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Categoría 7
A Category 4 hurricane, with winds of up to 155 miles per hour, tears roofs off buildings, smashes windows and doors, and can send floodwaters up to the second floor. Evacuation is suggested for up to six miles inland.Hurricane Katrina was a Category 4 when she made landfall.Hurricane Simone is a Category 7—the biggest, strongest storm in recorded history. When she hits New York City, skyscrapers will fall. Subways and tunnels will flood. Lower Manhattan and much of Queens and Brooklyn will disappear under more than thirty feet of water.All along the Eastern Seaboard, towns and cities are being evacuated as wind-driven rain lashes the coast and storm surges crash through seawalls. Roads are packed with fleeing motorists whose cars are jammed with every personal possession that can be crammed in, plus family members, friends, and beloved pets. A huge natural disaster is brewing in the Atlantic.Except that Simone isn't natural. She's the product of rogue weather science being wielded by billionaire Carter Thompson as part of a personal vendetta against US President Winslow Benson. Once Carter wanted to bring rain to the desert and feed the starving peoples of the planet. Now he wants to show Benson—and the rest of the world—just how powerful wind and water can be.If technology created Simone, perhaps technology can stop her. It's up to Kate Sherman, once a member of Carter's weather team; and Jake Baxter, a weatherman for the CIA, to try, using a secret US Navy weapon. The catch? It has to be deployed inside the hurricane.At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
400 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2007
18 people are currently reading
216 people want to read
About the author
Bill H. Evans
7 books16 followersBill Evans is a multiple Emmy Award-winning, nationally-renowned senior meteorologist. He has appeared on Good Morning America and Live! with Regis and Kelly. Evans has received the Outstanding Meteorologist Award from the National Weather Service and has hosted the National Hurricane Conference. Bill Evans and his family live in Connecticut.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 86 reviews
August 25, 2007
The category 7 hurricane does not even get near New York until the last few pages. We don't get to hear what the damage was until the epilogue.
The whole book up until those pages repeats the exact same information over and over, from each character's perspective maybe 4 times each.
There were zero likable characters. Zero.
Agonizingly tedious. Schlocky descriptive sections.
Three to five different characters use the term "woo-woo" to describe conspiracy theorists.
What is up with personifying the hurricane? It's already boring within a few sentences- we didn't need 12 short chapters on it.
What the hell happened to Elle? Why didn't we ever find out about her hands?
Finally, LASERS???? COME ON.
The whole book up until those pages repeats the exact same information over and over, from each character's perspective maybe 4 times each.
There were zero likable characters. Zero.
Agonizingly tedious. Schlocky descriptive sections.
Three to five different characters use the term "woo-woo" to describe conspiracy theorists.
What is up with personifying the hurricane? It's already boring within a few sentences- we didn't need 12 short chapters on it.
What the hell happened to Elle? Why didn't we ever find out about her hands?
Finally, LASERS???? COME ON.
July 27, 2011
I am a big Bill Evans fan, but I didn't enjoy this book. It's far too technical & scientific for the average person who isn't a weather fanatic. The book didn't get good until the last 75 pages or so and by that point I had really pushed myself to read it. There is no character growth and it's hard to like most of the characters. They are very flat. Unless you're a weather junkie, don't bother!
March 22, 2023
DNFed this one. Way too many characters added in almost each chapter, so there was no way for any meaningful character development.
December 3, 2021
The ratings for this aren't great so I had low expectations, but I was pleasantly surprised! Maybe you have to be a weather nerd to enjoy it. I didn't understand all the science and I'm sure a lot of it was made up, but I thought this was a good thriller. Interesting that it was written well before another S-named storm devastated New York.
The one thing I didn't like was the character Elle. We're told over and over how smart she is, but she's actually unbelievably stupid. She deserved what happened to her.
The one thing I didn't like was the character Elle. We're told over and over how smart she is, but she's actually unbelievably stupid. She deserved what happened to her.
September 20, 2007
Suspend your disbelief, and cast the movie in your mind - a la "The Day after Tomorrow" -- and you'll be able enjoy this conspiracy-driven novel about weather control. Any novel with two meteorologists as its heroes rates high on the nerd-patrol scale. Also, "co-writer" Marianna Jameson obviously supplied the pseudo-military and political intrigue, while New York's star forecaster Bill Evans theorized what would happen if a major storm swept up the east coast to New York City. As long as you can mentally overlay Brendan Frasier and Reese Witherspoon's faces on the two main characters, you're meeting the level of expectation for this thrill ride. This isn't Shakespeare, folks! The memory won't last more than an hour after you finish the book; start planning the press junket for the real film now.
