Pines: Wayward Pines: 1

I am pretty sure you all are going to be talking about Wayward Pines pretty soon. July 2014. Fox TV debut of Manoj Night Shyamalan. Did that pique your interest? So hang on while I let you in on the blockbuster phenomenon that is actually a thriller/horror series called Wayward Pines by Blake Crouch. If there is a word that captures the whole Wayward Pines trilogy, that in my dictionary would be Electrifying. Slick action thriller rolled in tight with horror, science-fiction and dystopian elements, this whole series kicks ass like no other.I haven’t been itching to finish a series like this for a long time. Miriam Black by Chuck Wendig came close – a real balls-to-the-wall visceral experience. But this reading has been a much more wholesome and fulfilling experience. A fire that burns through and consumes you. A little s***-kicker of a thriller with plot twists and action galore. Blake Crouch really knows how to keep you dangling by the barest of the thread, crouched on the balls of your feet, ready to explode into action with every dark blind corner you take on this ride. It’s a confusing ride, pretty much like our main protagonist Secret Service Agent Ethan Burkes who’s barely hanging on for the ride – as jumpy as ever, suspicious and untrusting of every leaf that flutters, back from a bout of short term amnesia, battered and bruised beyond belief and an emotional train wreck. Almost two-thirds through the first book, this is pretty much how you will feel. Lost and bumbling like a wet rat caught in a sandstorm. And the storm blows like crazy before you find your feet.This kind of thrill ride without any destination might turn off a lot of readers but for me, I loved the journey and I trust the driver blindly. God only knows why, but the Fantasy Book Critic review of both books was the stamp of approval enough for me to take this plunge.As I said before, electrifying.So a brief about the story from the first book and I will try and keep this free of spoilers as much as possible. Secret Service Agent Ethan Burkes arrives in the idyllic town of Wayward Pines in Idaho – surrounded by tall pine tree forests and insurmountable mountains on all sides to investigate the mysterious disappearance of two agents who had landed here two weeks before – he is involved in a horrific accident that leaves him with partial memory loss. But when he recovers, his interactions with the town residents, in particular the sheriff, makes him realize there is something wrong with the whole town itself. He also finds out that he is not able to reach his wife and kids in Boise or his handler within the agency. Dead bodies turning up, mysterious bar-tenders who disappear, a psychiatrist and a nurse who seem hell bent on harming him than curing and a whole town of kooks who love nothing more than shooting the breeze during day time and take part in blood fetes at night. It gets murky and weirder by the page. And things take a decidedly uglier turn when he attempts to escape the town. Book One, Pines is dedicated to him discovering the horrifying truth behind this idyllic town.Blake Crouch writes a crackerjack of a novel that is so well paced throughout that I found myself distancing myself from my normal life just so I could read that extra chapter. I haven’t stayed up late night to finish a book like this. The plot twists are simply spectacular and they hit you out of nowhere. Especially the big reveal at the end of book one left me agape and thinking for days after.Naturally I couldn’t resist the second book – again up on promo prices of $2 on Kindle and I went click-click. I was curious to see where Blake would take Ethan after that ending. And naturally my anticipations were sky high. Book two took my expectations and blew them away. While book one was a super-fast paced thriller purely from Ethan’s perspective – delirious, lost and heart jackhammering from all that fear and adrenaline as he stumbled from one plot twist to the next – book two widens the gamut of characters and we get a much rounder view of the larger plot at play here. It gets even much more cagey – a larger game of survival. With clear genre-bending elements that expand the world setting that Blake builds up, book two hits the ball out of the park. It’s very difficult to actually write anything about the plot without spoiling it for the readers unfamiliar with Blake’s first book on Wayward Pines. So I would let you as a reader – immerse and soak yourself up – in this entirely mind-blowing spectacular thrill ride.It’s a blistering read and a thoroughly satisfying thriller that should strike the right chords with a reader. With a climax that ups the ante and the stakes like crazy, I cannot wait for the last installment in the series now. Plus with Manoj Night Shyamalan going to make his TV debut with this being televised on FOX debuting in July this year, the interest levels are going to be stratospheric. Hit the moon and back. Take the plunge and you won’t be disappointed! This one's a 5-star through and through.

