Shattered Hourglass

Day by Day Armageddon, Book 3

By: J. L. Bourne

Narrated by: Jay Snyder

Length: 9 hrs and 27 mins

Publisher's summary

In a desperate bid to take back the continental United States - where hordes of undead now dominate the ravaged human population - a Navy commander leads a global mission to the heart of the pandemic. Task Force Hourglass is humanity’s final hope, and his team’s agonizing decisions could mean living one day more - or surrendering to the eternal hell that exists between life and death.

Shattered Hourglasss is the terrifying new novel in the acclaimed zombie apocalypse series.

©2012 J.L. Bourne (P)2012 Audible, Inc.

Good but didn't live up to the first two

This book did not live up to my expectations. I thought it was a fine book but compared to the first two it was dull. The writing style totally changed from being journal entries to bouncing around between multiple people's stories. I feel like it wrapped up too quickly as well.

My favorite author hands down!

I can listen or read through his book in one day easy! Always excited to read anything by J.L. Bourne!

not narrated by someone who knows the Navy

Any additional comments?

The narrator really needs to know how to say things the chief of the boat would never say call me C-O-B he would say call me the cob, like corn on the cob. Also kunai is not pronounced right and Rangeley all places where I have been stationed. It just seems like the narrator of the book could get it right. Same with buds

Good Listen

Always a fan of zombie stories and this was decent any person from Louisiana will LOL at the narrator's pronunciation of Lake Pontchartrain though

I can live with the change in style but...

I'm sure the change from the previous diary style will irritate some readers; personally I get why the author made the change. The main group of characters is necessarily split up and he would have had to jump through major hoops for a single narrator to effectively capture what was going on in all the locations. So from that perspective I think it was a bold move to make the change.

Unfortunately I'm not convinced the actual story held up to the switch in style. The writing is a little rough -- the author does struggle a little with the new voice -- but the first half or so of the book is pretty good, demonstrating several of the things that were so strong in the first two volumes. Bourne really does do zombie combat scenes extremely well and even three books in was pulling out scenarios and twists that kept it fresh.

But the latter part of the book felt really rushed to me. Almost as if he couldn't quite decide if it was going to take 4 books or if he had to wrap it in 3. Some of the plot elements introduced in book 2 are wrapped up in what I felt was very unsatisfying ways and at the end I was left thinking that Remote6 and Chang really felt like a let down. The ending could leave it open for a book 4 so we'll see if he does go that route and puts some more meat on the bones.

I'd still recommend the series and anyone who has read the first 2 volumes will want to know what happens but I do think this is the weakest of the volumes by far.

J.L. ! Were you rushed to write and finish this?

Like other reviews of this book that I just finished reading,I didn't mind the style chsnge of the book. It is no longer a diary account type story. I'm totaly fine with that,not a deal breaker for me. I loved the first two books in this series,I had even been getting friends to read them and listen to them.

Having said that,and praising the first two books,I must say that Shattered Hourglass disappointed me. The story is decent,but I really feel that the story was rushed. Rushed through key plots (namely the mysterious government help that was given to our hero in the second book), and more importantly the finish. The book was decent all the way to the end,then at the end I felt like someone must have held a gun to the head of J.L. and told him to finish up as fast as possible. I'm not the only person I know who feels this way,several friends listened to this story while I was and we all said the same thing,rushed ending!!! The first two books are the best,this last book is so so at best. But I would say still give it a listen,but don't expect much.

I'm sorry Mr. Bourne,I love your books,but this one let me down a bit.

Some people think the book was left open ended as if there will be another one. Perhaps,but I can't see how the main character could make a return. But knowing how this books ending was so rushed,and some good plots (the arctic station) were minimalized and not really expanded upon,I don't really think that the author has any idea for another bookmark in the series and that he added "quantum" as some sort of after thought to keep the reader guessing.

The narrator did a good job.

J.L., why hast though abandoned us?

Is there anything you would change about this book?

Yes, I would like JL to re-write this book and give it more depth and development.

1: The Über-villian, "GOD" completely fizzled after soooo much hyper.
2: the ET, Chang....okay so WTF was that all about? I mean I get it but damn it was like "little ET dude, funky suit, alloy shoes, oh crap he's human...screw him and we're outta here!"

