Top critical review
3.0 out of 5 starsDecent, But Not Quite A Stand-Out Effort
Reviewed in the United States on April 12, 2014
Refuge covers the adventures of a group of townsfolk who, whilst much of the town is gone, find themselves transported (along with the town itself) to another world. the books cover the exploits and dangers they encounter along the way.
Firstly the writing is good technically and stylistically. Pains have been taken to make the different authors styles gel, and while there are some typos they don't noticeably detract from the reading experience. The writing is generally easy to follow, pertinent, and varied enough to keep your attention.
The characters are so-so. There are a lot of them and not all of them feel fleshed out sufficiently or given enough page time. Even those that the story focuses on, though, do not feel particularly depth-ful. Some of this is due to the TV-show feel of the story and the penchant for slow character development that shows often take. That said, the dialogue is good, the characters are consistent, but develop believably as the as much as the story allows for as it progresses.
My biggest gripe is the story itself. For the page count, not a whole lot seems to happen, and the world that the characters explore could have played a much more prominent role. Much of the story focuses on the characters running around town trying to figure out what was going on or on characters who die off or otherwise don't much advance the overall plot. The cast can become a little unwieldy at times despite this and keeping everyone straight was difficult at points.
Perhaps the revelation at the beginning that the story was going to be modeled like a TV show, with the first 5 episodes comprising episode 1, skewed my viewpoint. As it was though, it just did not feel the story moved forward commensurate to the page count. While not a cardinal sin for a reader, I personally felt like the story that was told could have been told in a shorter amount of pages.
Recommended, but not one I'll rush to read the sequels for.