December 9, 2011
Borrowed this from my dad because it sounded interesting. However, I only managed to get halfway through. The writing is fine, there aren't any major info dumps, and there's obviously action moving the story forward. But the characters aren't likable in the least, not one of them. Each has an ulterior motive that gets old quick. There are too many different characters, as well, and the few I didn't mind weren't given enough face time on the page.
And the hurricane in the title? Well, it only shows up every five chapters or so and not much is made on it at all. From reading other reviews, I gather the bulk of the hurricane's impact is felt at the end of the story, but I got bored before reading that far. Living in Virginia and facing hurricane season head-on every year, I expected much more about the actual storm than what the book delivered.
And the hurricane in the title? Well, it only shows up every five chapters or so and not much is made on it at all. From reading other reviews, I gather the bulk of the hurricane's impact is felt at the end of the story, but I got bored before reading that far. Living in Virginia and facing hurricane season head-on every year, I expected much more about the actual storm than what the book delivered.
August 28, 2015
Written several years prior to Hurricane Sandy that caused untold suffering and millions of dollars in damage to the Northeast US, this book seems a prophetic vision of what could happen. The story centers around a wealthy multibillionaire that has been covertly researching storm/weather control for years. He's now stepped up the ante in an attempt to bring down the current President. There's plenty of intrigue and lots of bad guys in this story. Reading it while the country marks the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina also brings much of this into perspective.
Quote to remember:
...I just follow J. R. Ewing's basic rule of life. 'Once you can fake sincerity, you can achieve anything.' It's a Southerner's eleventh commandment, at least when dealing with ya'll.
Quote to remember:
...I just follow J. R. Ewing's basic rule of life. 'Once you can fake sincerity, you can achieve anything.' It's a Southerner's eleventh commandment, at least when dealing with ya'll.
October 12, 2008
I thought it was an interesting book. Granted it is fiction, hopefully!!, it does make me wonder about what WOULD happen to NYC in case of a major hurricane.
September 15, 2019
Originally posted on Creature From the Book Lagoon.
I love killer nature or cli-fi or whatever you want to call it. Bad storms, killer waves, earthquakes, volcanoes, and everything else mixed in. I love the disaster theme. High on frenzied action, everyone running around trying to stop mother nature somehow just in the nick of time. So fun!
Category 7 was not high on frenzied action. In fact, for a disaster story, it is actually really slow. I know I’m not the only one who read this thinking it was going to be full force hurricane craziness with the wind blasting, with cars and cows being blown away. If you go into this book expecting that, you might feel let down when you finish this book.
This book is filled with people sitting around looking at data and files and charts. It’s people sitting around waiting to see if a tropical storm is going to upgrade to a hurricane, and then the hurricane upgrade to which number category. We see the mastermind slowly escalate the storm. Occasionally someone gets in a jet or helicopter. We watch towns try to be warned, then told to seek shelter, then finally to evacuate. Author Bill Evans is a senior meteorologist and clearly knows his shit. He understands what needs to be done when a big storm is coming. Unfortunately, real life techniques for storm watching at headquarters doesn’t make for a super thrilling read. I was still entertained, but I could imagine some readers being pretty irked off over the slowness of the plot.
There were a few things that the authors used so much that it kind of was a turn off. First, they mention 9/11 terrorist attack on NYC a LOT. I understand bringing it up a few times because it ties a little bit in to one of the main characters… but, we didn’t really need to be brow beaten into remembering about it. We ALL remember. We ALL understand that it was traumatizing to one of your main characters. Less is more, and mentioning it this many times felt like the authors were just trying to shoe horn it in whenever they needed a little bit of emotion, and this was their one big go to move. Second… WTF was up with all the “woo-woo” usage? *shrug* Once was a little odd but fine. Not bad. But the authors used “woo-woo” so many times it just ended up really standing out and feeling kind of awkward. Third, so many adjectives in just about every sentence. Sentences were so bogged down with wordy descriptions. Like, I don’t even spot that kind of stuff! It felt like this made things move even slower through this book. Over all, I think this book was a little bit too long and could have benefited from some more editing.
Oh, and also…. seriously, NOBODY thinks the mega corporation that cleans up all these odd natural disasters is suspicious at ALL? The corporation that shows up out of the blue within mins of the crisis. They just happen to be in the right spot at the right time, everywhere in the world? HELLLLO! IT’S *THAT* GUY!!
