Lynne J. (Doughgirl) reviewed on 4/6/2013 + 138 more book reviews

After a short recap of The Passage at the beginning (done very cleverly IMO in a biblical old-testament style), the novel brings us to a period of time in the future five years after The Passage ended and gives a quick update on the characters. Then it time travels back to the very heart of the apocalypse before coming back to the future and picking up the continuing story of the fight to survive and the re-building of civilization in this bleak post-apocalyptic world.

Like The Passage, The Twelve is looooong. (568 pages in hardback and 21 CDs on audio). And also similar to The Passage for me, I felt like I needed to take a break about half-way through. But I kept going and it picked up. Hoo boy did it pick up! Although I enjoyed The Passage, it was never much of a thriller for me and the ending left the reader up in the air. It was almost like all of The Passage, and much of this book, was exposition for the last 200-250 pages of The Twelve.

I really got into the characters more in this 2nd book both the continuing characters and those newly introduced. There are more of them. So many that there is a list at the back of the book to help keep them all straight. But for me everything began to come together in this second book and I liked it more than The Passage. And now I cant wait for the third boo!.

Fans of Stephen Kings The Stand will notice many similarities to that novel, and Cronin freely admits that he is a big fan of Stephen King. Im a big fan of The Stand myself, but I dont mind the similarities because in the end this is a different story and Im loving the differences also.

Back to all reviews by this member
Back to all reviews of this book
Back to Book Reviews
Back to Book Details