It was just over a year ago that I read Rosson’s Fever House. I really enjoyed that novel and the way it reformatted the familiar zombie apocalypse trope.
I’m sad to report however that volume 2 of the duology is less satisfying. The Devil by Name mostly moves characters around in order to get them in the right place at the right time for the climax. And the climax is sort of Clive Barker rewriting The Stand. Lots of gothic horror and special effects, but a bit rote and too tidy a means of tying up multiple loose ends.
If you read the Game of Thrones novels, you may recall that the fifth novel felt as though Mr. Martin had lost the plot, and was sort of moving an enormous cast of characters around aimlessly as he tried to figure out how to resolve the enormous series of events he’d unfolded, while introducing new characters, cultures, and armies along the way. I think a lack of resolution is in some cases better, and Fever House could have stood alone.
That said, I will read more of Keith Rosson. He’s got skills, and won the Shirley Jackson award for a short fiction collection which sounds right up my alley.
Mysterium Coniunctionis 