I was entertained by Category 7, but it wasn’t exactly what I thought it would be. I think if you go in knowing that it’s going to be a much slower, more technical side to the storm chaser job, it won’t be too annoyed?
I love killer nature or cli-fi or whatever you want to call it. Bad storms, killer waves, earthquakes, volcanoes, and everything else mixed in. I love the disaster theme. High on frenzied action, everyone running around trying to stop mother nature somehow just in the nick of time. So fun!
Category 7 was not high on frenzied action. In fact, for a disaster story, it is actually really slow. I know I’m not the only one who read this thinking it was going to be full force hurricane craziness with the wind blasting, with cars and cows being blown away. If you go into this book expecting that, you might feel let down when you finish this book.
This book is filled with people sitting around looking at data and files and charts. It’s people sitting around waiting to see if a tropical storm is going to upgrade to a hurricane, and then the hurricane upgrade to which number category. We see the mastermind slowly escalate the storm. Occasionally someone gets in a jet or helicopter. We watch towns try to be warned, then told to seek shelter, then finally to evacuate. Author Bill Evans is a senior meteorologist and clearly knows his shit. He understands what needs to be done when a big storm is coming. Unfortunately, real life techniques for storm watching at headquarters doesn’t make for a super thrilling read. I was still entertained, but I could imagine some readers being pretty irked off over the slowness of the plot.
There were a few things that the authors used so much that it kind of was a turn off. First, they mention 9/11 terrorist attack on NYC a LOT. I understand bringing it up a few times because it ties a little bit in to one of the main characters… but, we didn’t really need to be brow beaten into remembering about it. We ALL remember. We ALL understand that it was traumatizing to one of your main characters. Less is more, and mentioning it this many times felt like the authors were just trying to shoe horn it in whenever they needed a little bit of emotion, and this was their one big go to move. Second… WTF was up with all the “woo-woo” usage? *shrug* Once was a little odd but fine. Not bad. But the authors used “woo-woo” so many times it just ended up really standing out and feeling kind of awkward. Third, so many adjectives in just about every sentence. Sentences were so bogged down with wordy descriptions. Like, I don’t even spot that kind of stuff! It felt like this made things move even slower through this book. Over all, I think this book was a little bit too long and could have benefited from some more editing.
Oh, and also…. seriously, NOBODY thinks the mega corporation that cleans up all these odd natural disasters is suspicious at ALL? The corporation that shows up out of the blue within mins of the crisis. They just happen to be in the right spot at the right time, everywhere in the world? HELLLLO! IT’S *THAT* GUY!!
I was entertained by Category 7, but it wasn’t exactly what I thought it would be. I think if you go in knowing that it’s going to be a much slower, more technical side to the storm chaser job, it won’t be too annoyed?
July 5, 2017
If you expect an action-fuelled, and somewhat low-brow, approach to disaster books then this Bill Evans novel will leave you disappointed. Yes, there is the storm of the millennium, however this slow building tale is centred around politics and science, not the storm. Based upon the science of weather control, Category 7 (a storm classification that currently only goes up to five) follows a group of businesses, some governmental, others rather shady, as they clash over weather control. There are still diabolical master-mind villains and nerdy heroes as the genre requires, however the pace is much slower than anticipated. The science is sound, however the narrative style makes it difficult to gain traction with the characters early on. Overall Category 7 is entertaining and a worthwhile read for fans of the genre whilst action and intrigue fans should be wary of the narrative style.
November 23, 2025
The first 38 pages took me on a yo-yo of "do I want to read this" to "hey, it's getting good" but only to fall back again. The novel promised suspense, science, revenge and manipulating nature, but it brought a painfully slow written 383 pages, with maybe the last 70 or so picking up speed with the hurricane hitting New York and the aftermath.
The characters felt thinly developed and a few chapters could have been condensed with less description for mundane verbiage. There were too long overly technical weather explanations, repetitive political dialogue, redundant exchanges, and nothing to grab me on the edge of the seat.
Maybe the author, Bill Evans, felt the need to prolong the technical jargon since he was/is an actual Emmy Award-winning senior meteorologist, but for someone not so "science" like me, it went way over my head.
The characters felt thinly developed and a few chapters could have been condensed with less description for mundane verbiage. There were too long overly technical weather explanations, repetitive political dialogue, redundant exchanges, and nothing to grab me on the edge of the seat.
