Everyone Says Hello

Everyone Says Hello was one of the first Torchwood audio books. Read by Burn Gorman (Owen), it's the story of a strange phenomenon: all over Cardiff, people stop living their lives and begin introducing themselves to each other and telling each other their life's stories, usually leading with the most mundane details. Things escalate from there, until Cardiff reaches an almost apocalyptic state, overrun with zombie-like people who insist on either converting or killing everyone else.

This is a long story (2 and 1/2 hours) compared to the 45-minute audio plays the BBC recently released, and frankly I think it would have come across better in the shorter format. The central idea behind this story (people acting creepily friendly) very quickly grows tiresome and repetitive. Way too much time is spent on forgettable side characters. The story picks up a little bit near the very end, when there's some action, excitement, and general running-around. I've liked some of what Dan Abnett has done on Torchwood, but this story just lacked real drama, humor, or enough of a hook to keep the story going for such a long time.