I liked the authors twisting of the plot from ex-veteran to agent to survivalist. The big reveal towards the finish was captivating.

Sometimes it can be hard to be a writer that flounders around at the lower end of the literary spectrum such as myself. I like to think I create fairly decent thrillers, chillers and tales of mystery and suspense (such as my latest, a hard-boiled detective novel called "Deklan Falls: One Against Many"). I have dreams, like many, of writing nothing but books and novels and not spending days behind a desk in an office. I always feel like I am close to that big breakthrough. Then, of course, along comes someone like Blake Crouch and I have to wonder just what the hell I am doing.I read Blake's novel RUN just about a year or so ago. I downloaded it to my Kindle. I was hooked immediately. I was literally on the edge of my seat for the entire novel and since I finished reading it, I have recommended it to so many people that I am quite sure most Kindle fans must think Blake is paying me to do so (he isn't). It is, quite simply, one of the finest thrillers I have read in years.So, it was with great anticipation that I awaited the release of his new novel PINES. It came out this week and was downloaded to my Kindle Tuesday morning. I just finished it.Dammit...he's done it again. Blake Crouch, I mean.This is a novel that doesn't just hit the ground running, it slams into the ground, making it shake violently, and then pummels the hell out of it from the very first page. It sprints along at a break-neck pace that leaves the reader breathless, always feeling just a little bit behind the story, looking to catch up with each turn of the page or flick of the page button on the Kindle. And when the story finishes, you, dear reader, will be breathless, exhausted, panting as if you had just run a marathon, but wishing there was more.The novel seems to start off as a standard mystery. Secret Service Agent Ethan Burke awakens near a river just outside of the small town of Wayward Pines - a tiny hamlet surrounded by towering cliffs and mountains on all sides. Burke has memories of being in a terrible accident where a Mack truck T-boned his vehicle. He had been sent to Wayward Pines to investigate the disappearance of two other agents. His memory is faulty. He can barely remember his own name and his head hurts.He ends up in the hospital, but something is wrong there. As he begins to try and start his investigation into the missing agents, the seemingly idyllic town turns openly hostile towards him. Paranoia sets in for Burke, then outright fear, and the reader goes right along with him.Crouch explored some of these themes in RUN - where the entire world seems to turn against other members of society. Creepy things begin to happen. Burke is hopelessly outnumbered, but what is going on in this strange town? Why do people seem to remember the dates all wrong? Why can't he make an outgoing phone call? Why does everything about Wayward Pines seem wrong and are the electrified fences that also encircle the town meant to keep people in, or keep something out?Each page reveals a new twist. It is nearly impossible to out-guess this brilliantly crafted story - so just go along with it. It is truly a roller coaster ride with so many twists and turns that you might end up with mental whiplash.Crouch crafts characters that are fully formed, all-too real in your imagination. So, with each twist and turn your own heart races for them. You find yourself fully vested in their welfare, which makes the pulse-pounding action and suspense even more nail-biting and intense. This is a book that not only will keep you on the edge of your seat, but up very late into the night.Crouch is a major talent. I cannot wait to see what he comes up with next. He is also a major force in indie publishing, having decided to release RUN last year via Amazon's Kindle platform when other publishers turned it down. As such, I admire him for his writing skills and for his willingness to take chances and strike out on his own.PINES will grip you from the first paragraph and will not release you until the end. That is the most you can ever hope for in a thriller. It is, without a doubt, one of the best books of the year and one of the best thrillers in years.I just wish Crouch wasn't setting the bar so high. Those of us jumping for the bottom rung of the ladder have a lot to live up to.Dammit.

