Welcome to 200 Words or Less, a weekly Friday feature (when I can remember or be bothered to post) here on The Tattooed Book Geek where I will bring to you reviews/thoughts of 200 words or less from the books I read before I started blogging. We all have them, books that we read and loved or even read and hated before we decided to start blogging and what better way than a quick fire review of 200 words or less to share your thoughts on them.
My Choice:
In a wasteland born of rage and fear, populated by monstrous creatures and marauding armies, earth’s last survivors have been drawn into the final battle between good and evil, that will decide the fate of humanity: Sister, who discovers a strange and transformative glass artifact in the destroyed Manhattan streets; Joshua Hutchins, the pro wrestler who takes refuge from the nuclear fallout at a Nebraska gas station; and Swan, a young girl possessing special powers, who travels alongside Josh to a Missouri town where healing and recovery can begin with Swan’s gifts. But the ancient force behind earth’s devastation is scouring the walking wounded for recruits for its relentless army, beginning with Swan herself.
Swan Song by Robert McCammon.
Swan Song has a character called Joshua Hutchins, who before the apocalypse is a professional wrestler called Black Frankenstein, how cool, enough said!!!!
After a nuclear apocalypse devastates the world, us humans do love us some bombs! Swan Song follows various groups of survivors in the aftermath as they struggle to endure, surviving and journeying onwards. It has a good vs evil vibe with some supernatural aspects. But, it is so much more, it’s an epic and character driven story.
The separate story-lines are all interesting as are the eclectic mix of characters and their individual back-stories. Swan, Joshua and Sister are all characters that you really care about as you follow them. And, Roland is a character you love to hate, an annoying twerp, he is Joffrey before GRRM thought of him.
McCammon has an easy and engaging fast paced writing style that makes Swan Song fly by and it’s 956 page length feels like half that.
If anyone tells you that this is a poor man’s version of The Stand, it’s NOT. Yes, there are similarities but Swan Song sits firmly next to The Stand as a classic post-apocalyptic adventure and deserves to be read.
Quotes from Swan Song:
“Even the most worthless thing in the world can be beautiful, it just takes the right touch”
“and as she’d watched him stagger away Swan had realized that forgiveness crippled evil, drew the poison from it like lancing a boil.”
“Once upon a time, man had a love affair with fire.”
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Roland was an awesome villain. Listened to this right after listening to The Stand. Both sinilar, but both conpletely different and engaging stories with vastly different writing styles.
Robert’s ‘Matthew Corbett’ series is also very good.
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Oh the two are definitely similar but as you say both are different to, it’s just a shame that lots seem to class Swan Song as a poor version of The Stand.
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Only poor reviewers or uneducated readers would class it as that. By that logic, Dracula is in the same bracket as Twilight due to both featuring vampires.
It’s a good thing we know the difference. It’s our task to enlighten.
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Yess! I have ‘Swan Song’ on my Kindle, ready to jump straight back in. I read a sample, loved it and immediately got the book. I do love ‘The Stand’ and was looking for something similar, but I am sure it’s not just a copy. The style of writing is very good so far as well.
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The Stand is amazing, one of my favourite books! There’s a few similarities between the two but then again that could be said for most post-apocalyptic books. But there’s plenty of differences too, characters, story and the writing style. Both are excellent reads.
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“…when I can remember or be bothered to post” At least you’re honest 😛 I’m like this with the WWW Wednesday feature, but I just pretend I get mixed up with the days of the week instead 😛
Might have to check this out! It seems to tick a lot of boxes of what I look for in a book 😀
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Damn right I’m honest, I’d have thought that was obvious from my blog posts, sigh, sprogs!😠
If you do check it out I hope you enjoy it, it really is a classic and a great book.
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Sounds awesome!!
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Well I haven’t read Stand , so I don’t think it’ll bother me at all and I may as well give it a go when I get the chance to , Great job on the 200 worded review , Believe me I’m taking notes ✍️
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True, Swan Song is often compared with The Stand, but I’ve always felt they were two very different books, with only the end of the world as we know it as a common point. And the fact that I remember it very well, despite having read it a loooong time ago, means that it made a strong impression on me.
Oh, and I LOVE the Joffrey quip! 😀 😀
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Ha, thanks and very true, they are different but lots of people seem to think they are very similar. I never really saw it, a few similarities but that’s the same for any end of the world book.
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