I originally met Shana Festa through Permuted Press and we have remained great friends since I formed Burning Willow Press. Thanks to her, I had the pleasure of listening to the audio book of her first release "Time of Death: Induction" and I will be listening to "Time of Death: Asylum" tomorrow and posting a review on that as well. No need for me to do all the talking on this awesome piece of work here. The review speaks for itself!
With the flood of zombie literature in the last few years
it’s hard to find something refreshing in this arena, but I am pleasantly
surprised. You hear zombie these days and you shrug and go about your business
like, “Oh, who hasn’t done this before?” Well, I can say that “Time of Death:
Induction” by Shana Festa was a breath of fresh air. As someone who reads quite
a lot as well as writes I can say with confidence that this series will go very
far.
When you start, it begins with how the zombie outbreak
begins which is a pivotal part of any zombie tale in my opinion. As to avoid
spoilers I will not go into explicit detail about the events within the work. Her
characters are relatable, take you in, and embrace you until you are one with
them and you feel what they feel. I cannot even begin to count how many times I
smiled, laughed, or cried with them. This is one of the most important parts of
any tale. Character development and investment. If you can’t become invested in
the story and the characters then the work isn’t for you, but with TOD you can’t
help but get attached. I’m not normally a dog person, but I even found myself
becoming attached to Emma’s little Yorkie Daphne. I am also a stickler for description, which
Festa excels at. I felt like I was in the action and moving through these
places with the characters.
Narration….this is some of the best narration work I have
ever heard on an audiobook (and I listen to a lot of them). I have to say, when
choosing a voice for Emma they chose the best that could be found. I give TOD a
five star rating all around and would give a lot more if I could. One of the
best zombie tales I have had the pleasure of reading in quite some time!
