by The Junkie Quatrain by Peter Clines is a collection of four short stories that weave together, yet also work independently. Originally these were exclusive stories that were bonus features for some Permuted Press books on audible.com. As you surmised, audible.com turns books, including Permuted Press books, into an audiobook format.
The Junkie Quatrain takes place over the span of two days, about 6 months after all hell broke loose and the world fell apart. The creatures involved are called “Junkies” due to the way they twitch and jerk their movements. Akin to the 28 Days Later creatures, these things are fast and infected with madness. And its up to you whether you consider them zombies or not.
What’s interesting here is Clines decided to do something creative with the stories. While making them intersecting, involving different characters and interweaving plots, they can be read in any order. No matter what order you read them in you learn something that will happen in another story but you’ll see it unfold from someone else’s point of view. Unfortunately, since this has to be made available for many formats if you own a Kindle the the locations aren’t mapped in the beginning but have no fear, ZombieMutts is here to help. For the Kindle readers here you go:
Story 1 is Location 58
Story 2 is Location 764
Story 3 is Location 1390
Story 4 is Location 1910
I went with 1,4,3,2. But like I said, the order isn’t important so much as just giving you a unique perspective to different characters so you don’t have to mess with this. You won’t miss out if you read it in the order its formatted in.
But with all of this neatness above pointed out, it all comes down to the quality of stories. So were they good? Yup. The Junkie Quatrain is a four course meal of apocalyptic awesomeness.
What struck me right away was the writing style seemed so different to me. It felt looser and more vivid to me than his most popular books, EX-Heroes and EX-Patriots. I have been following his blog that shares advice and insights for writers for a long time (I call it Clinesian Literary Theory) and as odd as it sounds, to me the writing style seems more closely related to what is on his blog. That is by no means a knock on the EX Series, I just love the way The Junkie Quatrain was written. Maybe the shift I noticed was due to the short deadline this book was written for but regardless, it works.
So with that style that I enjoyed, I also enjoyed this book overall the most from the quickly growing Clines bibliography. Fun, intense and a short read, The Junkie Quatrain is a must read that carries on the Peter Clines tradition of giving us something unique to read. Besides, he even mentions LEGO® mini-figs in one story so added bonus right there.
Grade: A-
The Junkie Quatrain is published by Permuted Press and if you have time make sure you check out Peter Clines other blog, H.P Legocraft
This sounds pretty interesting. Intersecting stories are difficult to pull off well. Bad ones (e.g. Crash) are one of my bigger pet peeves.
The format sounds really cool! Your description made me think of Pulp Fiction. Oh… and I love the link to his blog. lol
Which blog? His writing one is a weekly staple of mine.
Is it anything like the movie vantage point – same events told from different angles?
I hear it’s like Vantage Point if it had been done well. And had rage-zombies. And more guns.
I had to look Vantage Point up on IMDB before I realized that I’d watched it. Good lord.
Vantage Point was a neat idea with horrible execution. As clever people have said before.
Good review by that other guy….
Memento…..ugh….I just didnt like that at all. I should give it another shot as I see it’s still bouncing around on Netflix.
That’s hilarious….I just looked it up and realized I had seen it as well. Terrible.