Book Review: Long Past Midnight by Jonathan Maberry
After I finished The Pine Deep Trilogy, I thought I was done forever with it, but it turns out that I wasn't. A "continuation" of it can be found in this collection of short stories, which I found quite confusing.
The reason that I was confused was author Jonathan Maberry has brought in two characters from two of his other series- Joe Ledger and Sam Hunter. Both of these characters have multiple books in their specific series.
As this book starts, we're transported back to when the main characters of The Pine Deep Trilogy were kids outside an abandoned house. They dare each other to enter, and Malcolm Crow has a vision of what his and his friend's lives will be like in the future.
It's on that day that Crow has his first drink that turns him into an alcoholic, and he sees the violent deaths of his friends (which happens during the trilogy).
For the next two stories, we're introduced to both Joe Ledger and Sam Hunter, which is confusing since their stories either take place in the future or in the past. Their appearances, although brief, really don't add anything to the overall story.
At the beginning of two of the short stories, Maberry has an author's note that they take place following the events of the first book in the series, Ghost Road Blues.
Within these stories, there's a little bit of information following what happened at the end of the trilogy, but nothing really substantial. The only thing that we learn from these stories is that the dead are planning to rise again.
While I wasn't a fan of the trilogy (due to the length) I came across this book by accident and had hoped that it would have continued with the aftermath of the events in the last installment of the trilogy.
What we find out is that the FBI covered up the events and many books were written about the "Red Wave." They also made a movie about it.
This is something that the characters keep talking about, but the residents think that something is about to happen since there have been disappearances and unexplained deaths, from not only Pine Deep, but as far north as New York state.
And as I said, introducing Joe Ledger and Sam Hunter really don't add anything to the story. I may have been looking too deep into their characters to see if any of their series have any other crossovers (or if there were any events prior to the publication of this book) but it just confused me even more.
While this trilogy is set in and around Halloween, I thought I'd link the first installment if you want to visit what's known as "the scariest place on earth."
