![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Blackbirds by Chuck Wendig
Apr. 8th, 2014 11:01 pmThe Blurb On The Back:
Miriam Black knows when you will die.
Still in her early twenties, she’s foreseen hundreds of car crashes, heart attacks, strokes, suicides, and slow deaths by cancer. But when Miriam hitches a ride with truck driver Louis Darling and shakes his hand, she sees that in thirty days he will be gruesomely murdered while he calls her name.
Miriam has given up trying to save people – that only makes their deaths happen. No matter what she does, she can’t save Louis. But if she wants to stay alive, she’ll have to try.
( The Review (Cut For Spoilers): )
The Verdict:
Chuck Wendig’s hard-boiled contemporary fantasy noir is a foul-mouthed, rollercoaster ride with a damaged, self-absorbed main character. Whether you like the book depends on whether you like Miriam and I thought she was terrific – a broken narcissistic cynic who’s in dire need of rescuing. Her relationship with the decent, hulking Louis who’s still traumatised by the death of his wife is touching and Wendig does well in having you dislike Miriam for what she’s doing while also understanding why she does it. It’s also a nice counterpoint to the hot sex and cold manipulation that ties her to the venal Ashley. The story’s split between what’s happening to Miriam now and a flashback interview she gives where she describes how her gift works and how she came to have it. My only real criticism is that the villains of the piece are underdeveloped and I’d have liked to have seen a more fleshed out motivation for their actions.
Still in her early twenties, she’s foreseen hundreds of car crashes, heart attacks, strokes, suicides, and slow deaths by cancer. But when Miriam hitches a ride with truck driver Louis Darling and shakes his hand, she sees that in thirty days he will be gruesomely murdered while he calls her name.
Miriam has given up trying to save people – that only makes their deaths happen. No matter what she does, she can’t save Louis. But if she wants to stay alive, she’ll have to try.
( The Review (Cut For Spoilers): )
The Verdict:
Chuck Wendig’s hard-boiled contemporary fantasy noir is a foul-mouthed, rollercoaster ride with a damaged, self-absorbed main character. Whether you like the book depends on whether you like Miriam and I thought she was terrific – a broken narcissistic cynic who’s in dire need of rescuing. Her relationship with the decent, hulking Louis who’s still traumatised by the death of his wife is touching and Wendig does well in having you dislike Miriam for what she’s doing while also understanding why she does it. It’s also a nice counterpoint to the hot sex and cold manipulation that ties her to the venal Ashley. The story’s split between what’s happening to Miriam now and a flashback interview she gives where she describes how her gift works and how she came to have it. My only real criticism is that the villains of the piece are underdeveloped and I’d have liked to have seen a more fleshed out motivation for their actions.
