It probably would have helped if I had read the precursor to DAYBREAK ZERO, but John Barnes does a darn good job of catching us up without it being overwhelming.

After Daybreak, a mysterious, moon-based entity, has done its best to destroy all human life on Earth, it continues to harass the brave remnants, among them, Heather O'Grainne. This post-apocalyptic story is ambitious in scope, covering the complex political schema that struggles along in Daybreak's wake, as the survivors continue to puzzle out the essence and goals of Daybreak, as well as the situation on the ground among the lower echelons not involved in the politics (small towns and Tribals). There are complex problems everywhere, from whether or not to attempt to preserve the original concept of American government, to keeping Daybreak from infiltrating their human networks, to keeping everyone fed and in clean water and being able to communicate and travel across huge expanses of land; almost everything, except the complexity and frustrations of communication among non-like-minded people, has been lost.

I thought this story was well-written, the characters rich and diverse as were the varied settings. I was interested in most of the storylines but like they say, "You can't please all the people all the time." There are bound to be storylines in a multi-perspective book that don't appeal to everyone. Mr. Barnes is excellent at high tension within each vignette. I felt like the tension overall in the general arc of the story did not tighten up until the very end. I started out unsure if I would like this story—o ut and out hating the time stamps on each new section, with location and time of day as it was too much info and I couldn't keep everything straight— but by the end, I couldn't turn the pages fast enough. I'm hereby a converted fan of Mr. Barnes.