The Revivalists - Christopher M. Hood

 

Christopher M. Hood's The Revivalists promised to be a perfect fit to my reading tastes because I'm a fan of well plotted post-apocalyptic novels as well as a fan of accounts of long road trips, be those fictional on nonfictional. Although I didn't end up enjoying this one as much as I expected I would, it did mostly turn out to be a fun book to read.

The novel begins in the aftermath of a new worldwide pandemic that by some estimates has eliminated 60-70% of the world's population, something like five billion people. Governments across the globe have collapsed, survivors (called "dippers") have come out the other side of the virus with immunity, and anarchic gangs control large regions of America's roadways. The virus, dubbed the Shark Flu, was unleashed after Iceland's permafrost began to melt, and no one saw that coming.  And after the virus rapidly spread around the world via airline travel, there was simply no time for anyone to come up with a plan that could have stopped it in time.

Now, the best solution for most people is to remain where they are if conditions there allow them to survive on their own or with the cooperation of neighbors, friends, and family. One couple, however, is not content to stay in New York because their college student daughter was in California when the transportation system collapsed, and now it seems that she has joined some crazy religious cult. So Penelope and Bill decide to drive across the country, not having any idea if that is even possible, in order to bring their daughter home - whether she wants to come home or not.

Along the way, the two will have to make their way through various communities and groups that will do their best to stop them in their tracks. Some of the people they encounter are eager to kill them for what few possessions they carry, some are wanting to enslave them, and others want them to pay for the privilege of using the highways under their control. But Penelope and Bill are determined to keep moving west until they drop.

The Revivalists has all the makings of a great plot, so why did I lose some of my enthusiasm about the book? It all boils down to just how completely I could suspend my disbelief for the duration of the novel, something I don't usually have a problem doing. In this case, it was easy enough to suspend disbelief that global warming could really unleash an ancient virus that has been trapped beneath Iceland's permafrost for thousands of years. The difficulty I ran into was suspending my disbelief that two people could make so many dumb decisions in a few days and survive them all. Some...maybe...but these two didn't seem to learn much from anything that happened to them.

That's why I'm rating The Revivalists a three-star novel. As soon as I found myself talking back to Bill and Penelope, I suppose that was bound to happen.