Fortress Britain: Arisen, Book 1

I found the first book in the Arisen series a few weeks ago (2022). I wasn't sure what to expect, so I took a chance on the first book. I was hooked immediately, and I loved it. I like zombie books, and I like military books, so the combination is this series is outstanding. I didn't want any spoilers, so I read all 14 books back-to-back without reading any reviews on Amazon. Every book in the series was great, and I highly recommend all of them. To say the books are action-filled is an understatement! There must have been at least 50 situations where I was holding my breath wondering how the Alpha team, the MARSOC Marines, or Royal Marines of One Troop could possibly make it out of the situation. Many times I thought things couldn't get worse, but they did.I don't want to give any spoilers, so I won't say which characters survived and which ones don't. I can say in general that the author(s) did a great job with the entire story line, and I was happy with the the story line in the final books and the ultimate conclusion. Read the first two books in the series - if you like them, you will want to read the entire series. Trust me, just read the books and don't read any of the reviews on Amazon since they will spoil the story for you.I am about to start reading the Arisen Raiders series and the related stand-alone novelas.PS - If you don't like military stories, you won't like the series. There is a lot of military jargon and acronyms, but the military uses a lot of jargon and acronyms. It's easy enough to follow, so it actually enhanced the story instead of taking away from it.[Cross-posting similar review for Book 14.]

First let me say that this book is... hmm, fair - to a point. I'm former military, so there are many concepts where the author goes with the story that I completely disagree with.1. Air Superiority - the author pretty much says that fighting the zombies from the air won't work. I completely disagree with this. Here's why: The author stated that these zombies (just like any zombies in any zombie story I've ever read, watched, etc.) are attracted to sound. Hey! Let's use that! Instead of sending people in on foot to a zombie infested zone, carrying a limited amount of supplies and ammunition against overwhelming numbers, how about USE that air superiority and soften up the target first. Use helo's hovering at a relatively low (but safe) altitude to attract the zombies to their sound AWAY from the target LZ, then once a huge mass of them has collected, use incendiaries or better yet, thermobaric devices on them. Woof! All you got then is a bunch of cooked zombie pieces! Call that zombie DISINFECTED brutha! And that is just ONE way to use air superiority against zombies. It's not like the zombies will be able to quickly re-enter the battlefield from far afield if the areas for "attraction" are handled correctly in relation to the intended LZ, it's not likely they will use radio comms from distant "Zombie Outposts" then hop into "Zombie Piloted War Vehicles" to quickly re-enter the battlefield... they are ZOMBIES! There is NO SUCH THING as a Zombie QRF! (If you want to know what QRF means, read item 2, I am SURE the author will be delighted to spend several paragraphs explaining this one simple acronym). This would be MUCH safer for the ground teams to then move in for whatever mission is needed in that area.2. Military Jargon - the author goes to GREAT lengths to use as many Military acronyms as he can possibly fit into this story, then proceeds to explain those acronyms to an almost insufferable degree which at times almost leads off on a tangent away from the current scope of the story. Wait! What were they doing!?! :P This happened so much that it seriously detracted from the story almost to the point that I put it down... I hung in though, and believe me it was difficult.3. The Characters - hopefully these characters will develop more over the course of the series... Time will only tell though. At times the characters are so one-dimensional it's not funny. Instead of developing the characters a little more, the author proceeds to explain in almost ridiculously overdone detail how much of a badass this or that character is to the point you almost get to where you just don't like them. He does this REPEATEDLY too, often about the same characters! At times it is so overly done that you almost think the author has a h*rdon for the Special Forces. Yeah, we get that! You don't become a SEAL, or SAS or Delta Force without being a badass! Less Special Forces Man-Love please!4. Fuel and ammunition access - Sure, fuel would be somewhat of an issue for a while - until someone wises up and starts coming up with alternative sources. One being hydrogen. The UK is SURROUNDED by the biggest fuel depot in the world... WATER! Sure, it's expensive (but not overly difficult) to make, which is one reason why hydrogen, as an alternative clean burning fuel source is not in more widespread use today. But when the future of the species is at stake, suck it up! Do or die! Another source of fuel? Methane. EASILY and fairly quickly made! You start with "poop soup". There should be - even in the Zombie Apocalypse - enough pooping livestock left in the UK to produce a HUGE amount of Methane fuel. Yet another source? How about clearing all those North Atlantic drilling platforms of any zombie infestations and procuring some crude oil for conversion to JP5 fuel? Ammunition: One source would be to raid neighboring NATO nations military compounds (again using that air superiority to soften the target up prior to insertion) - and while you are at it, PROCURE some ammunition manufacturing equipment and supplies. Making bullets is NOT a difficult thing to do, at all, with the right equipment. Oh, is the previous owner of the equipment protesting? Pfft! Shoot 'em in the head! They are zombies now!All in all though - other than what I have stated above - the story is off to a fair start, I just hope the series gets better with more character development and less military alphabet soup explanations and FAR less of the Special Forces man-love otherwise I will leave it before it ends...

