Realistic Depiction of the Beginning of the End
4 out of 5 stars
I read a lot of apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic books and not a lot of things surprised me in them anymore. Most of the stories follow the same x plus y equals z kind of format. Beginning of the End didn’t seem to follow that formula exactly, but didn’t stray too far from it to be weird or too different.
Cooper really understand the audience and writes this book in a way that seems to speak to the prepper and the everyday person alike. Written from the point of view of a group of friends who are prepared but not as much as they would have liked to be, Beginning of the End tells the story of what would happen if you understand how to prepare and what to prepare and because of this intimate knowledge you are able to save yourself before everyone else goes out in a panic.
The author was able to write a lot of details into this book without it feeling overwhelming (or long). There were parts that some people might say weren’t realistic, but if you’ve ever watched fear and temptation creep into someone’s eyes during a crisis (think Hurricane Katrina) then what happens in this all feel right and appropriate. Every day is not going to be a new adventure. Some days are going to not work out the way you expected them to. People are going to fail, things are going to stop working, and you have to move on.
Overall, the story was entertaining and didn’t leave me feeling cheated at the end of it. Sure it’s a little short and people probably like a longer story with more in it, but I thought that Cooper was able to add a ton into this without overwhelming the reader. I’m not 100% sure exactly where the story arc is going to go from here, but I think I’m interested.
Some of my only issues where the lack of details around the disease (Ebola) and the reasoning/fallout/more details around it. I’m a sucker for a good story that involves a scientific plague or disease like that at the center of the story — but this story was much more about the interaction of the people and their need to survive.
The narration was done by Scott Berrier who I thought did a really nice job with this story. I was listening to it one minute and all of a sudden it was almost over. I was able to breeze through the story with his narration at the helm. This isn’t my first and it won’t be my last book narrated by him.
Note: at the time of review there were a few audio errors that I have reached out to Berrier to correct. I’m hoping that these will be fixed quickly.
Book Description:
Dystopia: Beginning of the End by DJ Cooper
Narrator: Scott Berrier
Length: 4 hrs and 22 mins
Series: Dystopia #1
on March 13, 2017
Genres: Dystopian, Post-Apocalyptic, Prepper
Pages: 195
Format: Audiobook
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Follow the action as Destiny & Matt, along with their small group, struggle to maintain some semblance of routine while the world around them spirals into chaos. With limited resources, some knowledge and skills they find that they are somewhat removed from the worst of things. Our group manages through each day until the world’s troubles come to their very home and it is soon apparent that they must adapt and improvise. Watch as they make do and work together to reconcile the reality of this new life. Working together with ingenuity and compromise they begin to overcome many threats that challenge their very survival. It soon becomes apparent that something just doesn’t fit about the Ebola and Isis news. When the financial crisis grinds society to a halt and changes their way of life, they find themselves at the heart of a war they did not intend and an unlikely enemy bent on their destruction. Enjoy their humor as they bring a lighthearted perspective to a very dark time.
D. J. Cooper's first novel and the first book in the Dystopia series offers a different view of things that could be, how these events could shape what might be and give hope for what can be. Written for those of us who are somewhat prepared to handle what may come but are like most of us who just make it day to day, they do not have unlimited resources or knowledge and improvise as each challenge arises. A story of today, in our current world of uncertainty, anything could go wrong and bring our way of life to an end.
I received this book for free. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
About the Author:
DJ Cooper is the author of the Dystopia series and other short works. Currently, a student at Southern New Hampshire University studying for a Bachelor’s Degree in Creative Writing/English.
Often writing humor, research articles for her blog www.survivingdystopia.com and post-apocalyptic fiction, she can be found in front of a computer somewhere. When asked about what kind of writer she is, she says, “The starving kind. Believing that writing is an ART, often times one must sacrifice to maintain the artistic integrity of the works.”
She works in and around the Cincinnati, Ohio area flipping houses and spends much of her time in the areas of Kentucky she writes about in the Dystopia books.
Spending over a year as an internet radio host and the executive producer of the Prepper Podcast Radio Network KPRN-DB, you can hear archived shows at www.prepperpodcast.com.
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