Flu

Flu Series, Book 1

By: Wayne Simmons

Narrated by: Michael Kramer

There's a nasty flu going round. An epidemic, they call it. The posters say to cover your mouth when you sneeze, and throw away the tissue. But such simple measures won't stop this flu. Because when you catch this flu, armed police come and lock you in your house to die alone. When you catch this flu, it kills you in days. And when you catch this flu, two hours after it's killed you, your eyelids snap open again....

Flu is a pacey, terrifying, frighteningly real zombie horror story.

©2012 Wayne Simmons (P)2012 Tantor

Critic reviews

"Simmons writes like the grotesque love child of George A. Romero and Charles Dickens." ( Physical Graffiti)

Sick with Flu to Zombie, it could happen

Well, I can hope all I want and not get what I want. Flu: Flu Series, Book 1 is definitely of the psychological zombie thriller variety. While this may not be what I was expecting I was able, after about 3 1/2 hours to get into the storyline. I have found that most zombie stories are the same virus infection, wide spread panic, complete anarchy, survivors trying to survive, the military up to something. But what is different between then all are the details of how the author tries to make their story different enough to stand on its own. The one major difference I found with this audiobook was that one doesn’t have to be bitten by a zombie or die, bit one can just become a zombie spontaneously. Sure not a lot happened in Flu: Flu Series, Book 1, as stated by other reviews, but it seems to me that Simmons is setting up for an even better second book and/or series and I will definitely be on board and not be bored.

Michael Kramer I found is one of the deep voiced, super polished voice-over narrators that I wrote about in my previous review of Timothy. One thing that bothered about Kramer’s narration was that the story takes place in Ireland and usually, in my experience of listening to many audiobooks, the narrator will narrate with at least an accent, good or bad, of the people that live in the area. Kramer chose not to do this and the only time he used an accent was with the dialog of the characters that ended up mostly sounding the same. Kramer all read almost entirely at one speed no matter what was happening within the story and this, to me, can detract from the overall encapsulation of the audiobook experience.

Easy to follow

Good story not overly gory. Kept my interest but allowed me to multitask. Looking forward to reading the series.

It’s OK

Everything about this was OK. Not great. Not terrible. Sometimes it was hard to keep my attention on it. Try to buy it when they have a sale.

Don't waste your time

This book wasn’t for you, but who do you think might enjoy it more?

No one this book is slow and boring.

What was most disappointing about Wayne Simmons’s story?

The characters are boring and I can't even keep track of them due to this.

What reaction did this book spark in you? Anger, sadness, disappointment?

Disappointment.

Any additional comments?

I am so bored with this book. I have tried to storm thru it since I used a credit on it but will have to chalk this up as a credit wasted!!! The book doesn't even dive into the zombies and I am on chapter 28. This book is a waste of time so don't waste yours!!!!!

Long and Boring

Such a slow story line. Lots of standing around and talking but no action in this book...

CLONE ATTACK

"A few parallel story lines"

And not one of them is original in the least.
When I read reviews on Amazon, I expected something more, something extraordinary....

There are lots of reviews with flying colors, but there is nothing original or special in this book.

This book is just a report of people's actions. A typical "Zombie" Genre "book clone"

PS
The Best Post-apocalyptic Zombie Book is "World War Z"
and if you prefer interesting Zombie Book without Apocalypse,
try "Patient Zero" Joe Ledger book 1

Painful to listen to

I've never read anything by Wayne Simmons before, however, after struggling to get 1/4 through this book, and finally giving up, I don't think I'll ever read anything by him again. I finally just gave up and called it unreadable.

I've yet to figure out who the main char. is, or what the story is about - it starts off as a typical Zombie story, people turning undead, then wanders off into some girl that's being held captive by some guy. From there it only got worse.

Breaks the record for MPM (Metaphors Per Minute)

This guy writes like he just finished his first creative writing class and wants to prove he can use metaphors. Remove all the metaphors and the audible book would be about 5 minutes long. Combine that with the fact that he hates using dialog to communicate, and this is the kind of thing you'll be hearing (I'm making this up to illustrate the problem):

"Would you like a cup of tea," she asked. Her heart was as fragile as the antique teacup. Blah blah blah blah blah.... The teacup was a gift from her grandmother, who blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. She once thought of taking the tea set to Antiques road show blah blah blah blah blah.

"No thanks," he replied. Truthfully, he loved tea and could have used the offering. But his heart was weighed down by the incident this morning where he stubbed his toe. That reminded him of... blah blah blah blah blah blah blah.

He simply won't let the characters be characters, TALK, and do what they do. It's like he spends the entire book trying to develop the characters with metaphors and back story. What it really accomplished was that I couldn't care less about the people in the story after about half the book. And since it keeps the story from moving forward at an acceptable pace, I lost interest in the story, itself. What a disappointment. It got off to a good start so I had high hopes. And every once in a while it hints at being interesting again, but then he pads out the next hour with crap.

Not recommended.

zombie story?

What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?

not downloading it

What could Wayne Simmons have done to make this a more enjoyable book for you?

please don't write a zombie like book and have them as a background detail, like the lamp was on, oh there are flesh eating things in the hall, what's for dinner?

Would you be willing to try another one of Michael Kramer’s performances?

as long as it is not a zombie story

If you could play editor, what scene or scenes would you have cut from Flu?

start middle and end

Any additional comments?

I would ask for a refund but I think that this author may need as much money as he can get to order Zombie fallout and find out what a zombie is before trying again.

Poorly Written

Would you try another book from Wayne Simmons and/or Michael Kramer?

Nope

What was most disappointing about Wayne Simmons’s story?

None of the characters were interesting or believable. He gave me no reason to care about any of them.

Which character – as performed by Michael Kramer – was your favorite?

I wanted them all to be eaten by the zombies in the end.

What character would you cut from Flu?

I stopped listening when I realized that I wanted all the characters to just die already. I was rooting for the zombies. Ugh.

Any additional comments?

The zombies-in-Ireland theme is pretty cool, but the execution was atrocious.