Saturday, January 26, 2013

Patriots: Surviving the Coming Collapse - James Wesley Rawles (Ulysses Press)


If you hear the terms survivalist or prepper it usually comes with a snicker of derision attached; a knowing, smarter than you “oh he’s one of those people.” This isn’t anything new; people who planned for any eventuality and to be self-reliant have always been derided as being more than a little off the beaten path, a little kooky.

Yet, I get the feeling that the folks that snigger and point fingers are the ones that will be the first to buckle and cry like little girls when bad things actually happen. It is those bad things, a worst case scenario if you will, in which James Wesley Rawles set his novel/preparedness guide, Patriots: Surviving the Coming Collapse.

Rawles utilizes a series of critical themes throughout Patriots, preparedness, self-reliance, team work and shockingly in this day and age…a dedication to the U.S. Constitution! The goal here seems to be seeding useful, vital information into a fictional account of the United States in a state of utter disarray, not due to an attack, a war or another calamity that so often pervades fiction, but a meltdown caused by an economic collapse. Given our current state, you’ve got to wonder just how fictional this story really is.

It certainly is not an easy task to have a fictional narrative drive the information that is packed into this book and at times the story gets a little scattered, but overall Rawles walks the tightrope between fiction and reality. The ripped from today’s headline quality makes it all the more believable.

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