‘The Devil By Name’ – Keith Rosson (Black Crow Books)
Just over a couple of weeks ago, I picked up Keith Rosson’s ‘Fever House’ for a read and… Well, you can read my review over Here, if you like, or if not, lets just say that once I got going, I couldn’t put the book down until I’d finished. That should tell you all you need to know ;o)
Well, it took me a couple of weeks to get round to it but there was never any doubt about my reading ‘The Devil By Name’. After sorting out hospital appointments, and bank card issues, yesterday, I settled down for a read and…
No one expected the apocalypse would be broadcast via phone call; anyone who managed to survive that doomsday call has a harrowing answer to the question, "Where were you when the Message came through?”
Five years after the event that drove most of the global population to madness, the world is overrun with the ‘fevered’ - once-human, zombielike creatures drawn indiscriminately to violence and murder. In a campaign to restabilize the country, the massive corporation known as Terradyne Industries has merged with the U.S. government in a partnership of dubious motives, quarantining major American cities behind towering walls and corralling the afflicted there with the hope, they say, of developing a vaccine.
In Portland, where it all began, guilt-ridden detective John Bonner scours the city's darkest corners for clues to humanity's redemption. In New England, Katherine Moriarty mourns the devastating losses of her husband and son while in hiding from Terradyne. And across the ocean in France, a sixteen-year-old girl named Naomi Laurent discovers she has a disturbing and powerful gift, which may just be the key to the world's salvation…
Well… This is going to be a difficult review to write as I’ll be honest, there is a real temptation to just copy the ‘Fever House’ review and just swap the titles :o) Yep, Rosson tapped a dark vein of horror in ‘Fever House’ and continues to let it bleed out into ‘The Devil By Name’. There are a couple of points that may affect your enjoyment but from where I was sat (the comfy chair, of course), ‘The Devil By Name’ was another book that I had to finish off in the one sitting. If it isn’t broken and all that… Rosson clearly knows what he is doing here and rounds off his duology in some style. I’ve said it before but it’s worth saying again, I would love to see this play out on the big screen :o)
Some of the frantic pacing, of ‘Fever House’, is sacrificed to take a proper look at how America (and by association, the rest of the world) has fared in the aftermath of ‘The Message’. The answer is pretty much as you’d expect but I still really enjoyed the sense of overwhelming emptiness that Rosson lends to his backdrop, especially when compared to the heaving menace of the containment zones. You come away with a real feeling that humanity is barely holding on, despite various ‘best attempts’. It doesn’t get a lot more post-apocalyptic than this, especially when Rosson ‘zooms in’ and lets us see, up close, how people are coping. ‘Not well’ is the answer; the message is suitably pessimistic, humanity will never learn.
Don’t worry too much though, Rosson doesn’t get bogged down in his message. ‘The Devil By Name’ knows exactly when to switch gears and delivers a breakneck finale that ties up all the loose ends and a way that left me happy. Your mileage will inevitably vary depending on your views on the use of ‘prophecy’ in fiction. There’s always a danger of prophecy just becoming ‘sign-posting’ but from where I was sat, Rosson avoids the obvious pitfalls, injecting plenty of uncertainty into proceedings and springing a few surprises as a result.
Were there characters that I would have liked to have seen a bit more of? Yep, definitely (Dean Haggerty for one, I felt he was underused as a small ray of hope for the future) but the main thing is that the plot arcs for the leads are all rounded off satisfactorily, and they were :o)
I’m going to stop here as I really don’t want to just repeat everything I said in my ‘Fever House’ post (despite the temptation). ‘The Devil By Name’ is a near perfect end to an awesome duology and I’m keen to keep going with Rosson’s work. And as it happens, I have a copy of ‘Coffin Moon’ waiting to be read...
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