Customer Reviews

Wool: Wool Trilogy, Book 1 (Unabridged)

Life is good in the silo. The people are friendly, food is plentiful, healthcare is readily available when needed. Those in charge are democratically elected and take their office on the top floor. A skilled IT department keeps channels of communication open throughout. And the whole silo is kept ticking over by the engineers in Mechanical, deep in the belly of the Earth. Just one look at the screens projecting video images of the bleak, uninhabitable landscape outside, and the inhabitants of the silo know how good they've got it. There are always some crazy folk who question this from time to time. How did the silo get here? What exactly is out there, out of view of the lens? These ungrateful dissenters are punished by being cast out with a woolen cloth to clean the cameras so that everyone else can continue to enjoy the view - fated to certain death. But one day sheriff Holston, the sensible and much-respected warden of the silo, joins the dissident ranks and chooses to go outside. This sets in motion a chain of events that shake the foundations of the entire community.

Wool is actually an omnibus of five short stories that were originally published separately but you can barely see the joins. I can see how books one and two worked as standalone novellas, but by the time you hit book three everything merges seamlessly. And it's a good job, too, because had I been reading this at the time of publication I don't think I would have been able to bear sitting on the edge of my seat waiting to find out what happens in the next installment! He spins a hell of a yarn.

Howey has created such a unique and intricate setting in the silo. It's fascinating to have the whole world condensed into one single underground warren. He clearly has a good understanding of sociology and politics, and deftly illustrates both the physical and social hierarchies that exist between the different cliques of inhabitants.

I also particularly appreciated the effort put into characterisation. Howey flits between different points of view but each individual is so well-developed that I was reluctant to leave them behind when it came to the next chapter. So many favourites - Holston, heartbroken after the death of his wife. The wise Mayor Jahns. Feisty mechanic Juliette. Old Walker, the reclusive electrician who's a secret genius.

I'm so glad I picked this up as it's a really satisying tale to get tangled up in. I certainly feel that Wool deserves the great reviews it has received and would be enjoyed by many readers, even those who aren't usually attracted to sci-fi/dystopian fiction.

Review

Wool has been an amazing experience, the book started out for me as one mans emotional turmoil in a desolate world. It then led me to see and then feel the inner workings of the power structure of the Silo. All of this was engaging as a story, but it wasnt until the screen was peeled back that you began to see and experience the true 1984 style control surrounding the lives of everyone in the silo.

The Silo is one huge air tight world, an organism that functions only as long as every part functions properly, as long as there is a back up ready to take its place or to fix a problem. Disease cannot be allowed to fester and ideas are a disease. This is a world of do your job, live your life and don't question the world at large. This is how the end of the world looks and it's a scary sight.

This story is high tension, high stress and a bloody scary look at humanity in a confined space. It's not a book I can say I loved, but its a book I can say made me think and think and think, its a book you experience as much as you read it. I would highly recommend this book to all readers

(Parm)

I try to only give 5 to books I really feel are original, powerful, hard to put down, with well-written characters.

And yes, Wool is all of these things. I love the title, which takes on more than one meaning as the layers of the story are uncovered. I loved the gradual reveal of the truth of the lives the characters are living and the way I can picture the silo and the long, long walk from one end to the other. I love the way characters you were feeling strongly sympathetic towards were suddenly and brutally despatched.

But most of all, the story. Something has happened to our world. It must have done. A group of people are living in a 160-floor silo under the ground, have never left, work and rest and live within its confines. Segregated into sections within their own society, this group has classes - those closest to the top being the white collar classes, the mechanics keeping it all together being the 'working stiffs' in the depths.

Order must be maintained. And so every few years a dissenter/rule breaker is found guilty and sent out to 'clean' - clean the camera lenses that act as the only window on the world the silo inhabitants possess.

It is only after one such cleaning, of the silo's much respected widower Sheriff, that repressed feelings begin to bubble to the surface as a mechanic from the depths, Juliette, is offered the vacant post.

Very cinematic, you can picture the setting, the characters, clearly. It's a wonderful dystopian fiction that is frightening in the realism it contains: how this really COULD happen to us.

