Moore provides a suitably chilling answer to these queries, positing a special branch of the armed forces created to handle just such a task, a grim cadre of soldiers dressed in high-tech body armor, their faces concealed by black visors. Immediately after the crash landing, these soldiers descend on Collier, cutting it off from the rest of the world under the pretext of battling terrorist activity. Their main objective: to secure the apparently inert craft. Their secondary objective: to maintain secrecy, even if it means killing everyone in the town.

This then is the focus of Moore's narrative, as he chronicles the reactions of everyday people to the invasion of their town by their own country. Although at first they are cooperative, the townspeople come to realize that they are in fact prisoners. Their resentment and anger grow by the day, building to a surprising crescendo. Moore populates his book with living, breathing characters, human beings on both sides of the conflict who, despite their fears, are only doing their best to cope with a stressful situation.

Moore is more in control of this narrative than he was of his prior effort, the flawed but highly readable Under the Overtree. The writing here is crisp and clear, the pacing is almost flawless, and, with the exception of the appearance of the spacecraft which triggers these events (its origins and purpose remain a mystery throughout), the subject matter is utterly believable and involving. Moore effectively milks the situation for all it's worth, filling the novel with telling incidents and detail, forcing readers to confront the brutal reality that true horror may lie in something as simple as losing the simple freedoms that Americans take for granted. A twisted combination of Sinclair Lewis' It Can't Happen Here and Thornton Wilder's Our Town, Fireworks is a great read, a book that merits your attention.


Good Read!   September 17, 2003
 3 out of 4 found this review helpful

I had never read anything by James Moore before - and wasn't quite sure what I was in for when I started this book, but it was quite the page turner - I think I finished it in just a couple of days. Pick this one up - you won't regret it!


Moore writes a great pain book....and that's horrible.   September 23, 2003
 3 out of 5 found this review helpful

Suspend your disbelief as an alien spacecraft, while being tracked by a supersecret US anti-extraterrestial force, purposely plunges into a lake in a small Georgia town during the 4th of July celebration, killing or maiming most at the lakeside. Never is any reason postulated for this act. One receptive townsperson is sucked into the craft when he approaches it; all others are blithely ignored.
Generally likeable citizens are subjected to martial law as the US forces attempt to enter or carry off the spacecraft, which in the end leaves, utterly unaffected by these attempts. No one can leave; those who try die trying, impaled on erected razorwire or shot. Those who are injured by the spacecraft's arrival are quarantined, unable to see their family or their doctors or pastors. As citizens begin to crack under the pressure of the occupation, some begin to kill soldiers and are killed in return. The rich small town mill owner spins his plots, attempting to control events to his liking, regardless of the danger he brings down on all the townspeople. Some really ugly characters begin killing and maiming soldiers and fellow townspeople alike. The resultant anarchy after the only responsible town leaders (the sheriff, the pastor and the mayor) are eliminated prompts the military forces to call in their mind benders, to reprogram all the remaining citizens to live lives elsewhere, with no memory of this town and their old lives.
Such relish is evident on the part of the author as he describes the injuries that individuals sustain and perpetrate upon others that a tone of malignancy pervades the entire plot. Is this pain autobiographical? How does one write about such events so vividly if he hasn't experienced them? Is he venting? What is he trying to say? What is the purpose of detailing such interpersonal evil? By way of contrast, Robert McCammon writes great horror novels about the unknown, unseen and humanly incomprehensible that can encapture men, but this novel is about the malignancy of man. If you like that genre, if you like gore, you'll LOVE this book. I didn't.


Powerful SF thriller   May 12, 2003
 2 out of 2 found this review helpful

The residents of Collier, Georgia always enjoy the annual Independence Day celebration especially the fireworks. However, this year the fireworks are different as a huge UFO crashes killing or severely injuring approximately twenty-five per cent of the locals.

Top secret elite military cadre ONYX arrives in town to secure the perimeter. No one will enter or leave quarantined Collier. To the surviving townsfolk, the operation looks more like an invasion force, which turns worse as the soldiers obey orders of strict security enforcement. Violence between both sides of Americans break out even while the UFO remains under the waters of the nearby lake. Unless cooler heads prevail, further tragedy seems like the only outcome.

FIREWORKS is not an Independence Day or War of the Worlds ET invasion tale though the alien craft crash serves as the catalyst to the theme of how will the Feds react to a UFO and how will locals react to the heavy handed Feds' response that "incarcerates" them? Instead the novel feels more like the Hoffman thriller Outbreak though the impetus varies. Though why the UFO was flying over earth is never revealed (sequel perhaps) the action is loaded, but James A. Moore forces his audience to ponder what seems like believable actions and reactions of real people, soldier and resident alike.

Harriet Klausner