WHEN THE CHILDREN COME

A haunted Afghan War veteran leads the resistance when a hostile extraterrestrial influence compels adults on Earth to kill children.

Thriller author Kirwan lights the fuse on a new SF series with a particularly gruesome twist on the alien-invasion theme. Nathan Sanders, formerly in the 25th Airborne in Afghanistan, is a New York City area war vet haunted by bad battleground memories, but he’s lucky enough on New Year’s Eve to hook up with the enticing Lara Engels. Their all-night sexual bliss is the reason they are among the few individuals who get no sleep. Those who experience substantial slumber awaken as the “infected,” somehow hypnotized into embarking on a single-minded mission to murder children—their own sons and daughters or any other kids they can find. The infected speak beatifically about how the “glorious children will come from the skies” and that they must make preparations. Joining new allies—including an entire cell of straight-out-of-Kabul heavily armed Taliban terrorists who had been preparing for a 9/11–style strike on the stateside American military until this new cataclysm took precedence—Nathan and Lara manage to put some of the pieces of the puzzle together while fighting to protect about 200 children they’ve gathered. It seems an alien spaceship is circling the planet, beaming out its lethal influence over humankind in advance of what seems to be an insidious ET conquest and colonization. It is up to Nathan in particular to find and unite the bewildered holdouts among the United States armed forces (and perhaps the world) and determine what they can possibly achieve in Earth’s defense. And they must stay awake all the time while doing it.

This is one of those easily-read-in-one-sitting, freight-train experiences, steered by a novelist who knows better than most how to sustain the tension and maintain momentum throughout. And a good thing, too, because any substantial pause might cause readers to ponder the outrageously far-fetched plot developments that place in Nathan’s orbit just the right people (including immensely beddable women) with ties to NASA, the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, and U.S. naval installations, forming an instant brain trust to counteract the menace from the stars. And readers may note that the unlikely Taliban allies don’t seem to have a lot of Islamic or Quranic baggage as they prove themselves stalwart and up to the challenge of a desperate fight for the fate of the species. Characters are broadly but effectively drawn, and Nathan is one of those “ordinary” guys somehow pulling off superhuman accomplishments that have become the stock in trade of Bruce Willis movies. Despite the dire peril being heaped on them, the child characters aren’t thrown into too many cliffhanger situations, as is the usual pitfall in material like this. When Kirwan wide-angles the jeopardy outward, from the Eastern Seaboard to the whole planet, and then makes the leap to outer space, he covers ground in one volume that usually takes up a wide shelf full of blockbusters from more long-winded apocalypse writers. And in the end, he leaves his tantalized readers eager for the sequel. No wicked alien mind-control rays are required to keep the captives turning the pages.

Popcorn action-adventure and dark-edged SF that will enthrall readers.