Review: Alas, Babylon by Pat Frank

Ugh. My internet has been.. misbehaving for the last week. It'll take at least 10 minutes for this post go load! Having little internet is driving me batty! I don't mind as much not being about to surf the net. But I cannot even access my email.. oh and don't get me started on trying to use it for my school work.

Onwards to the review! I should have a few more of them coming in the next few days.

Title: Alas Babylon
Author: Pat Frank

Published: 1959

Length:  323 pages

Genre:  Classic, Post Apocalyptic, Survival

Where Found: The wonderful BookDepository

Cover: Isn't the cover just gorgeous?  It'a part of what drew me to this classic.

Summary:

The survivors of a nuclear holocaust are forced to rely on their own resources as they join together in the struggle for survival amidst the ruins of Fort Repose, a small town in Florida.

Review:

I'm often weary about classics because some of them are disappointing reads. But 

I had been looking forward to reading this book for months now, and I had heard fantastic things about it. 

Honestly it wasn't the breathtaking, sleep stealing, obsessive read I was hoping for. But it was a great read. 

There were a few problems I had with this book. 

Alas, Babylon was first published in 1959 and while sometimes doesn't feel dated, you can tell it's age. The racism and sexism were blatantly obvious. For example at on point in the book our main character had this to say at one point - 

"The more he learned about women the more there was to learn except that he had learned this: they needed a man around." 

As a modern day girl I was quite offended by this, but do understand that's how things were back in the days. 

The next thing that I had a problem with that was by the time I had got though a 1/3 of the book, it felt like nothing had happened. Sure you get introduced to the characters, but we still didn't learn that much about them. Pat Frank's writing was a little wooden but readable but it wasn't fleshed out enough - for me anyway. There was just not enough for me to truly care and cry and laugh with and for the characters. Sure I liked some of them.. but again they just weren't.. fleshed out and real.

Despite all that I did like the book. And i'm glad that I read it.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars