Shovel Ready by Adam Sternbergh

Shovel Ready by Adam Sternbergh was an interesting novel. I was not sure what to expect going into it, but am happy I did decide to read it. I normally am a huge fan of post-apocolyptic novels, but this one was different. It didn't focus as much on society as it does the characters of the novel. Spademan, a garbageman, is the protagonist of Shovel Ready, and it is easy to understand his rational and thinking. He has a past and personality that keeps him interesting and morals in a society that most have given up on.

The structure of Shovel Ready is pretty standard: a common man must fight an evil man that has taken control of the land to save the princess. I was hoping for some plot twists, but there was not many, making the novel somewhat boring at parts. It could have been better with surprises or being a little more unpredictable. One of my favorite things of Shovel Ready is how well Sternbergh describes plot and helps the ready to understand the society and what the characters are dealing with.

One of the biggest problems with the novel is the formatting. The story is told in thoughts that each come as separate paragraphs, making it a quick read; however, this formatting get repetitive and can be confusing at times when switching between thoughts and dialogues. Also, I'm not sure if it was the font or spacing between lines, I could not speed read as quickly as normal because I lost focus on words due to formatting.

Overall, I would recommend Shovel Ready to anyone that likes a quick read about a post-apocolyptic novel that is action packed and has many Christian motifs.