melt

 

Melt Down
(2012)
Edward W. Robertson

While preparing to write this review, I found that somehow I neglected to review the first book in the series, Breakers. I’ll have to go back and remedy that soon, but probably not today. 

Melt Down follows the same time period as Breakers, but with a different set of characters. This time we see the plague and alien invasion through the eyes of Nestor (Ness) and Tristan. Ness is a twenty-something still living in his mother’s trailer in Moscow, Idaho, spending the majority of his time on MMPORG raids on his laptop instead of going to college. His older brother, Shawn, comes home unexpectedly after his own home is foreclosed on, and what begins as intense sibling rivalry becomes a strange camaraderie as they are soon the only ones left alive in their makeshift cabin in the woods.

Tristan is a soon-to-be college graduate with no direction, realizing her chosen career path has left her with limited real-world options. After coming home in hopes of being able to ride her parents’ coat tails a little longer – and being told there will be no more free rides – she suddenly finds herself responsible for not only herself but her younger brother’s survival as well. 

I found it a little odd to start back over at the beginning, but for the most part I liked it about as much as the first book. I did find it interesting to learn more about the aliens and how things work within their world of ships and devices a little more. The original set of characters from Breakers was a little more compelling, and I was glad to see some connections back to them, but I find Ness and Tristan pretty intriguing in their own rights and I am hooked enough to want to see what Mr. Robertson might have in store in Knifepoint, the third book in the series. Although, according to his Goodreads book pages, I should read Outcome, a novella about the outbreak, before I go any further, so perhaps I will do that first.

A minor note, and it may just be the edition I have (Kindle 3-book set): There are a LOT of minor spelling errors, some really simple ones that just a spell check run should have caught. It’s just irritating enough to disrupt the flow of my reading, but it’s been long enough since I read Breakers that I can’t remember if it was a problem then as well. I’m hoping it’s just my edition and not indicative of the author’s work in general.