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Cold Light (Book 2 in the After Series)
Publisher: Parvati Press

Cold Light, by Traci L. Slatton, is the sequel to Fallen, a post-apocalyptic story of survival. It picks up some months after the end of Fallen, with Emma, Haywood, Beth and Mandy living safely in Edmonton. However, tragedy strikes when a camp of raiders kidnap Beth, along with a number of other women and children, and the leaders of the town will do nothing to rescue them. Emma and Haywood decide one of them must go for her and, with Haywood having the ability to see multiple possible futures since the mists, they decide Emma will have better luck.

Emma sets out to steal a horse and winds up instead with food and intel, from a friendly source who once benefited from her healing hands. On this info, she heads to a grimy town called Outpost City in the hopes of stealing a horse and rescuing Beth. Instead, she gets more than she bargained for when she realizes a group of her old friends from the camp in France have crossed the sea to come looking for her. Arthur, her lover from France, leads the pack, along with pregnant Jeannie and her husband, Robert, Theo, Marco, Nwokocha and Laurette. Emma tries to leave town before they spot her, but they end up having to rescue her from being hanged when she is caught stealing a horse.

After angry exchanges about her leaving without saying goodbye, the group finally coalesces into a decision to band together to rescue Beth. However, they soon discover that Beth is not being held by any ordinary group of raiders. She is held by a sworn enemy of Arthur’s, one who aims to capture Emma for himself and kill Arthur in the process. To make matters worse, the mists have begin evolving and it appears that Arthur can’t control them as he once could, at least not without Emma’s help. Her main priority is to rescue Beth and reunite her family, but her heart still belongs to Arthur and now that they are together again, she will have a very difficult choice to make. But only if they all make it out of this alive.

Cold Light is absolutely thrilling, even better than Fallen, but a bit shorter. I burned through the book in a couple of days and it left me longing for the conclusion to the story. Once again, I love the characters in Slatton’s story, as well as the intense and horrifying storyline. This is post-apocalyptic storytelling at its best. I’m a sucker for disaster movies and stories of post apocalyptic survival and I can visualize Slatton’s stories as if they are a movie in my head. That’s what great storytelling is all about. Highly recommended.



-Psibabe, GameVortex Communications
AKA Ashley Perkins
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