Review: Taking It Back by: Joseph Talluto
Around every corner, they are waiting.
In every dark alley, they are lurking.
Behind every door, they are hiding.
For each survivor of the upheaval, every day brings the same grim reality: the dead are coming.
For every community that managed to survive, for every band that came together. Questions nag their minds. Are they alone? Are they the last ones left? Does humanity die with them?
As the dead roam the abandoned highways and walk among the ruins of the living, one group will make a stand to halt the tide and take it back.
The white flag of the dead series is one of the most fast paced series I have read. He doesn’t much time with needles descriptions and his motives are to keep the story at a head charge. This makes for a nice quick read but problems arise with characterization and sympathy in my opinion.
I think he could have spent a little longer when describing the scenes involved with Sarah and his son Jake because these are integral to his character. I think that in some places, he needed to slow down the pace to allow for proper and strong characterization, and I think the best way of doing this would have been to make these scenes with Sarah and Jake a bit longer. He needed to make the reader feel sympathy for the character’s distress over the safety of his child, but I felt that the author wanted to keep a running pace in the story and he shortened these scenes, which hurt the character.
Characters: The main characters in the story are well presented. The characters of Charlie and John are personable and the author manages to coordinate the character’s personalities and actions together to create strong characters. The dialogue between John and Charlie is sharp and brimming with personality, but I feel as though the characterization stops there. Beyond the characters of John, Charlie and Sarah, there isn’t much for strong characters. This is mainly due to the fact that a few new characters are introduced in nearly every chapter of the story and it makes the reader feel a little bombarded.
Writing: like I have mentioned before, Joseph Talluto is evolving as a writer and his writing is getting a little more concise and he is developing admirably. Taking it Back is a prime example of how he is evolving as a writer and it feels like with every page he is gradually developing and I think that the third book in the instalment will verify what I am saying. I expect a lot from the third book in terms of the writing and I hope that he keeps perfecting his craft so that he can make the jump from sharp writer to magnificent writer.
Gore: Joseph Talluto likes to stay away from the gore in his story mainly due to the pace of his writing. His action scenes are written with a better confidence in this novel than its predecessor. He limits his descriptive writing to action scenes and this is also intended to move the story at bullet speed. If you’re a gore hound kind of reader, this wouldn’t exactly be the read for you but the action scenes are well orchestrated.
Overall: Joseph Talluto wrote a very fast zombie novel with a lot of action, there aren’t very many plot twists and the characters need some fleshing out but otherwise this is a great read. This is a fast read and the author composes a great action story. Taking it Back is a fun adrenaline filled story that gives the reader little time to recuperate, and I think Joseph Talluto is going to bring out some bigger guns with White Flag of the Dead 3: America the Dead.
Available on Amazon
