Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I'd like to give this story a review with more stars, but... The basic premise was decent: a guy with a basic interest in survival recognizes that an EMP event happened, reacts quickly, and attempts to escape his suburban home/work area for a remote but safer location. A major subplot involves a working class single mother who is attempting the same thing. The basic plot premise is workable and believable. However, the story loses credulity because it is incredibly rushed. Except for the very end, and one single chapter subplot, the entire story takes place in about a 36 hour time frame. During that time civilization collapses back into the dark ages. An angry mob loots a grocery store and attacks the clerk within a few hours of the event, a local militia takes over a town, a (I think) national guardsmen turns into a looting/marauding warlord, a prison break dumps harden convicts into community who somehow end up on a remote overgrown wilderness hiking trail to confront the protagonist, police quarantine the community (without any explanation of how or why), and that's just to name a few of the plot problems. Now, while all of these things might happen, it's unlikely that they would happen instantly because the power goes out and communications go down. Most people would carry on thinking that, just as has always happened in the past, the lights will be turned back on shortly. The chaos would start once people started running out of food and nothing seemed to be happening to rectify the situation, but that would not happen instantly. Another problem is how the protagonist seemingly runs into an old buddy he's not seen in years, then meets the single mom who is the subject of the major subplot by literally colliding with her when she's in the only other car on the road. They start by pointing guns at each other but shortly after they're best of friends. It seemed incredibly contrived and nearly nonsensical. All in all, this story had potential but it just failed to get there.