Maybe the author, Bill Evans, felt the need to prolong the technical jargon since he was/is an actual Emmy Award-winning senior meteorologist, but for someone not so "science" like me, it went way over my head.
November 13, 2017
It was well written and interesting though the end was unrealistic. With the amount of flooding and damage described in the book to have occurred from the Super Hurricane in NYC (including toppling over the Statue of Liberty), it was never mentioned the inevitable flooding that would have occurred at Indian Point and the very real possibility that such flooding would cause radioactive explosions and radioactive release similar to what occurred at Fukushima from flooding.
September 15, 2019
A bit disappointing. I thought it was going to be about a huge hurricane, which it is, like in a disaster movie only to find it is about a wealthy person, an expert on meteorology, manipulating the weather out of revenge and personal ambition against the President of the US. To much weather-speak for me and not enough suspense and danger. Almost was about to stop reading it but I have this thing about me that once I start a book, however it is, I'm going to finish it.
December 5, 2023
Enjoyed it. Probably wouldn't read again. Very scientific language so as someone who knows nothing about metrology, I was lost in a lot of places.
*spoiler
There's a lot of death, which was impressive and very descriptive. My biggest issue was when I was telling my husband about it we can came to the conclusion that the fancy ice particle gun was a freezer ray. So they shot a freeze ray at a hurricane, which was just hilarious to think about after finishing.
*spoiler
There's a lot of death, which was impressive and very descriptive. My biggest issue was when I was telling my husband about it we can came to the conclusion that the fancy ice particle gun was a freezer ray. So they shot a freeze ray at a hurricane, which was just hilarious to think about after finishing.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 5, 2017
I think part of the problem is that we're expecting to see a Category 7 storm and how the characters are inside it as they try to combat it and we didn't get that. Not enough time was spent on the myriad of characters to form that emotional attachment to. It is a good bathroom read and it's premise isn't bad.
June 10, 2018
I thought this would be a good start-to-summer disaster thriller, perhaps even Cussler-esque. It was a disaster for sure! The most egregious part was the lack of a storm! This was way more of a sub-par political thriller than action novel. The most interesting parts were the short strom-based interludes. Also, the characters are all terrible people. You can't root for anyone! Very disappointing.
July 2, 2018
Entertaining brain-candy beach read. Just don't think too hard or analytically. Or in any way like an English major.
January 3, 2019
A little slow at times. There should have been more attention to the storm.
October 27, 2019
novel - thriller
383 pages
An interesting enjoyable read.
383 pages
An interesting enjoyable read.
December 1, 2021
This was good. A little too many characters in the beginning that dragged a little but it picked up and was very good.
March 2, 2022
The only good parts of this book was just the chapters about the storm. Very slow
March 21, 2022
Overly technical and repetitive. I skipped many pages just to get to the story, and the story was not that compelling. It’s a no go for me and I am a natural disaster book fan.
April 5, 2023
A big-budget disaster movie in book form, only devoid of almost any cool disaster scenes and focusing entirely on forgettable background characters.
Read
June 4, 2023It was a good book. A little hard to get into when I first started reading it.
February 26, 2025
A satisfying disaster thriller
September 28, 2012
I went on a search for novels about Natural Disasters and from looking at this one, written by an Emmy Award Winning Senior meteorologist as the blurb states before anything else, I thought I'd definitely picked a winner.
Wrong.
The title of this books is Category 7: The Biggest Storm in History, yet the storm doesn't really actually happen. It builds, and we get small "chapters" from the storms POV that always seem to end with it just getting closer, but never really hitting the coast.
What I wanted was some Day After Tomorrow type scenario, the weather smashes up the world and survivors have to deal with hellish shifts in weather. Instead I got a lesson in meteorology and how terrorists use it to create storms to kill us all, however this storm named "Hurricane Simone" never actually manifested.
I skimmed through many pages waiting for the big reveal, the huge tidal wave to smash against the earth, the tornado to wipe out a city, and I didn't get any of that. In fact towards the end, page 223 of a 370 book, one of our "main characters" Kate is enjoying a jog on a dock by the water on a beautiful day surrounded by other joggers and walkers, boats on the water and she even remarks that it would be a "perfect day to dive". So... no storm worries for Kate.
I will say a lot of the chapters are split up into different character's POV at different times and in different cities all over the US. It's very confusing to keep track of when so much information is just shoveled a the reader and we're expected to remember which one is Elle, Kate or Lisa. I assume Kate is jogging somewhere the storm isn't going to hit, which as a storm buff who is desperate to find out why she's missed three storms on the last few months, I would think she'd want to be right there in the middle of the action.
