The American Zone - Mille feuilles

Paperback

English language

ISBN:: 978-0-312-87369-1

(2 reviews)

In the North American Confederacy . . . People are free—really free. Free to do as they please, whether it be starting a business, running for elected office, or taking target practice in the back forty. There's not a whole lot of government, nor is there a lot of crime, because everyone who wants to carries a gun, and isn't afraid to use it. But someone has bombed the Endicott Building, killing hundreds of people, and Win Bear, the only licensed detective in the confederacy, has to find out who did this dastardly deed, and why. Because whoever did it has already shown their willingness to commit more terrorist acts, no matter how many people are hurt. And that can't go on, or soon the confederacy will be just as the bad old United States--and that is something they want to avoid at all costs.

2 editions

Ji FU reviewed The American Zone by L. Neil Smith

Detective Win-bear must prove Americans arent' all bad, but will he die to do so?

No rating

The American Zone was a good way to end out the North American Confederate series. Nearly as good as the first. It really can stand on its own. Certainly no reason to read the rest of the series, particularly the barely even relavant books 3-8. That being said it is certainly a product of its time> Being written at the tale end of 2001 there is a more than mild obsession with terrorism and the possibility that the terrorist aren't who they seem but actually folks who want to create a laviethan state. I susepct that L. Neil Smith is, or at least was at the time, a so-called 9/11 truther. Regardless the story is entriguing. our hero Win-Bear is saved by his healer wife far more times than should be justified for any red-blood American. And even the open minded confederates start blaming the terror plots on immigrants, like …

The American Zone was a good way to end out the North American Confederate series. Nearly as good as the first. It really can stand on its own. Certainly no reason to read the rest of the series, particularly the barely even relavant books 3-8. That being said it is certainly a product of its time> Being written at the tale end of 2001 there is a more than mild obsession with terrorism and the possibility that the terrorist aren't who they seem but actually folks who want to create a laviethan state. I susepct that L. Neil Smith is, or at least was at the time, a so-called 9/11 truther. Regardless the story is entriguing. our hero Win-Bear is saved by his healer wife far more times than should be justified for any red-blood American. And even the open minded confederates start blaming the terror plots on immigrants, like those from the USA and other altenrate realities, after all they didn't have these issues before there was an "American Zone." A few thigs do seem a bit far fetched, like that one of our new comers finds a market for troll dolls because they never came to this reality, but somehow no one has thought to bring all the gold from all the other realities to debase their precious metal currency? Oh and of course there is Smith's regular obsessoin where we get more descriptions of a character's firearms than we do of the characters' character.

Ji FU

rated it

Jan 20