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Disappearance
After the great disappearance, Mark Taylor found himself faced with a second chance to right the wrongs of the past. What he found instead was a city whose familiar streets harboured a deepening darkness, and an obsession bordering on madness.
292 pages, Paperback
First published February 16, 2013
31 people are currently reading
71 people want to read
About the author
Trevor James Zaple
23 books9 followersTrevor James Zaple is a web developer and writer for a youth-focused educational non-profit organization. His work has most recently appeared in Sinister Smile Press' If I Die Before I Wake: Better Off Dead 9, The Brazenhead Review, Bleed Error, and Quill & Crow's Bleak Midwinter: The Darkest Night. He lives in the other London with his wife, children, dog, and a family of strange cats.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
April 8, 2014
I don't normally pick up self-published books, but this one fell into my hands and I thought, what the hell, why not. Ignore the summary on goodreads, it's really not as long-winded or boring as that block of description might suggest.
In an inexplicable phenomena they start calling the Disappearance, people disappear - leaving the world in a state of confusion and mild chaos. The story revolves around a few key characters and follows their lives in the aftermath.
I think it's a pretty decent story with a couple of key flaws that I can't ignore.
The story opens with a typical introduction of the characters. You meet Jason, an internet troll and bored, jobless boy-man living at his parent's house. Even in the first few paragraphs you can get a feel for the tone of the book. Heavily influenced by internet slang and internet culture, a lot of casual sex without clear plot purpose, a very male dominated perspective, and fairly good characterization.
I can roll with the internet slang and internet culture, and then I start getting to know Jason and Sarah, the plot premise occurs... and then we start hitting problems. We are quickly thrown into a flurry of snapshots of the world through different perspectives.
We learn 13 different characters names and their background within 30 pages. That is just madness, especially because the reader has no way of knowing which ones are important (and since they all have backgrounds and personal names, I assumed they all might be important later on). And let me just spoil a little for you - most of them are not important. !! Yeah, I got a little frustrated. Personally, I'm thinking that the author was trying to take a leaf from World War Z (the novel of course) and show the progression of the "apocalypse" through different views. Unfortunately I don't think it works because each vignette is a brief paragraph and then most of the characters are discarded.
Another major issue I had with the book is that there is a severe perspective problem. We jump from one character's point of view to another's within the span of a single paragraph. It's really odd, it really is. Why am I reading about Jason's thoughts on this political speech of taking care of the city and then oh here's Mark's thoughts too! There's no clear demarcation between changes in perspective and that really bugs me. And then occasionally there are brief "interludes" where a third person omniscient narrator-like voice comments on the overall scene of what is happening. See? I have this inkling feeling that the author is confusing this novel with a movie or something with quick shifts in POV and voice-overs.
I have a couple of other peeves about this book. Like the excessive amounts of sex that don't really add anything to the plot or character development. And the sex isn't even gratuitous or sexy, it feels like it's just put in because, I dunno, guys think about sex a lot?
Or the way the book only has male perspectives and despite the number of female characters, they all fall heavily to the wayside (or make their appearance during lustful thoughts from the males).
Or how the book focuses heavily on politics for a good portion of the book, but doesn't exactly matter for the first 100 or so pages.
But the biggest flaws that caused me to severely lose interest in the book midway is the lack of direction and the lack of plot. I got really mad around page 100 because there was literally no reason for me to keep reading except to see how these characters survived another day. And I didn't love them enough for that. There was no goal or purpose and way to survive this entire phenomena for ONE HUNDRED PAGES. That's half the book, people! Okay, there were really minor day-to-day survival problems to solve, but no overarching book goal. So page 100. That's where I started to skip and skim to see if there was any hope for the latter half of the book. And then finally, the mention of depletion of the food supplies, mentioned in the summary. I can't believe it, it takes half the book to even get to the main plot problem written about in the summary? And it's not that convincing of a plot. In some strange way, it almost felt like that plot was contrived in order for characters to interact more.
That is my conclusion for this book: It never was about the plot, the book was trying to be about the characters.
