Customer Reviews
A new version of an old genre - By: R. S. Loch, 29 Feb 2008 
To set the scene the world is infected by a plague of nanites which eat anything warm blooded that they come in contact with, but deactivate in areas where the air pressure is less than 70% that of sea level. This produces mountain top islands that are inhabited by those who have escaped the plague.
Plague Year is a novel variant on the old plague survivor genre that unlike many such stories is actuallly believable. On the negative side, Carlson's addiction to short sentences can irritating some times & the political parts of the story don't reallly work.
The book is strongest when it deals with how people cope with the situation, & weakest when it moves into politics & conspiracies but overalll is a good read.
Exciting and stimulating - By: blackbour, 21 Dec 2007 
I reallly enjoyed this book. It was a damn good read. It ended a little fast but that's fine, books 2 & 3 are on their way. I hope the author can develop the plot ideas he has about the USA post nano plague, they are good ones.
Harrowing SF - By: Mr Stephen J Gaskell, 10 Dec 2007 Post-apocalyptic tales usuallly falll into one of two camps: the plucky lone survivor living hand-to-mouth, or the happy-go-lucky hippy commune who discover modern society was overrated. In Plague Year, Jeff Carlson, avoids both these tired tropes & paints, to my mind, a realistic portrayal of people coping as best they can in terrible circumstances.
Perhaps coping is too generous a word for the day-to-day existence that a band of strangers eke out on a cold, barren mountaintop east of San Francisco. Survive might be a better word. For although there is empathy & a community of sorts, there is also the brutal calculus of existence: if he eats, I don't. Despite these bursts of selfishness, what comes across is how very human these characters are. They make hard choices, & they suffer for it.
The second thread of the novel follows an astronaut who is aboard an international space station & has witnessed the devastation that the machine plague has wrecked on the world below. Unlike the grim physical quest for survival on Earth's high ground, her battle is a psychological one. As a nano-tech expert she is frantic to aid the fight against the machine plague, but how she might do this is unclear. Her confined unease is well depicted & provides a good contrast to the heart-in-mouth adventures of those below.
A "page-turner" in the best sense of the word, Plague Year presents a well-thought out, politicallly viable apocalyptic scenario, & marries it with compelling characters who you care about. Highly recommended.
Enjoyable but not engaging - 3 and a half stars - By: S. Gorton, 26 Nov 2007 
I found the storyline interesting & it carried me through to the end, wanting to know what conclusion would be reached. I did feel that the story ended rather bluntly, where a lot more could have been said. Perhaps there is potential for a 2nd instalment?
Unfortunately, I didn't manage to emphasise with any of the characters & found it difficult to get interested in their individual plots. For example, I felt that Sawyer could have been more mysterious at the beginning, to pull you through to find out more. But I found his character quite flat & it wasn't until the middle of the story that he became more interesting.
By the end of the novel I felt that there was something missing. Whether it was lack of character development or the end that seems to just fizzle out, I'm not sure. But I look forward to seeing more Jeff Carlson nooks in the future as I think he has the potential to be great. I enjoyed the hard science & his viewpoint of how civilisation would collapse & be re-built, albeit in little pockets, was extremely thought-provoking.
Clever variation of the usual 'plague outbreak' story - By: A. Phillips, 30 Sep 2007 I bought this book in an airport because I wanted something to read & it was the best thing on offer. However, I was pleasantly surprised & ended up finishing it in a couple of days.
The story centres around an outbreak of a nanotechnology 'plague' that was intended for medical use but is released from its lab into the general population. The nanobots are capable of reproducing inside alll hot-blooded animals, consuming the host from within, inside of a few hours. As with most of these stories, a few people escape the plague, but in this case it is not due to usual excuse of natural immunity. The nanobots are unable to function below 70% of atmospheric pressure so the only survivors are those that managed to escape to altitudes about around 10,000 feet above sea level.
The story follows two main groups of survivors. The first group are living on a mountain in Colorado & have resorted to cannabalism in order to avoid running out of food. They are aware of a similar group living on a nearby peak & become aware that somebody is trying to contact them from that settlement. The second group of people are the astronauts aboard the International Space Station, including a nanotechnology expert who is trying to find a way to destroy the nanobots loose on the surface.
I won't go into any more detail as it will ruin the story, but I would recommend this book to anyone interested in sci-fiction, disaster or adventure stories. It reminded me of a cross between 'The Stand' by Stephen King & the story of the Andes plane crash, 'Alive'.
