It is VERY rare for me to judge a book within the first paragraph…but AFTER THE SNOW didn’t even take that long.  I nearly gagged on the first couple opening sentences.

Here’s a sample so you can make up your own mind:

Chapter 1

I’m gonna sit here in my place on the hill behind the house.  Waiting.  And watching.  Aint nothing moving down there.  The valley look pretty bare in the snow.  Just the house, gray and lonely down by the river all frozen.  I got to think what I’m gonna do now that everyone gone.

But I got my dog head on.  The dog gonna tell me what to do.  The dog gonna help me.

The house look proper empty-don’t it, dog.

This is the first part of page 1.  Hoping this style of speech was only temporary, I flipped through the rest of the book.  It does not get any better folks.

Blah.

I checked the ratings on Amazon and overall the rating is a 3 star.  I think that’s being very generous.

Now I’m sure the plot is fantastic.  Maybe the characters are unforgettable.  Perhaps there’s even a little romance thrown in there…but I will never know.

I can not stomach to read a book with such broken, heavy dialect.  This way of speaking makes the main character feel slow of mind, which I am sure is not the case, but I’m not sticking around to find out.  Apocalyptic or not, realistic or not, I can’t stand to read it.

What a shame.  It sounded like a good book.