Author: Sean Platt and David Wright
Series: Available Darkness (Season 1)
Publisher: Collective Inkwell
Read Type: Author request
Stars:
This book can be purchased from Amazon (International) as a full series of 6.
To find out more about the authors please visit Facebook and their Website.
Individually, you can find Sean on Facebook, Twitter and Amazon
Individually, you can find David on Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and Amazon
Season Blurb
From the writers of the post-apocalyptic smash hit serial, Yesterday's Gone, and Z 2134, comes Available Darkness, a new breed of vampire serial thriller.
The Darkness Has Awoken
FBI Special Agent Caleb Baldwin is on the hunt for a serial killer who has left a trail of burned bodies. One of those victims — his wife. As he gets closer to finding the killer, he falls deeper into an elaborate conspiracy.
A man wakes buried alive with no memory of who or what he is. In his pocket, a note: “Avoid the sunlight and don’t touch anybody.” Now he is being hunted by the FBI while trying to remember his monstrous past. He must control the darkness within before it consumes him and the child whose life he must protect.
11-year-old Abigail was dying slowly each day as the prisoner of a sick man. Until she is saved by the most unlikely of heroes — a vampire with a deadly touch. He is her only hope, and she may hold the key to unlocking the memories of his hidden past.
Past, present, fate, and future are on a collision course as the hours of AVAILABLE DARKNESS are ticking away and a force greater than anything the world has ever seen threatens humanity.
Available Darkness is an epic serialized journey that reinvents vampire mythology with a fast paced, character-driven thriller that blends action, mystery, fantasy, and horror in an addictive, tragically romantic story.
Author Bios
Sean Platt
Together with co-authors David Wright and Johnny B. Truant, Sean has written the series Yesterdays Gone, WhiteSpace, ForNevermore, Available Darkness, Dark Crossings, Unicorn Western, The Beam, Namaste, Robot Proletariat, Cursed, Greens, Space Shuttle, and Everyone Gets Divorced. He also co-wrote the how-to indie book, Write. Publish. Repeat.
David W. Wright
David is also a cartoonist who is working on a children's book.
David blogs about writing and stuff he likes at his personal blog, and about his books at Collective Inkwell.
He lives on the east coast with his wife, seven-year old son, and the world's most poopingest cat.
Review
Strong language: None
Drugs: None
Violence: Yes, frequent
Sexual content: One instance, graphic
You can find links to all of my review of the series at the Available Darkness Archive
The authors gave out a free copy of season one of this serial in their newsletter as an apology for messing up details in the previous letter. I decided to read and review this. Despite having the entire first series, 6 episodes, at once in front of me, I will stick to no more than one a week the same as they are initially released in America.
This episode had a big explosive entrance, but I felt it was let down by its writing quality. To keep the fast pace of the writing the author's often described complex emotions in one word rather than giving it the richness it deserved by using systems such as show don't tell. However, a couple of chapters in this smoothed out to the writing level I am used to from these authors using phrases such as "hair half as wild as the look in his eyes."
There has been an FBI agent appearing throughout the series I have commented on not being able to connect with him. In this episode I was very pleased to finally make a connection as his story unfolded in a rather dramatic and traumatic way for him. I now look forward to reading his chapters in future episodes, rather than considering putting the book down when I come to them.
I also liked that this episode finally switched to darker tones, showing what the vampires are and what they can do. Having seen this my thoughts about where this series could be going have seriously expanded. I feel like up til now we'd only seen the tip of the iceberg, and there's still more to discover.
For me the one thing that stuck out in this episode as a striking difference to other vampire media at the moment was how it treats children in the line of fire. Rather than suddenly turning into a super ninja with no childhood fears or reservations, Abigail is still allowed to be a scared kid, feeling alone, messing up and ultimately sometimes putting the group in more danger instead of less. I expect her to harden as the series goes on, but I hope it is gradual and for good reason.
Apparently this was the end of part one of the series (I wasn't aware it was in parts) so will be interesting to see how the second part differs
The 411
The writing threw me a bit at the beginning of the episode, however it smoothed out as the story went along. This was action packed, yet it took time to let the characters take a breath and be themselves, not be their situation.
I give this 4 stars
