Shift

Damn, did I just win a late-to-the-party award? Speech time.

I'd like to thank Goodreads, without whom I'd probably never have known of this book. I'd like to thank Hugh Howey for creating this masterwork. And lastly, thank you to all the kind readers that so generously update their reading habits to the site — even the bizarre readers, you know who you are. Without you, this series would have not stared back at me. Without you, I would not be making this textual speech. Thank you so much.

I've found my comfort zone in reading three books at a time. Only reading one would probably result in more unfinished, and more than three I feel would challenge my attention span — picture a monkey in a locked room filled with plastic bananas. The show more reason I mention this, besides to impress a smile, is because I finished the other books to devote myself to the last half of this one.

Never once have I felt the author attempting to embellish, not that he doesn't drop a clever line or draw a vivid scene. But he writes with such clarity it's hard not to appreciate how everything just seems to fit exactly where it belongs — even while juggling multiple time periods. If I had to guess, I'd go with the author is a plotter, if for no other reason but the deft hand used to connect characters and events in such a natural way. His word choice always seems to add spice and at the same time manages to bring the characters more into focus. He has a knack, a talent, for doing so, and he does it with a subtle touch. Time and again I've witnessed it. Spoilers are difficult to avoid, so these three simple lines will have to suffice. With context, layers of possible meaning can be gleaned.

"Donald tried the coffee. It was cold and weak but he didn't mind. It suited him."

I did like Wool more, but this is in no way a step down. As great as Wool, in like and different ways. Shift continues the story by going back in time, answering questions, then moves forward evincing and raising more.

Justin Cronin was right when he said, "You will live in this world."

All the stars, even the fallen ones. show less

It runs on and on forever. When will this boring book end?

And there are problems that start small but after 600 pages become really irritating.
The tedious non-descript characters have the same voice and dialog as each other. It's mind numbing. It just rambles on and on. A good editor could have helped a lot here. Some things you can't fix by editing- plot holes, annoying characters, and god-awful metaphors. I cursed the author throughout the book, sometimes in my head, sometimes out loud.

The author likes to leave some things vague and sometimes you're supposed to be in the dark by design. But he also uses allusion a lot seemingly with the intention of making a connection or a surprise revelation. Sometimes this means scrambling back show more dozens of pages or even back to the last book. You're in the predicament of trying to figure out if this is the former or latter. It leads to a lot of wasted time tracing back a reference only to find out it doesn't exist. Eventually, over time, you just stop giving a shit.

The crying and the tears every 10 pages. Honestly, there's somebody weeping or sobbing all the time. It's like the Hollywood gimmick of having characters vomiting all the time to show extreme emoting. The incessant crying and tears make you want all the characters to die. My favorite part of the book is when someone dies. Good riddance loser character number #. If they all die maybe this crummy book will end. show less

The Shift Omnibus Edition by Hugh Howey is a trilogy that is a sequel to his bestselling Wool. I read and loved Wool and was excited to finally be reading these next books. Unfortunately, I really didn’t care for Shift at all. The time sequences were all jumbled around and just when the reader would get to a good part, wham, the story shifted to another time. This took me totally out of the story and after a number of these time shifts, I really didn’t care anymore about any of the characters or the stories they were telling.

This three volume book is over 600 pages and believe me I felt as trapped as the residents of the various Silos. The characters were lame and dreary, the plot had huge holes, and it was painfully obvious when show more the author liked a phrase as he would then repeat it over and over. Why did I finish this? Well, I kept hoping that something would pull the various story lines together and give me some kind of semblance to the original story. This never happened and now I feel that spending so much time on this was a complete waste of time.

I also have this author’s Dust on my shelves which would once more place me into this claustrophobic world of the silos but, at this point I am not sure if I will bother to read it. What started out with such great promise with Wool really went downhill with Shift and this book has been my biggest disappointment so far this year. show less

First sentence: Troy returned to the living and found himself inside of a tomb.

Premise/plot: Shift is the second book published in the Silo science fiction series by Hugh Howey. It is a series of flashbacks. It spans centuries. It reveals how the Silo(s) came to be. It isn't until the end of the novel that the action catches up to Wool.

So there are essentially two or three stories: 1) Donald's story of how the Silo project came to be and how the world ended; 2) Donald/Troy's various shifts through the centuries as manages the Silo project(s). 3) Jimmy (aka Solo)'s never-ending nightmare as the "only" survivor of his Silo. He's not really the one and only survivor--as revealed in Wool. But he might as well be...to some extent. It's all show more survival of the fittest, shoot to kill, trust no one. This section has CAT. (I'd forgotten about the cat).

My thoughts: Jimmy's story was SO compelling and heartbreaking. This character and his experiences have sticking power. I don't think I'll soon forget him. Troy/Donald is perhaps a less likeable character. Perhaps. He's a pawn in many ways. Even if he'd "woken" up and seen the truth about how things were going down, what could he have done???? Is there anything he could have done? anything he could have said? I don't think there is.

I do think this is a thought-provoking read. It is MORE political than Wool (in my opinion). But it was written political in a time BEFORE politics went...I'm trying to think of a good, polite way to say it...before politics became so very, very, incessantly divisive and explosive for the nation. So it doesn't feel like it was written with a hammer directed at anyone in particular. (Which I appreciated.)

I've never read the third book in the series. So I'm not sure how the series ends....but I have to keep going now. show less

I friggin' loved this book. Just as good at Wool and a perfect sequel/prequel which gave us so much additional info, with tons of allusions to what we read in Wool. I can't wait to read Dust. Hugh Howey's the real deal. The man knows how to put a story together.

When the important bits of information and story connection came along, they were satisfying, but OMG GET AND EDITOR! It took forever to get to the points and there was just too much repetition, explanation and pointless detail and the story just grinds to a halt all the time. Was so tired when I finished this that I don't even want to get on to the next one.

I HATE when sequels Shift characters, yup out with the old, in with the new... older. Shift is set as a prequel to Wool, Shifting between a few points in time to deliver context of the Wool world, and to drive it home in the 3rd book, Dust.

While the first book (and subsequently the developed show), I felt, was set as some type of murder mystery, it unfolded into an story of survival. Shift begins to divulge some answers about about the Silo project and how the characters will cling to life, but many questions will remain unanswered (keep that 3rd book on the ready!)

Due to my disdain for building a whole new relationship with new characters, when I really just want to know about the ones I've grown to like, it took me a while to get show more around to reading this, 6 years abouts after I read Wool, partially because of a lack of reading. Trudging through the withdrawal from a dystopian environment, it took a bit to get into the groove, but only a bit. Once characters that started as meh or merely side characters, they quickly developed and launched into an intriguing set of circumstances. I was hungry for the results of what Dust would conclude and quite emotional for characters of whom I had little to no interest at the start.

Below are passages that will get me emotional every time, but benign to those without context (low/no spoilers, no direct character references)

| There had been items [they] spent days and weeks searching for. There had been some things he'd needed that consumed his hunts for years...
| [They] smiled and gazed over the rail, thinking on the things found and lost over the years...
| A thing found, before he knew he needed it.


And these are my thoughts and actual spoilers


I don't know why but the way Hugh wrote the loss of Shadow really got to me, I hesitate to pick up the book again and read the short chapter to write the above passages. I couldnt comprehend what was happening until the end of the 3 page chapter. Very sad, very well done, not just sorrow of a loss, but a tribute to the things we take for granted even though they get us through tough times.
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