Has Shattered Hourglass turned you off from other books in this genre?

Not in the genre but I wouldn't buy another JLB book until it gathered several decent ratings by other like-minded individuals here. The first two DBDAs were fun and they were, most importantly to me, DIFFERENT!

JLB did something that, for me, has also been exquisitely executed by the likes of "The Walking Dead", Jonathan Maberry's zombie epic and of course the holy grail "WWZ": he made the zombies a catalyst for the storyline and a propulsion vector for the characters!

"Shattered Hourglass" was like a microwaved burrito: temporarily filling with no nutrition and almost no flavor.

Did the narration match the pace of the story?

Well enough I suppose.

Did Shattered Hourglass inspire you to do anything?

Yes it inspired me to aggravation, frustration and to write this short review.

Any additional comments?

When I read Mike Naka's review I was like "YEAH" and "ME TOO"! He pretty much outlined all of my story woes.

I really liked the freshness and originality of the first two books. This book just made me feel like the author had to be coerced into writing it and that he just wanted it done and over with.

Honestly I just wanted the book to end so I could read/listen to something else.

Well, the writing is better in this one

The writing is a lot better in this story than the first two, but there is still an awful lot of explaining and not much storytelling.

Shattered Hourglass continues to be the military man’s expression of survival in the zombie apocalypse, loaded with military jargon and acronyms, names of weapons and details that are meaningless to people who are not military or weapons experts. These particular details did nothing to enhance the story and washed over me as white noise. He could have stuck with saying “rifle” or "grenade launcher" instead of naming each weapon and hiding the details of what they do in meaningless dialogue between characters and it wouldn't have hurt the story.

And I say "man’s expression” very deliberately. Bourne's female voices are somewhat unrealistic. Each woman, and especially the little girl, sounds like he learned “woman speak” by watching daytime television. by contrast though, I thought Jay Snyder did a wonderful job capturing the varying tones of each woman, though the language and the dialog he had to work with was sub par.

Bourne also could have done without the pro-gun proselytizing. The action in the story contradicts his offhand pro-gun remarks that he's sprinkled throughout. In one moment he will state how one community fell because they didn't have guns and another survived because they did, but in the next action sequence he will describe in detail how problematic guns are (gunfire noise attracts zombies), how unreliable they are (bullets run out, shots to the head don't always work), and how if the victim had a weapon other than a gun he would've fared better (ice ax to the head always works). His little pronouncements are superfluous as his pro-gun stance is pretty apparent in the way he names each gun and describes its value.

Still, there is a lot of action and the zombies are nasty, and with this series Bourne has placed himself high in the pantheon of zombie dreamweavers.

The best thing about this book was that it was read by Jay Snyder. He is a great talent and I don't think I would’ve made it through the series if I were reading these on my own. Snyder's narration makes all the difference. I've read other books he's narrated and I'm convinced he could read the phone book and make it sound interesting!

Not as good as the first two...

Any additional comments?

The first books followed the protagonist through his journal, thus it was first person narrative. This book is just a story with our original protagonist being one character out of many. It did not have the same feel at all of the other books. The ending was rushed and the book was less about zombie survival and more about covert ops with zombies. By itself it would have been an ok book but knowing that this is the third installment of a series that started off so well is a huge let down. Mr. Bourne, if your fans felt your series was so unique and stood out so much over other zombie books, why would you totally change the way you wrote the third, and possibly final, installment. At least I can always go back and re-read the first two books to remind myself that you did in fact write some of the best zombie stuff I have ever read. Just disappointed in this one and probably won't be reading any more from the series unless it goes back to the original style. Third installment was just run of the mill zombie fiction.

Slight departure in style from previous but great

If you could sum up Shattered Hourglass in three words, what would they be?

The style was different, going from a single point of view journal to multiple documentary style and that made it a bit hard to follow in the beginning with so many new angles. But you get the hang of it quite quickly.

What other book might you compare Shattered Hourglass to and why?

Just as good as his earlier books. Well worth the money.

What does Jay Snyder bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

Consistency - Great voice for this story telling...

If you were to make a film of this book, what would be the tag line be?

I wish they would make a film on this series, it would be awesome. Same tag line the author uses.