Instead of the hearty natural disaster novel I was hoping for, I got what is basically a 200 page long discussion between twenty or so characters, none of whom have any substance, and every time they appear we get a massive "info dump" of their past, how they think of people they work with, storms, etc all without this character actually saying or doing anything. And all they seem to do is TALK about the storm, TALK about how bad it could be, TALK about researching storms, TALK about how dangerous it might become. But that's it, it's all talk. We never get in there with the action.
Example, Carter (who is one of the political characters, he might be the President. I forget and can't be bothered to check) is sitting at his desk and for almost two and a half pages muses about how nice the weather was the earlier summer, a centuries old jet stream in Canada, and conservative TV Pundits. At the end of all this is the very simple sentence "Carter didn't really care about any of that." Great, I'm so glad I read it then.
Our apparent heroine, Kate, states towards the end of the novel: "This is New York, people don't get freaked out by the big things." It's a book written in 2007. Maybe I'm just a naive Australian here, but from what I've seen New Yorkers are quite rightfully scared by the big things. And at least twice in the novel they mention the Towers and 9/11. Maybe it was a joke that even the characters didn't get.
At some point a character dies, which then becomes the focus of the story. A story labelled Category 7: The Biggest Storm in History has turned into pages and pages of people mourning over someone I don't really remember anyway and can't figure out why Kate's upset. Is he the same old tutor of hers that she was screwing now that his wife was dead?
Finally, on page 299, we get the revelation that the sky changed. But as far as I can tell this is just because the sun is setting and the kidnapped person watching them is using the sky as a time dial to count how long they've been stuck. Nothing to do with the storm. And so leads into a few pages of this kidnapped victim being interrogated by the FBI for reasons they don't explain.
On page 311 we actually get some action from the storm. But we seem to have missed the exciting part. Now the streets are empty and whatever chaos has apparently happened. Our genius heroine Kate declares on page 319 that there's no storm category higher than five. No wonder she missed those other storms, her brain is often elsewhere.
It ends with nothing much else happening. Definitely nothing to do with the storm that's worth mentioning. Kate meets up with some guy Jake (wait, he might be the teacher she was screwing) going to lunch.
All in all, I would not (despite it's title) classify this as a natural disaster novel. If you like political drama/thriller, pick this one up. The fact that it claims to be about a storm is kind of a smokescreen.
Oh, loses points for having a political character named Winslow who is referred to by his nickname: Win. BookFail.
Wrong.
The title of this books is Category 7: The Biggest Storm in History, yet the storm doesn't really actually happen. It builds, and we get small "chapters" from the storms POV that always seem to end with it just getting closer, but never really hitting the coast.
What I wanted was some Day After Tomorrow type scenario, the weather smashes up the world and survivors have to deal with hellish shifts in weather. Instead I got a lesson in meteorology and how terrorists use it to create storms to kill us all, however this storm named "Hurricane Simone" never actually manifested.
I skimmed through many pages waiting for the big reveal, the huge tidal wave to smash against the earth, the tornado to wipe out a city, and I didn't get any of that. In fact towards the end, page 223 of a 370 book, one of our "main characters" Kate is enjoying a jog on a dock by the water on a beautiful day surrounded by other joggers and walkers, boats on the water and she even remarks that it would be a "perfect day to dive". So... no storm worries for Kate.
I will say a lot of the chapters are split up into different character's POV at different times and in different cities all over the US. It's very confusing to keep track of when so much information is just shoveled a the reader and we're expected to remember which one is Elle, Kate or Lisa. I assume Kate is jogging somewhere the storm isn't going to hit, which as a storm buff who is desperate to find out why she's missed three storms on the last few months, I would think she'd want to be right there in the middle of the action.
Instead of the hearty natural disaster novel I was hoping for, I got what is basically a 200 page long discussion between twenty or so characters, none of whom have any substance, and every time they appear we get a massive "info dump" of their past, how they think of people they work with, storms, etc all without this character actually saying or doing anything. And all they seem to do is TALK about the storm, TALK about how bad it could be, TALK about researching storms, TALK about how dangerous it might become. But that's it, it's all talk. We never get in there with the action.
Example, Carter (who is one of the political characters, he might be the President. I forget and can't be bothered to check) is sitting at his desk and for almost two and a half pages muses about how nice the weather was the earlier summer, a centuries old jet stream in Canada, and conservative TV Pundits. At the end of all this is the very simple sentence "Carter didn't really care about any of that." Great, I'm so glad I read it then.
