Torment: A Novel of Dark Terror [eBook Review]
Posted by Simone on August 9th, 2011Simone Allyne is the Weird Things eBook reviewer focusing on readily available, affordable Science Fiction and Fantasy. If you have a book you’d like reviewed, please email WeirdThingsMail@Gmail
“Could she murder the others to save the human race? Could she live with that for the rest of her life too?”
I absolutely loved Torment: A Novel of Dark Terror by Jeremy Bishop! Torment was a fast read, a little heavy, but still very enjoyable! I found myself wrapped up in the story from the very first chapter. I was convinced that this was going to be a story about an alien invasion, but was pleasantly surprised to watch as it turned into a tale of human survival in a post apocalyptic world.
Small town reporter, Mia Durante, finds herself having brunch with the President of the United States on the day civilization comes to an end. Survivors of a different sort greet those who lived. What follows leaves Durante and nine other survivors on the run and they find themselves fighting for survival in a world in which only torment remains and where death is the only escape.
What would you do to stay alive? That is the question that Torment had me pondering. By pondering I mean I had to ask everyone I came into contact with how far they would be willing to go to stay alive; just to make sure I wasn’t the only person who would be willing to do what Mia Durante does in hopes of surviving or at the very least being able to stay dead
The book also doesn’t explain every tiny detail of how something happened and allows the reader to think more for themselves and invites them to draw their own conclusions. This is most evident in the question as to what caused the mutation of the human race to begin with.
Torment is a social science fiction novel; meaning it is concerned less with technology and space opera type themes and deals more with sociological speculation about human society and beliefs. The religious undercurrent helps flesh out the characters and allows you to see their differing opinions of god, and what life really means.
Readers may find the ending unexpected and personally it wasn’t an ending I had hoped for. That is not to say that it was a bad end to this gripping story, but I wanted so much more for Mia and wanted her to understand that she wasn’t a bad person, no matter what decisions she made.
Despite my hope for a different ending, I really enjoyed reading Torment; it was very easy to visualize what the characters where seeing and going through. And again I enjoyed being able to draw my conclusions about the mutated beings.