So, I just wrote about all the flaws for most of this review. But I swear, I could have loved this book if it had a little more plot, a little more structure. I did like it quite a bit, until the lack-of-plot realization. The writing is actually quite good. I guess I should say that Zaple's greatest strength is probably creating unique characters and crafting fairly realistic scenes. Emotions are written well, dialogue is strong, action is well-written. Most of the book was enjoyable because I did want to see how things would progress. There are a lot of strengths in this book, despite some major flaws.
2.5 stars, rounded down because I had to skip/skim through so much of the middle portion.
Recommended for those who enjoyed something like World War Z. And I guess recommended for those who can tolerate perspective jumps and character development over plot. If you could choose, I'd probably would also recommend you be male to enjoy this book a little more.
In an inexplicable phenomena they start calling the Disappearance, people disappear - leaving the world in a state of confusion and mild chaos. The story revolves around a few key characters and follows their lives in the aftermath.
I think it's a pretty decent story with a couple of key flaws that I can't ignore.
The story opens with a typical introduction of the characters. You meet Jason, an internet troll and bored, jobless boy-man living at his parent's house. Even in the first few paragraphs you can get a feel for the tone of the book. Heavily influenced by internet slang and internet culture, a lot of casual sex without clear plot purpose, a very male dominated perspective, and fairly good characterization.
I can roll with the internet slang and internet culture, and then I start getting to know Jason and Sarah, the plot premise occurs... and then we start hitting problems. We are quickly thrown into a flurry of snapshots of the world through different perspectives.
We learn 13 different characters names and their background within 30 pages. That is just madness, especially because the reader has no way of knowing which ones are important (and since they all have backgrounds and personal names, I assumed they all might be important later on). And let me just spoil a little for you - most of them are not important. !! Yeah, I got a little frustrated. Personally, I'm thinking that the author was trying to take a leaf from World War Z (the novel of course) and show the progression of the "apocalypse" through different views. Unfortunately I don't think it works because each vignette is a brief paragraph and then most of the characters are discarded.
Another major issue I had with the book is that there is a severe perspective problem. We jump from one character's point of view to another's within the span of a single paragraph. It's really odd, it really is. Why am I reading about Jason's thoughts on this political speech of taking care of the city and then oh here's Mark's thoughts too! There's no clear demarcation between changes in perspective and that really bugs me. And then occasionally there are brief "interludes" where a third person omniscient narrator-like voice comments on the overall scene of what is happening. See? I have this inkling feeling that the author is confusing this novel with a movie or something with quick shifts in POV and voice-overs.
I have a couple of other peeves about this book. Like the excessive amounts of sex that don't really add anything to the plot or character development. And the sex isn't even gratuitous or sexy, it feels like it's just put in because, I dunno, guys think about sex a lot?
Or the way the book only has male perspectives and despite the number of female characters, they all fall heavily to the wayside (or make their appearance during lustful thoughts from the males).
Or how the book focuses heavily on politics for a good portion of the book, but doesn't exactly matter for the first 100 or so pages.
But the biggest flaws that caused me to severely lose interest in the book midway is the lack of direction and the lack of plot. I got really mad around page 100 because there was literally no reason for me to keep reading except to see how these characters survived another day. And I didn't love them enough for that. There was no goal or purpose and way to survive this entire phenomena for ONE HUNDRED PAGES. That's half the book, people! Okay, there were really minor day-to-day survival problems to solve, but no overarching book goal. So page 100. That's where I started to skip and skim to see if there was any hope for the latter half of the book. And then finally, the mention of depletion of the food supplies, mentioned in the summary. I can't believe it, it takes half the book to even get to the main plot problem written about in the summary? And it's not that convincing of a plot. In some strange way, it almost felt like that plot was contrived in order for characters to interact more.
That is my conclusion for this book: It never was about the plot, the book was trying to be about the characters.
So, I just wrote about all the flaws for most of this review. But I swear, I could have loved this book if it had a little more plot, a little more structure. I did like it quite a bit, until the lack-of-plot realization. The writing is actually quite good. I guess I should say that Zaple's greatest strength is probably creating unique characters and crafting fairly realistic scenes. Emotions are written well, dialogue is strong, action is well-written. Most of the book was enjoyable because I did want to see how things would progress. There are a lot of strengths in this book, despite some major flaws.