Great book but I think Crouch just tries too hard and ends up over-egging his own pudding. Let me explain.This is the third Blake Crouch book I've read and the previous two, Dark Matter and Recursion, I had some major issues with, and I think I've finally realised what my problem with them is. I think he simply adds too much, he tries too hard. Just because you like sugar in your coffee you don't dump ten spoonfuls of it in there because it'll destroy it, you add just enough to make it just right. Someone needs to confiscate Mr Crouch's spoon!My criticisms come from a place of frustration because I love these books, especially this one. Pines is probably my favourite to date, but there's always a section or two in his books where I end up pulling out my hair, or I would if I had any, and screaming 'Why did you do that!' and Pines is just the same. Which is really unfortunate because this book could have made my all-time favourites list.The beginning of the book is a complete mind-bender, a full-on psychological trip. And I was loving it. Not knowing what the hell is going on, and the tension of having to discover at the same pace as the protagonist is fantastic, and Crouch does it brilliantly in this book. But then things degenerate a little into a bit of a trope, but that's ok, I can live with that, until we get to THAT scene. Where the town's entire population, for some unfathomably ridiculous reason in Halloween dress, go on a murder frenzy. NO NO NO! It doesn't work, it makes no sense and it just doesn't fit at all. Why!? I'm trying to be as vague as possible here in case you haven't read the book. But this just cheapens the writing and utterly destroys all the beautiful work Crouch put in prior to this.Then there's the rock-face climb, tense, dramatic and gripping...until the pack of creepy alien-looking creatures turn up out of the blue. NO NO NO! It's not needed! It's cheap titillation which kills the real tension the main character is going through. And the fact that they are dispatched so easily and quickly is just comical.Ok, after all that please let me apologise, I don't usually go off on one like that, but this book could have been so damn good! I've still given it four stars, even though it really, really, should have been a solid five-star book. And yes, I have the second and third books, Wayward and The Last Town, and I will be reading them. I'm actually intrigued to see how a strong and driven man like Ethan manages to handle working under a morally bankrupt man like Pilcher, and the murder frenzying townsfolk of course...if I must.

Having never seen the TV series Wayward Pines I didn't have a clue what it was about or what to expect from the book, but I'm really glad I took a chance and bought this first of the trilogy, in fact I have to admit that I bought parts two and three BEFORE I finished book one. For me, this book more than deserves a five out of five star rating.Ethan, a secret service agent wakes up near a fast flowing river battered and bruised in Wayward Pines, all he can remember is his name, his wife and child, the fact that him and another agent were sent to Wayward Pines to find two missing agents last known to be there, and that he was in a bad car accident in which his partner was killed.As he tries to track down the missing agents he realises that he cannot leave town. If I said anymore I would be giving away spoilers and that's not my thing, so, suffice to say, I think this is one of the best books I have read in quite a while.Highly recommended.

I started to watch the TV series a couple of years ago, just because Juliette Lewis was in it. And then they had the utter gall to kill her off in the third episode. WTF!!! So i binned watching the TV version and decided to read the books instead.So how was the book? Awesome!I was very surprised to see this listed as ‘horror’ in Amazon. I would definitely put this in dystopian sci-fi, i didn’t notice any horror, just the normal dystopian sci-fi kind of stuff.I’ve previously read Blake’s book, ‘Dark Matter’, which was exceptionally well written and Pines is just as good. Blake does a fantastic job of putting his protagonists into some really mind bending, disturbing situations and putting the reader well and truly into the protagonist’s mind.All in all, a great start to this trilogy and i’m diving straight into book 2, ‘Wayward’, very optimistic for more of Blake’s style of writing — i’m becoming a big fan.

Another book I read through to the end when I wanted to give up after a few chapters. Having read. DARK matter which I enjoyed I thought I'd give his trilogy a go. I'm stopping at book 1. I like my sci fi but I have to have sense of... It could happen. From the off it never gripped me and I didn't bond with ANY of the main characters. It then trails off into a ludicrous preachy ending

This book, explicitly inspired by David Lynch's "Twin Peaks", bubbles along at a frenetic pace.It's packed with set pieces from horror, thriller and science fiction genres.But it manages to be fresh and entertaining, drawing the reader in as a secret service agent stumbles around an enigmatic and deceptively deadly small town. Is it him who is mad, or the entire population?Satisfyingly, the book does ultimately level with the reader, revealing a plausible explanation for most of the bizarre occurrences - and something close to a happy ending for our hero.There are further books in the series and I think I'll have to read them.