Reviews

Blackout: El apagón by Marc; Galán Echevarría, Beatriz (tr.) Elsberg

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4line's review against another edition

adventurous informative reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.25

Sehr gut recherchiert, mit einigen technischen Details, löste teilweise beängstigende Gefühle bei mir aus, aber ich finde es wichtig, sich mit solchen Themen zu beschäftigen und nichts als selbstverständlich zu erachten.

ingo_lembcke's review against another edition

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4.0

Started July 15th, 2013 just after finishing [b:Homeland|12917338|Homeland|Cory Doctorow|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1340259004s/12917338.jpg|18072409] .
As I am living in the EU - Germany - Hamburg, German is my first language and I am reading this in German, so far there is no english translation, imho.
Long. A bit too long.
Very good scenes and good main characters, the IT-technology is also while simplified spot on - there where no obvious errors in the computer scenes and it was very real for me.
One scene - a very horrifying one - felt familiar, that was explained in the afterword, that was based on a NYT article/series.
Must read, strongly recommended.
So why only 4 stars?
Too long and the twist in the end was not fully solved, could be a hint for a sequel, but then it is not enough material there for a sequel.
If this is translated, be sure to pick it up, as a warning for putting every device incl. smart-meters on the internet.
If it is filmed be sure to see the film.

pinkpanther's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark informative mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

5.0

A fantastic book.
It is not my first Elsberg and I have to say that I liked some of his other books, e.g. Helix and Zero, better. But it's like that with some authors, their worst books are miles ahead of a mediocre writer's best work.

First of all, it is exeptionelly well researched giving it a scary amount of realism. Elaberg does describe every detail. What parts break in what machines, what the consequences are, how people react in what stages of catastrophy - that's both the populance and the government.

The characters are all very 3-dimensional with their own goals and motivations. Also, their own ways of misjudging, while being completely rational and comprehensible. Hard desicions have to be made and some of the characters, that we follow very clearly show the devastation and struggles of ordinary people cought up in a crisis they and their country were not prepared for. The character development is visible in most of the mains but sometimes quite subtly shown, fun for anyone who likes to delve into some deeper analysis

, e.g. Manzano's journey to view women as more than objects of desire even making a female friend

.

The book deals with privilege, fear, human nature and decency, the break down of life as we know it

and (misguided) attempts to make the world a better place

. Highly recommend.