2.5 stars, rounded down because I had to skip/skim through so much of the middle portion.
Recommended for those who enjoyed something like World War Z. And I guess recommended for those who can tolerate perspective jumps and character development over plot. If you could choose, I'd probably would also recommend you be male to enjoy this book a little more.
November 27, 2013
An interesting, fast-paced piece that sucks you in and takes you on one helluva journey. There were some hiccups in spelling, formatting, and flow, but the overall was simply amazing, and could easily be adapted to a mini-series on television.
April 23, 2014
This book is sort of like Blindness meets The Road in concept. It's not truly a zombie novel, because the only cannibals turn in to cannibals through totally ordinary means. It's not really an apocalypse novel or a dystopian because for much of the story, the tone is dreamy and surreal as opposed to tense and horrific.
Still, the essence is that one day, people randomly disappear, leaving those left behind to figure out their roles in a world made largely lawless by this happening. But more than anything else, this story is a vicious take down of traditional masculinity and white supremacy. Most of the men in this novel that have the most privileges act the most barbarically. Through their eyes, the women around them become whores, waspish bitches, irrational, and disposable. People of color transform in to frightening specters, come to whip up the darkest desires of the white male characters, or to serve as punching bags for those in charge.
No one in this book is easy to like, but the character that best exemplifies everything petty and disgusting about alpha male internet trolling culture is Jason, who possesses not a single redeeming quality. He is like 4Chan come to life. He entertains himself by imagining alternately murdering and fucking his sister, and later, he latches on to one of the other female characters, Olivia, as his angel, the perfect woman. He is the epitome of the Nice Guy, the dark and evil side of putting women on a pedestal at the slightest provocation, thereby taking away their humanity. In reality, Olivia is almost a complete stranger to him, save for a single encounter at a party. But in his hideous man-child mind, she exists to absolve him of his pathetic meaningless existence.
The character I identified with most is Emily, a hard ass survivor who helps the other aimless idiots in this book survive. Jason shoots her at the very end, because in his role as Manchild he has to destroy independent and capable femininity. She gets him before she dies, though, dooming him even though he tried his best to obliterate her.
This book is highly political, and yet it managed to avoid pushing any obvious agenda. Both men who style themselves leaders are interchangeable assholes, reveling in their miserly, racist, and sexist ways. No matter the spin they choose to put on their ideas, everyone starves under their rule just the same. Taggart has a black second in command who he constantly abuses, Michael, and Jason's sister, Sarah, has been forced in to prostitution by Jason himself. These two eventually disappear together, after shooting Taggart in the head. With a novel with precious little hope, this made me happy.
Much happier than I was about Olivia, Mark, and their friends finding a place to stay at the end, though I was hoping the best for them too since they're the only even slightly pleasant people out there. I think the ultimate message of this novel is that trying to cling to comfort in the face of crisis can have unintended and hideous consequences. Only when Mark and Co decide to leave the wreckage of the city behind do their fates start to improve. Essentially, humans can rely only on their families and their work, the places they build for themselves, and if they assume that it's best to let infrastructure provide they will be disappointed. Before, they have been content to rely on a society that is inherently racist, which has provided for them as long as they remain complacent and sacrifice those with fewer privileges. The disappearance forces them to re-examine what human collaboration means, and ultimately, they reject the rumors of civilization rising up again. They have already learned the cost of trusting in exclusionary systems.
I loved this book. I think I went through every possible star rating as I read. Ultimately, it deserves high marks.
Technical issues: once I hit about 90% on my kindle, the formatting went all wonky. Occasionally the word choice makes me wonder if the author's first language is French, but that comes across more as a style thing than an error.
Still, the essence is that one day, people randomly disappear, leaving those left behind to figure out their roles in a world made largely lawless by this happening. But more than anything else, this story is a vicious take down of traditional masculinity and white supremacy. Most of the men in this novel that have the most privileges act the most barbarically. Through their eyes, the women around them become whores, waspish bitches, irrational, and disposable. People of color transform in to frightening specters, come to whip up the darkest desires of the white male characters, or to serve as punching bags for those in charge.