Most of the zombie books that I've read depict the military as an inept force that is unable to stop the ZA and usually follows a group of lucky civilians in their quest for survival. Arisen - Fortress Britain, on the other hand, tells the story of ZA through the eyes of the military. Great Britain had the foresight to begin preparing themselves for the end of the world and welcoming survivors that managed to reach its shores; the fortress island has survived for over two years by using the military and a strict protocol for those that have traveled outside of its protective walls.Instead of being content with just surviving, the powers to be in Britain want to find the cure of the dreadful virus that has almost destroyed the world. Through the use of special military operating groups comprised of multi-national soldiers from countries around the world, their missions take them to different countries in hopes of recovering data and samples from secret labs that had worked on possible cures or antidotes prior to their demise. The eight man teams are exceptionally stealthy, armed to the max with special weaponry and often find themselves vastly outnumbered by the zombie horde during these missions.The security of the fortress is breached when a super-zombie exits the destroyed France to England tunnel; this new breed is super fast, doesn't feast on victims - its only interest is in "scratching" survivors, who turn in mere minutes, taking on the fight from within. After a day, the military claims to have secured the interior of the fortress, but the special zombie has not shown himself since the initial attack. Was he real or imagined?The second half of the story bogs down without zombie battles as it focuses more on preparations for the next military mission; this one in Chicago, IL (USA). This lab is located in the middle of the city and surrounded by an estimated 3 million undeads. Is this a suicide mission for the 8 members of Team alpha? This mission must succeed as intelligence strongly believes the cure is there. Other surprises are in store for readers - something I've not read about in any other zombie genre story.The story is well-written but too short; appearing to take a six-hundred page novel and split it up into five smaller books. I received book one for free on Amazon and will have to spend $2.99 for each of the other books in the series. I'll download book two after posting this, hoping it holds my interest to the same extent as Fortress. The characters are likable and have secrets to protect - I hope book 2 exposes them.I'd recommend Arisen, Book One - Fortress Britain to both readers of the zombie genre and military books.John Podlaski, author Cherries - A Vietnam War Novel

