FINALLY! I’ve been waiting for this book to come out for a long time. So far the Day by Day series has been my favorite Zombie/ Post Apocalyptic series. Shattered Hourglass is the third and final(?) in the series. Possibly the best as well. I realized that starting my review of the series with the third might be a bit odd so I’ll include overall impressions of the series with the major focus on Shattered Hourglass. In any case if you haven’t read any of them you can go grab them all right now and not have to wait YEARS like I had to. I basically walked around work last night like a zombie reading the book from my Kindle app trying to finish in time to review for today. I needed something positive after my ranting and cussing from yesterdays. So lets dive into the world of Day by Day Armageddon by author J.L. Bourne.
About the Author
J.L. Bourne is an active duty military officer and currently resides in the Washington D.C. area. He has completed numerous tours of duty in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom, logging more than sixty combat missions over Iraq, earning three Air Medal Strike/Flight awards. Despite the ongoing war efforts, he somehow finds the time to put pen to paper in order to bring to you the fall of humanity in the Day by Day Armageddon universe.
I found out about J.L and the DBDA series from the Zombiesquad forums. J.L has been a member since 2004. So when I saw some other member’s mention he had written a Zombie novel I looked it up. The talk on the forums and the reviews on the internet were amazing. With reviews like that I had to get it.
The Premise
The Book follows Naval officer “Kilroy” as he tried to survive in a world where the undead are taking over. The first two books were told from the perspective of Kilroys journal he decided to start before the outbreak began. I really enjoyed the diary like story form. It gave a real personal feel to the story. The first book shows Kilroy see that trouble was coming and took some prepper measures for his planned bug in. This part is filled with great basic prepper info without beating you over the head nor sounding like a survival manual. Kilroy makes friends with a neighbor and eventually have to flee. Kilroy and his neighbor John keep on the run for a while holding out where they can and picking up more survivors as they go. Until they eventually, literally stumble onto an abandoned missile silo. The book series is filled with this running and hiding theme. Which gives good examples of both bugging in and bugging out.
Shattered Hourglass
The last book mostly centers around Kilroy and his companion from the second book Sayien on a submarine heading to china to investigate the origins of the anomaly. With the third book brings a new format, no longer is the book told in Journal style. It also jumps around to focus on several characters as the events unfold. While I was at first disappointed I quickly realized that the scope of this book would not work well with the journal entry format. Too many characters with stories going on at the same time for Kilroy to report. There were a few journal entries that were nice to have in there.
The Good
This book and it’s prequels are packed with greatness. This volume was no exception. Bourne knows how to write a realistic and exciting fight scenes. He really knows his weapons and characteristics. No bodies flew through the air when shot. He gave good descriptions of weapons. Even using the very well known name of La Rue on some of the high end weapons. The characters all had very unique personalities. You were never confused as who was talking. I highly enjoyed his characters spoke like real humans and like they should. The special forces operators in this book used adult language and were constantly ribbing each other. In fact there was plenty of humor in this book. I laughed out loud several times in the book. I like that Bourne doesn’t kill everyone off like some zombie fiction. I can’t stand reading a book and being filled with hopelessness. The Road was so depressions I stopped reading it half way through. This probably has one of the better explanations for how the dead rise.
The Bad?
Not much with this book is bad. I thought some parts of the book, the trip to Hawaii, were not needed. There were a few I felt needed to be fleshed out more. Parts that got glossed over and I wanted more detail to how they happened. Probably just because I wanted this book to keep going. When I was getting towards the end though I saw how few pages were left and I thought there would be no way to wrap things up. I was thinking it would require another book. I wish it had taken one more volume to finish up the end was on the anticlimactic side. The end seemed too rushed for me and should have been drawn out. Things were tidied up and the ending was satisfying. In the end I may have just been sad to see the series end and no ending would have satisfied me.
Conclusion
Not only is this the best in it’s genre it’s one of the best book series I’ve read. I highly enjoyed seeing the characters develop and grow. The books focus on the impact of the zombies on a few survivors as they struggle to make it in this new world where the dead walk. I can’t recommend these books highly enough. They are not survival manuals but great books about surviving. Check them out if your looking for a good read to cure your cabin fever.
Have you read the DBDA series? What did you think? Let me know in the comments!
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HUGE zombie genre fan here and thought this was a great review. I was leery of reading this series by the descriptions given, but I am almost through the first book and you are correct. If the next two are anything like this, I am in for a treat. Thanks again for all of the info you give and the review of this book. -Adam
Great series and great 3rd book. I really liked the new writing format but preferred the journal entries. Sad to see it end as if there are no more books. Also felt the ending was rushed. All in all 9 out of 10. Write another edition to it JL! A story about victory in North America!
Anticlimactic is a fair term to use. I too got towards the end of the book and thought there would be no way to wrap things up, and yet it finished up. I guess I expected something bigger, but that is perfectly fine. As I started out in the third book I kept thinking how I didn’t care about all this other stuff going on, but I quickly began to enjoy the other story lines. I enjoyed the book and have other friends reading it already. I would definitely recommend it to zombie fans. This is the first zombie book I’ve read and what drew me in was the first book and how it was like reading a daily journal. I really enjoyed that.
And of course the book is still wide open enough that more stories could come from it. The Phoenix team, their story isn’t over. Not to mention that man-kind has to start over and clean house possibly? The Quantum? Lots of room for other stories from J.L.B.
I see you have been a very very busy boy this year J.L.Bourne….. that is IF that is your real name. lol
Excited to read this one! I will definitely lock all my doors before I go to sleep.
I have to disagree. The series is good, not great, and definitely not the best zombie series out there. This third book was pretty terrible. The writing style was bland, the characters felt lifeless and stiff. There was no emotion in the story at all and it got too confusing with jargon and acronyms. I would not recommend the series since the final book was so terrible.
yes.
Trying to make this spoiler free while saluting yet complaining:
Found the first one by accident in a B&N. Loved it! Loved the way it translated “found footage” genre to paper. First book was pretty damn awesome.
Second one was above average but left me impatient for the third.
Third one, well, the first half or so was good, had me going. Then suddenly…huh? wait, what? why? how? When did that happen? what happened to..? I was sure I was missing pages if not entire chapters. Book 2 bugaboos? Fuhgeddaboutit. The third book is a sophomore slump where it feels like the author was at first trying to keep up the journal style, then abandoned it, then half-assed it, whether it was problems with “oh I have to go do a back-in-time chapter” or “uh, I have no idea what I was doing with that, let’s just drop it” or if the author was getting pressure from his job or his editor. As other reviews mentioned, great job on the weapons, and dialogue from his experiences. If one is unfamiliar with the military though I felt the acronyms in third book finally passed over to the point of incomprehensibility without sitting next to a google search box the entire time.
I don’t know what happened but I do know that the last half of the third book isn’t *#@45 to $%&* the **%^^% of the first book’s )(&&%$#$ and it’s a terribly unsatisfying conclusion to both the book and the series to the point I’d almost prefer the last sentence to read “…and they all became zombie poo, even the dog. The End.” I’d nominate this book to have a “director’s cut/expanded universe” where he goes back and fills in some of the more obvious blanks and plot holes.
Weapons, language, characterizations of real people based on real experiences? That part A++
The DBDA series are absolutely amazing. I agree with the reviewer. I too wanted there to be a 4th book. But I guess having the story wrapped up in 3 is a blessing that I don’t have to wait 2 more years until a book 4.
I wish the DBDA series makes it to the big screen. JL Bourne did an excellent job in an area flooded with copycats and rehashed stories.
Thanks JL.