No one in this book is easy to like, but the character that best exemplifies everything petty and disgusting about alpha male internet trolling culture is Jason, who possesses not a single redeeming quality. He is like 4Chan come to life. He entertains himself by imagining alternately murdering and fucking his sister, and later, he latches on to one of the other female characters, Olivia, as his angel, the perfect woman. He is the epitome of the Nice Guy, the dark and evil side of putting women on a pedestal at the slightest provocation, thereby taking away their humanity. In reality, Olivia is almost a complete stranger to him, save for a single encounter at a party. But in his hideous man-child mind, she exists to absolve him of his pathetic meaningless existence.
The character I identified with most is Emily, a hard ass survivor who helps the other aimless idiots in this book survive. Jason shoots her at the very end, because in his role as Manchild he has to destroy independent and capable femininity. She gets him before she dies, though, dooming him even though he tried his best to obliterate her.
This book is highly political, and yet it managed to avoid pushing any obvious agenda. Both men who style themselves leaders are interchangeable assholes, reveling in their miserly, racist, and sexist ways. No matter the spin they choose to put on their ideas, everyone starves under their rule just the same. Taggart has a black second in command who he constantly abuses, Michael, and Jason's sister, Sarah, has been forced in to prostitution by Jason himself. These two eventually disappear together, after shooting Taggart in the head. With a novel with precious little hope, this made me happy.
Much happier than I was about Olivia, Mark, and their friends finding a place to stay at the end, though I was hoping the best for them too since they're the only even slightly pleasant people out there. I think the ultimate message of this novel is that trying to cling to comfort in the face of crisis can have unintended and hideous consequences. Only when Mark and Co decide to leave the wreckage of the city behind do their fates start to improve. Essentially, humans can rely only on their families and their work, the places they build for themselves, and if they assume that it's best to let infrastructure provide they will be disappointed. Before, they have been content to rely on a society that is inherently racist, which has provided for them as long as they remain complacent and sacrifice those with fewer privileges. The disappearance forces them to re-examine what human collaboration means, and ultimately, they reject the rumors of civilization rising up again. They have already learned the cost of trusting in exclusionary systems.
I loved this book. I think I went through every possible star rating as I read. Ultimately, it deserves high marks.
Technical issues: once I hit about 90% on my kindle, the formatting went all wonky. Occasionally the word choice makes me wonder if the author's first language is French, but that comes across more as a style thing than an error.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 11, 2014
DISAPPEARANCE makes me give myself a hug for getting into this Indie business.
Zaple has a sweeping, smooth way of crafting descriptive narrative. He is an expert followthrough-er, leading you through paragraphs like a foul-mouthed gondolier. I was continually impressed, many times stopping for a satisfied exhalation before pressing on into the next dark, dark alleyway.
I would have given DISAPPEARANCE 4.5 cauldrons (DLB rating scale), but I found that I tripped on some of the dialogue. I'm confident that most readers would be just fine with it--and indeed I've read reviews in which readers are impressed with its authenticity--but for me it was at times clunky and in need of some developing. It's a minor issue, and Zaple's magnificent scene-setting far outweighed it.
This book is NOT for the prude; be prepared to despise most every character. I have a nagging faith in humanity, which may have contributed to my discomfort with some of the dialogue and despicable goings-on, but the characters that I COULD celebrate were flawed and likable.
I'm hesitant to say that I appreciated Jason and Sarah's chemistry--for fear that I'll be struck by lightning--but Zaple has a handle on this particular vein of obligatory kinship…before it happens. I can't applaud for that, though if I have to read something like that I definitely appreciate it being written remarkably well.
I really liked Olivia. Those of you that were with me for yadragonchaser know that I've been there--pregnant and PISSED. She's steadfast but scared and struggling to not just give in. You can hear it in her wavering anger, and for that I appreciate Zaple's delicate take on this.
Great book. I recommend this for anyone that's willing to hack through a thorny, demon-riddled thicket with a fantastic, raw talent.
Zaple is a CALLING ALL INDIES! winner. See www.dirtylittlebookers.com to submit.
Zaple has a sweeping, smooth way of crafting descriptive narrative. He is an expert followthrough-er, leading you through paragraphs like a foul-mouthed gondolier. I was continually impressed, many times stopping for a satisfied exhalation before pressing on into the next dark, dark alleyway.
