Carrier Wave

by Robert Brockway

Never accept a story for what it first appears to be. Stories are dangerous things, and they can trick you so bad that you don’t know who you are anymore.”

“I noticed — and you can write this down now, this here’s my statement — he looked like he wasn’t very tall, and he looked like some kind of skinny pansy that don’t work for a living. That’s all I saw. Where I’m from, men don’t look at other men, and if they do, they sure as hell don’t see ’em. That’s gay business.”

This seems like a stretch.

Yash let out a breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding.

You already used that line.

Yash didn’t see the arms came off

Come

“Now now!”

Not now maybe?

“That’s right,” Himura said, puffing up. “You are no doctor. You are an orderly. And an orderly in a wing that has been commandeered by the CDC. We are officially in control here, which means that I, as the sole surviving member of this unit, am officially in control here. You will do as you are told or face severe legal consequences.”

The contrivance that Himura is alone here is stretching credulity.

Himura followed his gaze, and god damn that dude to hell, he yelped.

He's In charge here and alone...why?

If there was one thing Bloom could never understand, it was people who didn’t ask questions.

like they he’d set

the end of block

“We couldn’t have been more different. I was cheap beer and she was expensive wine. I was action movies and she was books. I voted Republican; she voted for those weird parties you never heard of. They said she only married me for my money — every dime, I earned myself…”

No part of this character strikes me as believable or interesting.

steel of the coffee can.

Huh? This was a coffee pot several paragraphs ago.

When they were done, he took the fork and coffee pot

And now it's a pot again.

standing to twist the knots out of his back.

I bet our author has back problems. This is the umpteenth time a character has had back issues.

“You told her?” Bobby accused Anna. She laughed and shook her head.

This is a serious joke? Cringe.

Marcus shrugged, looked away. Halsey tried to scratch her forehead with her wrist. He cleared his throat. She smiled a little. Marcus flushed with shame at the quiet, broken spot he’d left in another conversation. He tried to fix it. “So Aiden was real? A real guy?”

The dialogue in this one is painful in an unintentional way.

Only two flights, Marcus told himself. He was not comforted. Deep, shuddering waves of dismay broke all through his body when he saw that Major Wallace had taken the only chair.

Why is this happening?

“Hey,” Nicko says, real shaky. Everybody turns to look. “Hey,” he repeats, more firmly. “Where’s my gun?” Fat Bob laughs a little, and Mari glares at him for it, but Nicko smiles. “I don’t trust your aim right now,” she tells him as gently as possible, and he just nods. “I still want it back,”

Lots of important detail missing here. The exact shape of the setting. Nicko's apparent injuries. Our author needs to work on clarifying location and blocking.

The turbine, dormant for years, took up most of the inner circle.

An example of how bad this book is at establishing setting: what INNER circle? We're in a tube right now. A tube is one long circle not an inner and outer circle. Unless you mean the inside and outside of the tube, in which case…seriously?

Sam’s hands fell on cold, textured metal.

Again. He is shoved upward and then his hands "fall" on metal. Visualizing the action in this book is a challenge.

The nonstop chatter of heavy gunfire and pained screaming from just beyond the walls.

A good editor would've put this up top.

he released a breath he’d been partially holding for the better part of an hour.

Dear author: be aware that you love the held breath so much you use it incessantly

When Mari finally catches up to the fleeing refugees, it’s only because they’re all dead. Mowed down as they ran, laid

Why on earth are we switching between past and present tense AT THE CLIMAX?

they’d have to plant this one on the inner rim of the bay, facing the dam, for the best shot at busting the levee. There’s where the problem comes in. Halfway across the still and stinking waters of Crescent Bay, there’s a flowing wall of blackness. Like a massive fog bank or an ash cloud churning in slow motion. It creeps steadily forward like airborne molasses, and scattered all along the perimeter, between her and her intended blast point, are the broken shapes of watchful Sleepers.

More totally senseless staging. What perimeter? Are the Sleepers in the actual bay? Does our author mean beach instead of bay?

thumps in the dust.

Dust? Is she not on a beach?

The two nearest Sleepers nearest perk up at the noise.

Okay. Yeah. The editing is getting much shoddier as we reach the end.

Sam felt all of his desperate, hasty emotional barriers begin to crumble, so he stood up and walked the length of the sleeping car. He crossed the swaying rubbery threshold and picked his way through the now-empty kitchen.

Sure he did. This deeply empathic sensitive man leaves alone without a word the child he just informed of her father's death.