5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
Taking the fight to the enemy, Aug 23 2010
By Justin Gaines - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Crusade (Eden Book 2) (Paperback)
The sequel to Eden, Crusade is the second in a planned trilogy of zombie survival horror novels from Tony Monchinski. I came to this book cold, having never read Eden, so I was unfamiliar with these characters. Still, the survival story is more or less timeless, and Monchinski's prose kind of forces you into the flow of the story. It started with a fully armored titan waging all out war with the zombie hordes while blasting a classic heavy metal soundtrack, so I was pretty much guaranteed to love it!
I admit I was a bit lost in terms of the sheer volume of characters and their relationships with each other, but the book was absolutely worth the effort of learning all the new names. Monchinski does a great job balancing complex personal relationships with the greater survival/quest story, and his dialogue is very impressive. And of course there's the gloriously described zombie warfare. Monchinski's depictions are long on technical detail (you're going to learn a lot about armor and weaponry), but also have some great choreographed battle scenes. You can almost see these fights unfold before your eyes.
Obviously you're going to get more out of Crusade if you've read Eden first (and believe me, that one is going to the top of my reading list), but Crusade is a very strong zombie novel that should appeal to just about anyone who is into this kind of tale.
9 of 11 people found the following review helpful
3.0 out of 5 stars
Disappointing sequel to Eden, Aug 11 2010
By Kevin Brown - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Crusade (Eden Book 2) (Paperback)
I feel that Eden is one of the best zombie novels I have ever read so I was looking forward to Crusade with great expectations, unfortunately they were not fulfilled. The book opens with a 25 page-long zombie battle that just gets monotonous and maybe a little silly. When that is finally over we get back to our group of friends who had left Eden at the end of the last book. The story from there on is just not very good. What the author does to Buddy, one of the best characters of the original novel is just sad. I won't say anymore but if you (like me) loved the Buddy character you will not be happy. Bear takes center stage and I like the Bear character but he really is not interesting enough to carry the book. Most of the characters meet sad and unhappy ends and it just lacks the depth and excitement of the first book and seems to just kind of ramble around until reaching a depressing conclusion. Don't get me wrong, it is still readable and probably better than most zombie fiction out there. The author can write but this book is nowhere near a good as Eden.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Buckle up: bumpy ride ahead., Dec 2 2011
By M. Delabar "mansonormonroe" - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Crusade (Eden Book 2) (Paperback)
So if your anything like me, after reading Eden, you were like "neeeed mooorrree" well, the wait is over. Crusade is an intensely awesome sequel of our favorite new York stronghold inhabitant, and to top it off, it.opens up with one of the best action scenes one could hope for in a good zombie novel. Bear is a beast of a man with a heart of gold, even if the gold is caked in layers of zombie gore.