Juliette is a wonderful female role, an Ellen Ripley / Katniss Everdeen heroine, surrounded by a full complement of society's inhabitants. The book is long, but once you see more of the overall picture of Howey's, it's a story you relish will take 500 pages. And of course. It's a series, and ends on a note that leads you to want to follow the story further.

Don't be put off by the length, Wool is worth getting tangled up in.

In a ruined and toxic landscape, a community exists in a giant silo underground, hundreds of stories deep. There, men and women live in a society full of regulations they believe are meant to protect them. Sheriff Holston, who has unwaveringly upheld the silo's rules for years, unexpectedly breaks the greatest taboo of all: He asks to go outside.

So I'm aware that this was originally written in parts and this is the whole brought together in one volume - I am actually immensely grateful that this did not appear on my radar earlier because it would have driven me absolutely insane to have to wait for each new instalment - ok I am pretty insane most of the time anyway, but still.

Wool is that rarest of things - a completely character driven dystopian novel. Its a beautifully written one at that. The pace is fairly slow but oh so compelling - as we meet various characters living in the Silo, a lot of whom for one reason or another start to doubt the facts they have been living with. Endlessly fascinating, this little snapshot of a life led in one place and in one way, following very specific rules whose purpose seem to have been lost in the mists of time, its a living breathing thing.

Of course that is not all there is to it by any means. The world building here is also superb but rather than extensive descriptive passages, we see pretty much all of it through the eyes of our characters - as they move through the various levels of the Silo and a wider picture emerges. The various aspects of the life they lead, the social structures and different communities that make up the whole. Some familiar themes are woven into the narrative - power, responsibility, rebellion and realisation - at times its emotive stuff - you will come to know these people well.

As our protagonists start to learn more about the realities, what came before, what is being hidden, it is absolutely addictive - I could barely put it down. Absolutely brilliant writing.

I am so pleased that I still have two more novels to go - I believe the next one is in the way of being a "prequel" and that the last will pull all the various strands of the tale together. I can't wait to see the whole picture. I really can't. Highly recommended.

Happy Reading Folks!

Starts slowly but worth persevering. When the book hits its stride it's unputdownable.

Looking forward to the rest of the Trilogy.

Loved this book so much! It was a real page turner. The plot is excellent and leaves you wanting more.

I picked up Wool after hearing many good things about it.

I really like the basic idea of the Silo (an underground bunker which the remnants of humanity live in hundreds of years in the future) and the possible world beyond it. The mystery of this world is what kept me turning pages - I was intrigued by the overall concept and eager to find out more about the silo and how it came about.

However, in many ways the book was disappointing. The characters were very thin, with the exception of Juliette, who was the one character I cared about. Aside from her we have a pantomime villain and, in my opinion, a very unlikeable love interest.

The central love story seemed utterly unbelievable to me. The male character at first seems to be some sort of cool, enigmatic stranger but pretty soon seems to have turned into an annoying, angst-ridden, easily-led dimwit. Why on earth would a strong, beautiful, intelligent woman fall for this guy?

The other main issue was that the book had very long passages which were intended to be tense situations but which in fact were incredibly boring. These usually involved a character having to work out some intricate combination of electronics to make something work or go through a painstaking number of steps to remove protective clothing (imagine a very slow moving Houdini with a toolkit). One scene in particular, set in water, seemed to go on forever, with absolutely no tension because the character was obviously going to be fine.

Finally, I don't often see twists/surprises coming in books but there is one "reveal" very near the end which had me cringing due to its obviousness.

Overall, the thin characters and love story makes me think this would have been a good young adult title... but for the fact that it is far too long and slow. Unfortunately, the sometimes clunky writing prevents a nice scenario from becoming interesting.

OMG this book is so different to anything I've read recently. I immediately bought the second part. It seems like your typical 'apocalypse' story except how it happened and where the survivors end up living. It is brilliant. The second book is a prequel to this one and it explains a lot! The individual characters story lines are written with care and lots of detail. I love that.

Good story, likeable characters, albeit a little two dimensional - common in a lot of sci-fi I think, where story and plot take precedence over human complexity. Looked forward to returning to the book each night though, enjoyed it a lot.

I know it's a trilogy but I feel a bit disappointed by the ending of this book it was very sudden and felt like someone had stolen the rest of the book!