PINES was the March 2015 pick in my neighborhood book club.

I give the premise of this story a B+ and the execution a C+. Without spoiling anything, the premise simply falls apart under the gentlest scrutiny once you (and Ethan Burke) finally find out what's going on in Wayward Pines! At the end of the day, it just doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

But the "McGuffin" was there, and it kept me turning the pages to find out exactly what was going on. Though I must say I didn't buy Ethan Burke as a Secret Service agent. His thinking and decision-making made him seem much more small town cop caliber than high-ranking government agent.

Although this was a quick read, there were a few watch-tapping pages where I found myself urging the narrative to get where it was going already!

Overall, I recommend PINES if you enjoy sci-fi thrillers. It starts off like a typical thriller in the first half, but very much becomes a science fiction story by the end. I give it a generous B-. It was interesting but I never got into it enough to want to continue the series. Maybe I'll check out the TV show to see how it compares.

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I didn't know this was a sci-fy book and probably would not have picked it up if I did. However once I started it, I felt Ethan's horror and fear as if I was experiencing it myself, and as my anxiety grew stronger, I almost had to put the book down! It pulled me back and I finished it in one evening since I just had to see what was wrong in Waywood Pines. I didn't expect the ending, not my kind of book! I will not read the rest of the series, I really hate horror!

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I had this on my wish list for over a year so finally had the library get it for me, very glad I did, it is more of the syfy genre but it is very good, easy to read and keeps your interest to the end

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A little s***-kicker of a thriller with plot twists and action galore. Blake Crouch really knows how to keep you dangling by the barest of the thread, crouched on the balls of your feet, with every dark blind corner you take on this ride. It's a confusing ride, pretty much like our main protagonist Secret Service Agent Ethan Burke who's barely hanging on for the ride â as jumpy as ever, suspicious and untrusting, back from a bout of short term amnesia, battered and bruised beyond belief and an emotional train wreck.

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I ended up really, pleasantly surprised by this book.

I was a fan of the short-lived television show when it aired, and always meant to give the novel a try. Finally, all these years later, I got to it.

While it's very fast reading (could easily be finished in one long sitting), the first half of the book is almost so lightheartedly pulply and void of emotion that it doesn't seem to take itself seriously enough. It was fun, but I didn't feel engaged. The second half, however, changes that completely as we are with Ethan as he fights for his life against a few different groups.

While I knew from the beginning WHAT Wayward Pines was, because of the show all those years ago, I still found myself nearly as in awe as Ethan as the truth is revealed to him. In the end, I just really had a great time reading this.

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Secret service agent Ethan Burke arrives in Wayward Pines, Idaho, trying to locate and recover two federal agents who went missing in the this town one month earlier. Ethan is involved in a violent accident and arrives in the hospital where strange things begin to happen to him. Soon Ethan's investigation into the disappearance of his colleagues turns up more questions than answers. Why can't he get any phone calls through to his wife and son in the outside world? Why doesn't anyone believe he is who he says he is? And what is the purpose of the electrified fences surrounding the town? Are they meant to keep the residents in? Or something else out? Ethan soon finds out he may never get out of Wayward Pines alive. This book was a quick read. I found it to be more of a sci-fi book than a thriller. It is somewhat hard to believe that Ethan is a secret service agent as he seems more like the sheriff he ends up being in Wayward Pines. Crouch also went a bit too far with the story in the end which took away from the book. I also watched the TV series on Fox which was advertised on my book. I actually enjoyed the TV series more than the book. If you enjoyed Stephen King's books, The Stand and Under The Dome then you may enjoy Pines too.

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Ethan Burke is a secret service agent who has arrived in Wayward Pines, Idaho in search of two of his colleagues that have gone missing. He is involved in an accident with a truck upon reaching the town. He awakens in a hospital with no phone, no ID, nothing of his personal possessions. There are times when he is not really sure of who he is.
He leaves the hospital in search of law enforcement to acquire his personal items, but the sheriff tells him that he does not have those objects. When he uses a land phone to call his wife and son, he can not get through.
Ethan explores Wayward Pines and there are many instances of things not being normal.

This was a good story, just a little bit too much physical description of violence and body trauma for my taste.

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