Our apparent heroine, Kate, states towards the end of the novel: "This is New York, people don't get freaked out by the big things." It's a book written in 2007. Maybe I'm just a naive Australian here, but from what I've seen New Yorkers are quite rightfully scared by the big things. And at least twice in the novel they mention the Towers and 9/11. Maybe it was a joke that even the characters didn't get.
At some point a character dies, which then becomes the focus of the story. A story labelled Category 7: The Biggest Storm in History has turned into pages and pages of people mourning over someone I don't really remember anyway and can't figure out why Kate's upset. Is he the same old tutor of hers that she was screwing now that his wife was dead?
Finally, on page 299, we get the revelation that the sky changed. But as far as I can tell this is just because the sun is setting and the kidnapped person watching them is using the sky as a time dial to count how long they've been stuck. Nothing to do with the storm. And so leads into a few pages of this kidnapped victim being interrogated by the FBI for reasons they don't explain.
On page 311 we actually get some action from the storm. But we seem to have missed the exciting part. Now the streets are empty and whatever chaos has apparently happened. Our genius heroine Kate declares on page 319 that there's no storm category higher than five. No wonder she missed those other storms, her brain is often elsewhere.
It ends with nothing much else happening. Definitely nothing to do with the storm that's worth mentioning. Kate meets up with some guy Jake (wait, he might be the teacher she was screwing) going to lunch.
All in all, I would not (despite it's title) classify this as a natural disaster novel. If you like political drama/thriller, pick this one up. The fact that it claims to be about a storm is kind of a smokescreen.
Oh, loses points for having a political character named Winslow who is referred to by his nickname: Win. BookFail.
March 19, 2021
I think to do this story and storm justice, it needed to be longer. The last few pages aren't enough to justify the title. The story had potential, but it just wasn't reached.
September 23, 2015
OK, I admit it...I am a weather junkie! I saw meteorologist Bill Evans of Good morning America fame's book CATEGORY 7 in a book catalog I receive monthly and thought it sounded interesting. A mad scientist/former CIA agent/billionaire/presidential hopeful practicing weather manipulation on the unsuspecting public is a pretty good premise for a book. I wasn't disappointed in it but I also wasn't thrilled enough to give it five stars. I think the problem for me was there were too many characters and I got mixed up on who was who and their place in the story.Also to me the politics got muddy and a little unbelievable. I did enjoy the story and it was appropriate setting for me personally to read it in September because in my memory that is when the worst hurricanes have hit Texas. I live in North Texas we don't get the full hurricane but some will come our way and provide pretty heavy tropical storms. We had hurricane warnings for Hermine in 2007 and I had to be out in it and that was scary enough so I could imagine how some of the people felt when having to deal with a hurricane that was 700 miles wide and had the force above a Category 5 which is the top on the hurricane scalar. I thought the characters were good but just too many to keep up with and what happens to some of them made my skeptical mind not buy it. Still in all I liked it and i do recommend it for people who love the science and myth of the weather and looking for some fairly good fiction for a weekend's read. Just don't let a politician read it. They might get ideas. (shiver)
December 28, 2008
There it was--facing me on the rack at Barnes & Noble. Was this published in hardback? Probably not. Hot off the paperback presses, a new ecco-disater: not eathquakes, volcanos or tidal waves, but weather. Since it is apparent weather might take us down in the not to distant future, I carrried the freshly minted paperback to the counter. In truth, I was in the mood for a diaster. Something equalling the quality of my life would be good. Category 7 didn't come close. The only thing overtly obvious: it was written by an (ex?)meteorologist. The plot is totally predictable, the characters are throw-aways and the prose is lumbering (especially when you know there will be no surprises). There is one redeeming thing: the descriptions of the storm are compelling in their detail. I found myself skipping ahead just to get to the disaster parts. If you go to Florida on holiday and are hit with a hurricane--this would be a good book to read by flashlight.
January 22, 2010
A decent book on the evils of manipulating the weather. I could see Roland Emmerich getting his hands on this and making another big budget CGI lovefest, complete with the requisite shots of the White House getting demolished. That guy really hates the White House... But I digress. The action moved along well when there was any description of the hurricane, but much like the central storm, the narrative stalls frequently as the author tries to put his knowledge of meteorology into layman's terms. The motivation behind the antagonist's actions are flimsy at best, and the person I had hoped would be the main hero wasn't around to see the storm hit. But the characters were well written and some decent twists kept me reading long enough to find the last page.
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