It’s no secret that I adored The Three by Sarah Lotz. My review was glowing and it was an easy five out of five stars for me. So when I heard there was going to be a follow up, a kind of companion novel, it was on my radar and I was lucky enough to be sent an early copy of Day Four.
What made The Three so good for me was the multi-media aspect, much like the mockumentary interviews in World War Z, but you just get a glimpse of that in Day Four. The majority is third person narrative from the point of view of certain characters; the maid, the security guard, the doctor, an elderly guest, even the rapist on board. There are a few blog posts from one of the guests here and there which I obviously enjoyed and some interviews near the end but no where near the level that was put in The Three.
Sequels rarely stand up to the originals when the originals are so amazing that all you want is a sequel. Donnie Darko had S. Darko. Hangover had Hangover II. And The Three had Day Four. It’s not a bad book by any stretch of the imagination, if I picked this up as a stand alone I probably would like it just fine. But for me, it just doesn’t stand up to the original. It’s worth a read but not a classic.
As an original book, the story of a cruise ship being out of power is pretty scary. There was even a line that had me shiver from the chill up my spine. The characters were interesting but the multi-POV had me wishing for longer with certain people and less with others, I wanted to see the relationships change under the strain and I found it pretty trick to keep up with the switches. Despite that, I’m not going on a cruise for a while!
Overall, if Sarah Lotz writes another book for this series- I’d still buy it and devour it. But this sequel didn’t stand up to the original for me. You can buy Day Four here!
Imogen's Typewriter. 