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Water Death
Paul Johnston Book Review

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Plot Summary of Water Death
"

St. Martin's, Mar 2001, 24.95, 400 pp.
ISBN: 0312273118

    In 2025, compared with the anarchy that surrounds it, Edinburgh remains a calm island of no crime. Though rationing is a way of life and entertainment only comes in the form of a festival for tourists, the clever City Council occupies the restless residents with a weekly lottery. How can individuals not play when a five-minute shower a day is a potential prize.

    However, a missing person interrupts the lottery nirvana when Kennedy, a winner, simply vanishes. Rumors spread quickly, and the concerned Edinburgh leadership hires private investigator Quint Dalrymple to quickly learn the truth. Before he can solve that case, murdered bodies begin to appear in the Leith, leaving the City Council in a panic, a city in fear, and a pressured Quint trying to stop a body count from growing any further.

    Award winning Paul Johnston's world is radically different from that of today. Global warming has reached extreme levels turning the climate into the Big Heat. Everything seems rationed and centrally controlled. Still Quint remains an interesting character with his obsession for the blues standing out in this drab world. Mr. Johnston brings in his full cast from the previous two books, but instead of the welcome return of old friends, this sends a clever story line spinning into chaos greater than his surrounding countryside. Doomsday fanatics will relish WATER OF DEATH and its predecessors for its descriptive look at an apparently dying society trying to survive. However, readers of other science fiction sub-genres will struggle with the plot's anarchy.

Harriet Klausner
"

Harriet Klausner, Resident Scholar



Review Analysis of Water Death
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Ratings are on a 1-10 scale (Low to High)
Plot
FANTASY or SCIENCE FICTION? - science fiction story
Spying & Investigations Yes
What is main char. doing? - finding a killer (criminal) - unraveling a conspiracy - finding a spy/saboteur
Is this an adult or child's book? - Adult or Young Adult Book

Main Character
Identity: - Male
Profession/status: - government investigator
Age: - 20's-30's
How sensitive is this character? - middling sensitive to others' feelings
Sense of humor - Mostly serious with occasional humor
Intelligence - Smarter than most other characters
Physique - average physique

Main Adversary
Identity: - Male
Age: - 40's-50's
Profession/status: - mastermind
How much of work is main antagonist actually present in: - an average amount
How sensitive is this character? - hard edged
Sense of humor - Mostly serious with occasional humor
Intelligence - Smarter than most other characters
Physique - average physique

Setting
Terrain - Water
Earth setting: - near future (later in 21st century)
Takes place on Earth? Yes

Style
Person? - mostly 3rd
Accounts of torture and death? - generic/vague references to death/punishment
scientific jargon? (SF only) - a fair amount of scientific explanation
How much dialogue? - significantly more descript than dialog
Most similar books to Water Death
The Scoundrel Worlds by Chris Bunch
The Silk Code by Paul Levinson
Tangled Up in Blue by Joan D. Vinge
A Gathering Evil by Michael A. Stackpole
The Caves of Steel by Isaac Asimov


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