Welcome to the tour for Zipline: Aftermath, the exciting follow-up to P. Anthony Michael's thriller Zipline!
Zipline: Aftermath by P. Anthony Michael is the continuation of the Zipline series where readers are introduced to a group of friends out to have their last “hurrah” before life and responsibilities began pulling at them. This last trip was meant to be a fun zipline expedition down a mountain. However, it turned into some much bigger. Zipline: Aftermath continues the story of this group of characters, and their lives since that fateful weekend at the mountain.
Zipline: Aftermath stays true to the elements of the first book with the same color scheme for the cover. With this cover, we get a man in uniform kneeling while behind him is the outline of a city. On either side of him are glowing eyes. On one side, the eyes are glowing blue, and on the other side, the eyes are glowing orange.
Author Michael brings Zipline: Aftermath to readers two years after the end of Zipline. The friends survived the mountain, but several questions still remained. What really happened up there? What are the implications of what happened to Neal after being attacked by two different creatures up on the mountain?
Neal and Gail are married in this latest installment. Neal has joined the police force, and he’s doing a lot of good. He’s getting the bad guys off the streets and racking up quite the reputation. He’s focused on doing good, and making sure that only the bad guys go down. This has gained him both good and bad attention from the other cops on the force.
It sounds like a good thing, right? Neal uses his newfound abilities to accomplish a safer neighborhood for the people where he calls home. Working to make sure that his pregnant wife has a safe place to live is a benefit of all of this as well. But what happens when Neal starts having bizarre nightmares? Well, that’s where this story gets interesting.
Zipline: Aftermath explores the aftermath of Neal having two warring sides inside of him. He is using his new abilities to hunt criminals, but what he doesn’t know is that something is about to start hunting him in turn. Author Michael is going to put Neal to the test when the danger follows him home.
Compared to the first book in the Zipline series, Zipline: Aftermath is a step above. This novel gives readers some horror elements but focuses more instead on the suspense and thrills. A killer is roaming the streets targeting the homeless. Things get more complicated when a reporter is targeted and killed. So readers get the sense that this reporter saw something that they shouldn’t have and paid the ultimate price.
Readers get a sense of rivalry between Neal and a fellow cop, Lieutenant Clay. Neal is creeping up on Lieutenant Clay’s arrest record, and that creates a bone of contention between the two men. It’s more one-sided than anything, but Neal gets the sense that there is more going on than meets the eye.
Zipline: Aftermath is an intriguing novel that does a good job at drawing the reader in. Author Michael weaves a story that encompasses more than just Neal’s work life, but his home life as well. All of the group show up in this novel, but the story focuses mostly on Neal. That doesn’t mean that Neal’s family and friends don’t get drawn into the chaos, because they do.
When it comes to the “horror” aspect of this installment to the series, it’s there at random places in the story. However, it isn’t the focal of the story. Zipline: Aftermath is more about the suspense and drama. This book is told from the third person point of view, and works on emphasizing just how unique Neal has become.
As Zipline: Aftermath draws to a close, readers will get a sense of a solid conclusion. Author Michael is going to throw in a few answers to questions that were left to linger at the end of book one. But while you get some closure, you are also getting the sense that there is more to come. So, we’ll see where things go from here.
4 stars
ZIPLINE: AFTERMATH
Publication Date: August 1, 2024
Genre: Thriller
Gail and her friends may have escaped the mountain, but now they all have to deal with the AFTERMATH. Two years later, all have entered the workforce. Neal and Gail are contentedly married, and she’s pregnant with twins on the way. But Neal is unsettled as special abilities emerge, which he has to learn to embrace. Worse yet, he’s having strange visions of gruesome murders that actually happened as if he was there. Now Neal, Gail, and friends are wondering if he is truly going rabid. As they dig deeper into the mystery, they find the truth is far worse and more insidious than anyone could imagine. Aftermath is a mystery suspense continuation to Zip Line that will grip you from beginning until the very end.
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