more on the end of the world

lucifer’s hammer by larry niven and jerry pournelle was a book that someone recommended after i read earth abides (or recommended in relation to someone else mentioning it). it was what i polished off while sitting in the jury assembly room. on top of being another end-of-the-world book (this time caused by the impact of a comet), it was even more fun because most of the characters experience the impact in and around the los angeles area.

like a lot of science fiction, it suffers from mediocre characters (particularly the bad guys in the last part of the story) and almost too many liberties taken with events and circumstances to make the plot work. i think the book works best as an apocalyptic tale, and the post-apocalyptic story is disappointingly conventional in comparison.