It's 2 years into a zombie apocalypse that has brought the world to its knees. Mainland Europe is overrun, America has gone dark and it appears the only nation left standing is the UK or 'Fortress Britain' thanks to it being an island, and the government shutting off the Euro Tunnel, and leaving refugees to languish. Now the military really are the ones taking care of everything, and we follow a group of Alpha Soldiers as they are sent on missions to try and stop the disease as a terrifying new breed of zombie emerges.I picked this up mostly to see if this kind of military-heavy ZA novel suited my reading tastes, and I can say after reading this, it definitely isn't. I don't think this is badly written at all but it definitely just didn't gel with me. I had trouble from the very first chapter and was completely lost with all of the military jargon, and almost too fast-paced and brutal action scenes as people shouted things I didn't understand into their walkies. When things got back to base, and it felt like we were getting to know the soldiers better, I felt more confident but I was ultimately left didappointed.I think we were seeing too many of the soldier's POV, and because of this I feel like I confused who they all were in my mind (other than Wesley, the one security guy), and would always be trying to figure out who was who when we swapped POV. I also don't think we got to know anyone well, it was all surface skimming.The characters in the story are extremely male-heavy - we don't get much at all from a female perspective. There is one woman on the Alpha team and she's an amazing sniper, yet the conversations we get about her from the others is their speculation on who she is sleeping with. Lovely.I also think this story ended before it really got going, and looking at the length of the second book I'm confused why the first two couldn't have been put together to create a longer, more detailed story. Not that much actually happened before the book ended, and I was left disappointed I didn't get to see them enter Chicago. I'm not sure if I would continue this series or recommend it unless you really like military heavy fiction.

Writing this from a view of book 8.This series is great fun. But it also has some failings. The books are mini books, up until Book 5 they can be completed in an hour or so each. The story line is one continuous storyline, and could easily have been written as one or two long books rather than ministories. About book 5 this turns into a more sustained novel.In some ways, this series is a bit tiresome. Everything that can go wrong, DOES go wrong. It feels forced for the sake of unnecessary action and drama often. Nonetheless, the fundamental idea, and storytelling is pretty great. I do thoroughly enjoy it, it's just a bit tedious with so many things often going wrong. There are quite a few story strands, as well, which I find quite frustrating - introducing 'forced' cliffhangers - when in fact we could focus, and resolve, storylines one at a time. Getting left on a cliffhanger not to know what happens until maybe 4 or 5 actual chapters later is a bit infuriating, and teases the reader rather than screaming of good writing in itself.Overall, though, great fun.

Just finished book 3, was so impressed I've had to come back and leave this review. This series is one of the best I've read and I've read many in this genre. All the characters are awesome especially the alpha team. I know you may be thinking a military based zombie apocalypse story will be full of military jargon you don't understand and be too unbelievable because most people can't relate to these exceptional operators, as they are called, but the way this is written is as good as it gets. The military jargon is introduced slowly and explained well and as a result becomes quite simple. Highly recommended.

I enjoyed reading this book, but the length is annoying. The book abruptly stops as the story begins a new phase. Personally I wish these authors would have more guts to publish the full work at a reasonable price instead of selling cheap snippets hoping to lure people in. But we're in an age of publisher free publishing.....Anyway the story is a nice variant on the standard zombie apocalypse. There is not too much time spent on describing the gory details of zombie slaughter (there's only so much of that you can read - one gore fest is much like another and there's been loads of that out there already). The central characters are interesting and the concept of a fortress Britain, although not new, is well done.I enjoyed it enough to immediately buy book 2 - I just would have preferred to buy it all in one go.Amazons claim to have "x" thousands of titles is a ridiculous boast if they encourage every new book to be split into 2, 3, 4 or more smaller books.

Arisen: Book One Fortress Britain.The action kicks off from the outset, Alpha Team is raiding a Biotech company in Germany and have their first encounter with a FN. ( I won't elaborate because A) it'll reveal too much and B) it's easy enough for you to get a copy and find out :).The pace is kept up throughout the book, but not at the expense of the characters. The team is nicely fleshed out as the story develops and we discover that an incident touched on in Arisen: Genesis is the reason Britain is now a sanctuary for many and a a home to USOC. (Unified Special Operations Command)Apart from the main Tier 1 characters we are introduced to a host of new characters including Andrew Wesley a Corporal with UK Security Service whos story develops unassumedly in the background until a reveal in Book Two: Mogadishu of the Dead.All in all an excellent read - I was a little disappointed that Baxter and Zack were missing, but I found out later that Michael had written Genesis after Fortress Britain so can't really complain, just hope they have a place in future books.