THE SEVENTH SEAL is a good example of the overuse of adjectives, adverbs and descriptive writing.

The use of descriptive writing sets the mood, but when it is used excessively in every sentence, it stilts the plot and makes scenes unclear. In one scene the author writes "...John's vision came into focus. The black cape of a vampire fanned out across the floor with a pool of dark liquid shimmering under his chest." Where did a vampire come from? John knew there was a Halloween party (however the reader does not know), why not just say it? It made me stop and look back to see what I had missed. We find out later these are costumes.

The paragraph continues with "The hardy flies that survived the bitter day buzzed above the corpse." Seriously? John discovers a dead body and this went through his mind?

And it continues "The Bee Lady slumped..." The Bee Lady? Who is that? Where did she come from? Is she a vampire too? "Mascara ran down her face and smudges of black lipstick caressed her chin." A supoosedly dead body (we are to assume from the dead vampire that she is dead) has lipstick that is caressing her? "Three ragged holes desecrated her chest." Okay, now I guess she's supposed to be dead. Desecratedly dead.

John walks into a bedroom. Mind you he has been unconcious in the basement for three days. He get upstairs, steps over some dead partygoers and raids the refrigerator and eats a ham. Then cooks some beans and eats those. Meanwhile "The stove rattled and popped, following the lead of the house in attempting to expel the intruder." The House was expelling him? He's an intruder now? I thought he was part of the party from three days ago.

So John eats and NOW he searches the house (I guess he was afraid of being expelled).
..."The faces of others sunk in sickening pools of life's essence." Did you mean they were facedown in blood?
"Black holes crawled down from the ceiling to the wall and escaped by shattering the two windows overlooking South Belvoir Road." What? What?
"John recognized the growl of an internal combustion chamber."

John is running from some Army guys, a "blinding beam of light cut through the sheer curtains..." John dives for the floor. In the next paragraph he climbs into a bed and goes to sleep. Okay, maybe he does. He doesn't seem too concerned over a houseful of dead friends. Maybe he can sleep with dudes just outside the window.

I think that is enough to show how slow the plot runs and how indifferent the first character we meet seems to act. The book reads like someone wrote it then went back and added everything they could think of to try and impress the reader with the author's literary knowledge and skill. Unfortunately, J. Thorn fails in the worst way and makes the same mistakes one would expect from a high school student. Thorn makes the plot plodding, confusing, and boring.

I love a descriptive novel. However, the use of description must be judicious and in the proper place. There is nothing wrong with setting a scene, but then stop it! Move the story along and put away the thesaurus!

I recommend this book only as an example of how not to write. ( )

Book Info: Genre: Dark Urban Fantasy
Reading Level: Adult
Recommended for: fans of Apocalyptic fiction
Read: First read 9/29 - 30/2012. Edited 10/15 - 16/2012

Disclosure: I picked up a copy of this book when I found it free on Amazon; I am under no particular obligation to anyone, but am happy to provide an honest review. Later the author asked me to help him by providing a polishing edit, which I began on 10/15/12.

Synopsis: John awakes from a Halloween party with a hangover and a dead cell phone, on the first day of the End of Days. He's desperate, on the run, and fighting for his life.

My Thoughts: Wow, this book is quite a ride, in which a man named John gets caught between fanatical Catholics that have decided to cleanse the world of “Infidels” and a motorcycle gang that calls itself the Keepers of Wormwood, while his wife Jana ends up with another group of survivors, and they both have strange dreams involving Father, the fanatical leader of the Covenant.

Thorn has a real gift for description. Consider this passage: “The cold November sun sent weak rays onto the floor of the old house. The floor beneath snickered, trying hard to hold back snaps of bawdy laughter. The temperature dropped with ease.” There are some spelling mix-ups, such as “thirty odd six” for “thirty-aught six”, but overall the pace is too fast to really stop and notice these sorts of things.

It’s a terrific coincidence that I originally posted this review on International Blasphemy Day at the end of September, since in many ways this story deals with faith, redemption, fanaticism, belief, being an outsider vs. conforming to the conqueror (We welcome our new insect overlords), and the End of Days. Strong themes, and overall, strongly presented. The only real problem I had with the story was how characters were introduced – they would just appear, with their name, and that was the introduction. It made it a little hard to feel comfortable with them: “Hey, who's this Alex dude?” But they were eventually described, and the reader just had to keep up.

I think folks who enjoy apocalyptic fiction will like this story. It’s intense, it’s not pretty, and it was a good story. Definitely check it out. ( )