Book Review: Any Given Doomsday

I really tried with this book. I read, I cringed, I put it down for awhile, I picked it back up, and then I read some more. I’ve gotten about halfway through at this point, and I really think it’s about time to throw in the towel. It's amazing how a bad book can become even worse. The only impending apocalypse that "Any Given Doomsday" prophesizes is the hopeful end of Lori Handeland's writing career. Toted on the cover as a New York Times bestselling author... I think they may have to make that print bigger if they expect to sell more copies. Then, of course, is the problem of people actually reading it and realizing the book is so poorly written it will give you a migraine.

Let me give you just one amazing example of this literary masterpiece. Note my sarcasm. On page 104, "Jimmy stood in the doorway and surveyed what appeared to be a mass murder. I got a pretty good idea what Jonestown had looked like. Except that there were no remnants of poison Flavor-Aid, just blood on blood and then, hey, more blood." That is not made up. It's an actual excerpt from the book. The premise is a true “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” knockoff which doesn’t even attempt to hide the fact that it’s… well, just plain bad. The main character, who in 150 pages I’ve come not to care about at all, is a psychic orphan who became a police officer who… I guess she got fired? Her partner died? She has an ex-boyfriend named Jimmy who cheated on her who is half vampire. He is also a DK, which stands for Demon Killer. Yeah. Not making this up people. Even though calling him a DK is clearly… well, just plain bad… she keeps doing it. She’s called him a DK or referenced DKs at least two dozen times. It’s almost caused me to throw the book out the window. I also don’t believe this woman was a police officer at all. Read the book and you’ll see. On second thought, don’t. Spare yourself the migraine.

I’m a little shocked and severely disappointed by the reviews I’ve read on LibraryThing commenting that the book is “not that bad” and is an overall good book but “lacks character development.” Guys, seriously. That was your biggest problem with this title? How about the fact that none of the characters react realistically to these situations at all. Granted, they are dealing with monsters and the like, but that’s no excuse for creating characters who have never dealt with anything that fantastic shrugging off the situations like they were no big deal. The book also does mention sexuality way too much. That has been brought up in the reviews, but really not enough. At times, it reads like a trashy romance novel. Emphasis on the trashy. I don’t care that the main character is horny. I guess you're supposed to because it's brought up in nearly every chapter. I don’t want to read about how she can feel a man’s junk rubbing up against her thigh. Sadly, these parts aren’t even well written. As a librarian, knowing books like this exist just make me plain sad.