I would have given DISAPPEARANCE 4.5 cauldrons (DLB rating scale), but I found that I tripped on some of the dialogue. I'm confident that most readers would be just fine with it--and indeed I've read reviews in which readers are impressed with its authenticity--but for me it was at times clunky and in need of some developing. It's a minor issue, and Zaple's magnificent scene-setting far outweighed it.
This book is NOT for the prude; be prepared to despise most every character. I have a nagging faith in humanity, which may have contributed to my discomfort with some of the dialogue and despicable goings-on, but the characters that I COULD celebrate were flawed and likable.
I'm hesitant to say that I appreciated Jason and Sarah's chemistry--for fear that I'll be struck by lightning--but Zaple has a handle on this particular vein of obligatory kinship…before it happens. I can't applaud for that, though if I have to read something like that I definitely appreciate it being written remarkably well.
I really liked Olivia. Those of you that were with me for yadragonchaser know that I've been there--pregnant and PISSED. She's steadfast but scared and struggling to not just give in. You can hear it in her wavering anger, and for that I appreciate Zaple's delicate take on this.
Great book. I recommend this for anyone that's willing to hack through a thorny, demon-riddled thicket with a fantastic, raw talent.
Zaple is a CALLING ALL INDIES! winner. See www.dirtylittlebookers.com to submit.
November 18, 2015
This was one hell of a book! It's definitely not for a faint of heart, because disappearance of people in this thriller conducts to a disappearance of morals, good human nature, innocence and maybe even hope. Mark's and Olivia's struggle in post-apocalyptic Toronto is written in rich, satisfying manner and the reader starts very quickly to care about them and follow their adventures. I particularly enjoyed Mark's point of view as he was not a hero at all, but "just a guy", who had to overcome his own fear to protect what's his and survive. The moments when he confronted his biggest doubts and fears were amazingly heart wrenching. The vision of humanity is very dark and gruesome and the author really has no pity in describing it (sometimes I found it a bit exagerrated, but it certainly spiced up the book). I'm amazed at his skills and ideas.
I guess that the moral of the book is: what doesn't kill you - drives you insane.
I guess that the moral of the book is: what doesn't kill you - drives you insane.
November 22, 2018
I actually made a goodreads account just to rate this book. Friend turned me onto it because I'm into post-apocalypse and let me tell you, this is damn good post-apocalypse. You got neckbeards getting kicked around and sniper girls and shit blowing up. It starts off intense and just keeps going right until the end. Don't usually read stuff I didn't find in the back rack at a used book store but if this is the kind of stuff that's out there maybe I'll take recommendations more often.
April 4, 2019
Poorly written. Uninteresting and undeveloped one dimensional characters; most who are also not very bright.
The premise was good, the execution was not. I read the first 70 pages or s before I wanted to stop reading it, but later nitride skimming, and nothing seemed t change at all. I started reading against n 3/4 of the way through the book then skimmed some more.
Not a good book.
The premise was good, the execution was not. I read the first 70 pages or s before I wanted to stop reading it, but later nitride skimming, and nothing seemed t change at all. I started reading against n 3/4 of the way through the book then skimmed some more.
Not a good book.
April 19, 2022
Vote: 2,00
Class: L-B2 (FP)
No, I didn't like it and no, I couldn't bring myself to finish it.
The language is too coarse and the characters seedy; I understand the author is maybe trying to make a point (the world is full of shit?) but I don't share his point.
The world building is not really believable and the characters don't feel to me like real people, and I couldn't care less for them (bad and good people alike).
Definitely a second-rate book, quite poorly written.
Class: L-B2 (FP)
No, I didn't like it and no, I couldn't bring myself to finish it.
The language is too coarse and the characters seedy; I understand the author is maybe trying to make a point (the world is full of shit?) but I don't share his point.
The world building is not really believable and the characters don't feel to me like real people, and I couldn't care less for them (bad and good people alike).
Definitely a second-rate book, quite poorly written.
September 8, 2013
Never a dull moment! A unique take on post-apocalypse fiction, with a sprawling but well-controlled cast of characters and chase sequences as exciting and suspenseful as anything I have ever read. Would make a tremendous television mini-series.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews