"Amy Harper Bellafonte is six years old and her mother thinks she's the most important person in the world. She is. Anthony Carter doesn't think he could ever be in a worse place than death row. He's wrong. FBI agent Brad Wolgast thinks something beyond imagination is coming. It is.
Unaware of each other's existance but bound together in ways none of them could have imagined, they are about to embark on a journey. An epic journey that will take them through a world transformed by man's darkest dreams, to the very heart of what it is to be human. And Beyond.
Becausesomething is coming. A tidal wave of darkness ready to engulf the world. And Amy is the only person who can stop it."
I picked up this book from our tea room here at work, knowing nothing more about it than the sleeve notes as above. At nearly 1000 pages long, I knew this was going to take some dedication to read. Without giving too much away (which is quite difficult), the story follows initially, a scientists investigations into prolonging mankinds lifespan. The military get involved, as they can see the potential of turning this work into a weapon. 12 death row inmates are chosen for experimentation. It's the job of FBI agent Wolgast to persuade these inmates to sign up to the experiments. Then, he is asked to pick up Amy, a six year old girl. He baulks at this, and goes on the run with her. Meanwhile at the secret base where the experiments are being carried out, something has gone wrong (naturally!) The drugs they have given the inmates have basically turned then into vampires. Of course they escape.
The action then jumps forward 100 or so years, to a small group of humans living in a walled compound to keep the hoards of vampires out.
That's enough plot spoiling from me!
I must admit that if I had realised from the start that this was a vampire book, I may not have bothered. But I have to say that this is a fantastic read, that reminds my very much of The Stand (in tone). Being such a long book, you really get to know the various people and care about what happens. My only criticism - it does take a while to get started and to explain itself. Then when the action shifts forward 100 years, you have a whole new cast of people to get to know, which I struggled with a bit. But once it got going, I found I couldn't put it down.
Warning, this is the first book of three apparently, so you will need to invest quite a bit of time!
Ian