Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I bought this book based on all the 5 star reviews, I mean, its rated at nearly 5 stars! Award winning authors are rarely rated so high! And I love post-apocalyptic stories, so I was excited to read it, and had high expectations. All I can say, is what a disappointment. I should have read a sample. It left me wondering where all the 5 star reviews came from . . . The idea was interesting. I thought the concept of the Silo was pretty unique although not terribly unique. I've read other "closed system" post-apocalyptic stories. A big issue for me was the supposed science in this science fiction novel (rather the lack thereof). It was weak to the point of being non-existent. I like a hard science fiction base to my science fiction, at least in the pertinent, plot dependent parts. I felt Wool had none. From the very beginning I was skeptical of the Silo itself, the sustainability of the population, the supply of food (as example, fruit juice from fruit trees grown under grow lights) or even such things as clothing (where does the material for making/mending such things come from?), grow lights/computers that last centuries. Where are the replacement parts coming from? Hard drives aren't viable for that long. Next, the characters were uninspired and uninspiring, and they kept saying and doing things contrary to their character, going through very involved mental gyrations to support it. Any explanation would have been better than paragraphs of internal dialogue that was supposed to make me think "well, okay, then, in that case, NOW it makes sense." when really it just leads me on a downward trend where characters and plot made less and less sense. My suspension of disbelief was completely eroded. I never really got to know any of the main characters before they were gone and cared very little what happened to them. I would end up skimming much of the rambling internal dialogue or strange, stilted speeches. The dialogue was very frustrating to me. It ran on too long and too preachy to be believable. Everyone sounded the same or had cliché, caricature accents. Much of the character background, history and setting information was given in this format, pages and pages of excruciatingly detailed dialogue on subjects/history that the characters would already know and was just recited for the reader's benefit. Most often, after the first hundred pages or so, I understood most of it anyway, and subsequent lengthy pauses of the actual story to read through yet another scene/dialogue of two characters (who already know this stuff) stand around and recite pages of info-dumping dialogue. Finally, I come to the most frustrating part of the book for me. I can forgive a lot given an interesting plot and characters, which in Wool, in my opinion, both were not strong, although they not terrible either. But, the writing style itself, really jarred me. I was pulled from the story again and again and again by awkward descriptions in overwhelming detail on how a drawer is closed or a tool used or a knife returned to its sheath. It was to the extent that these simple actions, that often did not even need to be addressed at all, were rendered in such detail as to go on for sentence after sentence, for a paragraph at times. I do not need to know what the drawer looked like, how heavy it was, how paper protruded from it like tongues or mummified skin or ancient dried leaves from a better time, just how the squeal of it closing sounded like some over worked, tired machine, echoing out of the bowels of the decimated past (this is not a real example from the story but created for illustration purposes based on many such similar renderings). I was annoyed to the point of eye rolling, to read how someone opened the door, came through the door, closed the door, walked across the floor, stood or sat or leaned, looked, spoke, whatever. I felt like there was way too much description and detail that I'm sure was intended to add to the story but really ended up taking too much away from it. I started skimming much of this, looking for the plot and characters within, and found less and less as the story progressed. My suggestion would be to read a sample or purchase the lower priced first installment if it is still available before purchasing the rest.