reversed?
Conclusion 1:
A good read. It takes awhile to get started and some of the characters can be a little one note early on. The story and the characters get better as the plot progresses and the end is worth getting too even if everything seems a little too neatly wrapped. Give it a read if you like end of the world thrillers / adventures with a spiritual twist. m.a.c
Conclusion 2:
This was an interesting story. It reminded me of both Flash Forward by Robert J. Sawyer and the Stand by Stephen King. In away it also reminded me of Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson. I'm not going to give away the twist, but it is a different take on what influences life to evolve and what might happen if one of those selections was performed too soon or by force. While I liked the story it did have a few hiccups here and there.
The main character can be a little... too hopeful sometimes and a few of the other initial characters seem to have tunnel vision for most of the story till around the end, where they get fleshed out. The journey to the end of the story is entertaining and has some good scenes. The end of the book while good, seemed to wrap things up a little to neatly. I just think it could have been a little larger, but that's just me.
All in all it's an interesting read. If you like end of the world adventures or thrillers with a spiritual twist take a look at this one. m.a.c
The Setup:
-Note-: If you don't like even tiny spoilers, stop reading at conclusion 1.
It's a normal day and everyone is going about their daily live when suddenly everyone on the planet blacks out for a few seconds. Some didn't experience anything at all, or they don't remember, while others experienced a great truth. When everyone comes to, the world has changed. Many people simply vanished, didn't wake up or were killed in various accidents that occurred as the result of the Blackout. The “Blackout” as it comes to be known also had a few side effects that no one can explain. The first is that for some unknown reason all births post blackout, including animals and plants, have some kind of mutation, often fatal. The second is that there is a strange madness that is spreading through out the world, making those inflicted almost feral and addicted to any kind of violence. As the dust settles the people of the world try to hold onto the crumbling remnants of civilization, in a world that will never be the same.
The Story:
Lara was one of the few that experienced the “truth” during the Blackout. Not that she knows what it means or anything, she just knows that it should have been a good thing. Instead she wakes up to a world that that is much more chaotic and confused than the one she was in before she blacked out for a couple of seconds. All she knows is that the world is different and that her and her unborn child are now on their own. Luckily Lara soon finds others that survived the initial chaos of the Blackout and they form a small group that begins to search for a new place to call home.
Mack, Lara'a fiancee, is also on a journey, though it's not the one that he started out on pre-blackout. Along the way he runs into Conrad, Lara's brother, and a young boy who's family was killed in the chaos that followed the blackout. While Conrad just wants to get back to his family and return to whatever passes for normal life, Mack has other plans. You see Mack also found another sort of truth when he came to. In time all that come in contact with it will learn to fear it and him.
As nature becomes more corrupted and the people of the world look to find hope where ever they can get it, there is still one question that no one can answer. What caused the blackout and how can its effects be reversed?
Conclusion 1:
A good read. It takes awhile to get started and some of the characters can be a little one note early on. The story and the characters get better as the plot progresses and the end is worth getting too even if everything seems a little too neatly wrapped. Give it a read if you like end of the world thrillers / adventures with a spiritual twist. m.a.c
Conclusion 2:
This was an interesting story. It reminded me of both Flash Forward by Robert J. Sawyer and the Stand by Stephen King. In away it also reminded me of Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson. I'm not going to give away the twist, but it is a different take on what influences life to evolve and what might happen if one of those selections was performed too soon or by force. While I liked the story it did have a few hiccups here and there.
The main character can be a little... too hopeful sometimes and a few of the other initial characters seem to have tunnel vision for most of the story till around the end, where they get fleshed out. The journey to the end of the story is entertaining and has some good scenes. The end of the book while good, seemed to wrap things up a little to neatly. I just think it could have been a little larger, but that's just me.
All in all it's an interesting read. If you like end of the world adventures or thrillers with a spiritual twist take a look at this one. m.a.c
October 17, 2021
Readable but at the end some of the ‘explanations’ still don’t make a lot of sense to me. The characters didn’t really have enough depth for me to care about what happened to any of them. Story was promising but I think could have been better.
December 31, 2016
Meh. What can I say? Having read more books from every genre than I could possibly review, this one does not stand out among them.
If I were a publisher, I would call it a survivor of the slush pile that happened to survive being tossed aside. Why did it survive? Maybe because it is littered with new-agey premises that currently permeate every social mefia site? Or perhaps it spoke to the publisher's sense of comfort of belief that everything is connected and true evil is another life form that looks human but isn't?
As others have said, the characters are flat and undeveloped. They don't evolve and are not fleshed out. What you see of them in the beginning never changes - it is vague and uninteresting and highly riddled with stereotype or, if you prefer, cardboard characters.
The plot, although interesting is never fully explained or explored until the last chapter, and done in such a way as to avoid having it make much sense. It's the kind of story that I have come to call lazy writing. It says just enough to get someone to pick it up from the library or book store, but doesn't ever deliver on the promise of a new adventure.
The world is full of stories like this, of which the author's name will not be remembered.
Read it or don't, but know that similar forgettable stories just like this one are available for free to read on Wattpad. Some of which are memorable and will be remembered.
If I were a publisher, I would call it a survivor of the slush pile that happened to survive being tossed aside. Why did it survive? Maybe because it is littered with new-agey premises that currently permeate every social mefia site? Or perhaps it spoke to the publisher's sense of comfort of belief that everything is connected and true evil is another life form that looks human but isn't?
As others have said, the characters are flat and undeveloped. They don't evolve and are not fleshed out. What you see of them in the beginning never changes - it is vague and uninteresting and highly riddled with stereotype or, if you prefer, cardboard characters.
The plot, although interesting is never fully explained or explored until the last chapter, and done in such a way as to avoid having it make much sense. It's the kind of story that I have come to call lazy writing. It says just enough to get someone to pick it up from the library or book store, but doesn't ever deliver on the promise of a new adventure.
The world is full of stories like this, of which the author's name will not be remembered.
Read it or don't, but know that similar forgettable stories just like this one are available for free to read on Wattpad. Some of which are memorable and will be remembered.
May 11, 2013
I wanted to give a much higher rating based on the milieu. Ms. Roddy does an excellent job of rendering a freaky post-apocalyptic setting, especially in terms of the social structures involved. The plot itself was intriguing, but I felt the characterizations fell a bit flat at times, with some of the dialogue forced and unrealistic in places. One peculiarity that really stood out was something I have never encountered in literature before. Ms. Roddy has created a new visual technique for conveying the sense of vertigo that I felt was very effective. I struggled with this one between a 3- and 4-star, but I think it is probably more personal preference in characterization than writer skill. Overall, the book is well written and her descriptions were spot on. If you are looking for post-apocalyptic non-zombie ride, Ms. Rodding is your ticket. Oh, and her soulless monsters are high on the creep-scale.
May 27, 2010
The thing about a book is that it has to draw you in, then hook you, and make you want to read it. A Catch in Time was the kind that scared you into reading further, twisted your mind, and made you avoid it. Would it make sense to say that for this reason it was both good and bad?
Every time I opened this book, I had trouble putting it down. I liked it a lot--except for the writing and the characters. The writing was full of fragments and, in general, mediocre. I despise the characters. Few of them have any redeeming qualities, and after 100 pages half of them are not developed well enough to know them very well or be individual personalities. But the only character I like is the dog.
Maybe horror isn't my genre? Or maybe it was the fragments. repeated and pointless fragments. that got to me.
Every time I opened this book, I had trouble putting it down. I liked it a lot--except for the writing and the characters. The writing was full of fragments and, in general, mediocre. I despise the characters. Few of them have any redeeming qualities, and after 100 pages half of them are not developed well enough to know them very well or be individual personalities. But the only character I like is the dog.
Maybe horror isn't my genre? Or maybe it was the fragments. repeated and pointless fragments. that got to me.
May 9, 2011
This was an intense, amazing apocalyptic book! It's in the "horror" genre, so there is blood and some intense situations, but I didn't think anything was too over the top (but it may be touchy for some people-- i.e. violence against children, etc.). The premise is that the whole world has a blackout at the same time (the only similarity to the short-lived show, Flashforward) and it deals with all of the repercussions of that. The population is severely depleted and mutations are starting to occur. One of the main characters, Laura, remembers what happened during the blackout, but the majority of people don't. It is very intriguing and I love how all of the characters have some flaws. This was a good random pickup from the library :)
Read
August 22, 2012This book wasn't that great nor horrible. The plot was decent. It was like the apocalypse. The blackout caused the people to fear with many problems with mutation and survival. However, not everybody remembers what happen during the blackout, only a few remember what had happen. The characters in the story were just bad. They were half developed and you don't really understand them at all. Even though the characters was half-bake, the twists in the story was pretty good to make up for the half-bake characters development. You see what humans are willing to do to survive and sometimes it shocks you to see what humans are really capable to do in time of need. Overall, the book is mehhhhhh~
January 28, 2013
A brief but global blackout precipitates a series of events leading those experiencing it to believe that evil has spilled out in to the world. The embodiment of this malevolent force are called Shaitan among the post-blackout survivors. I liked it and it may not have been something I would normally read. Like many post event or post apocalypse books it contrasts the newly arrived dark forces with the determined hope of the survivors. It does a great job peering into the dark inhumanity inherent in the Shaitan, that malevolent force. I liked the ending, not easy to bring everything together and tie up the story lines.
July 26, 2010
"Six billion people will suffer unimainable horrors. Only a select few will even remember."
A new twist on the extinction/decline or the human race and survival.
Lets just say 551 pages read in a day, practically non-stop.
Don't pick this book up if you have plans.
A new twist on the extinction/decline or the human race and survival.
Lets just say 551 pages read in a day, practically non-stop.
Don't pick this book up if you have plans.
May 18, 2013
Good book and I enjoyed the story. The concepts were a little hard to wrap my brain around and I wasn't totally hooked on the book. It took me awhile to get through it. Glad I finished, interesting story.
July 4, 2011
Not horrible, but not terribly good either. It was sort of a post-apocalypse, that turned too preachy and far too hopeful. Give me despair over Pollyanna anyday!
September 12, 2014
Suspenseful story which moved along at a good pace. Very addictive read!
January 4, 2014
Pretty good sci-fi/horror post-apocalyptic fiction. Read my full review at Dreamworld Book Reviews: http://www.dreamworldbooks.com/2014/0...
June 21, 2014
blech.
November 16, 2015
good book but the ending was a bit too pat..
Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews