For the Love of Everything Dystopian

Last month I posted of my first love, historical fiction. Now I have to show my affection for my second love, everything dystopian/post-apocalyptic. I still remember years ago, slowing filling my bookshelves with stories of survival, bleak skies.. characters enduring hardships that make me feel brave by just reading about them. Here are a few dystopian/post-apocalyptic novels that stole my soul.

Wool by Hugh Howey

An epic story of life, love and survival at all odds and one of the most-talked and anticipated books of the year. In a ruined and hostile landscape, in a future few have been unlucky enough to survive, a community exists in a giant underground silo. Inside, men and women live an enclosed life full of rules and regulations, of secrets and lies. To live, you must follow the rules. But some don't. These are the dangerous ones; these are the people who dare to hope and dream, and who infect others with their optimism. Their punishment is simple and deadly. They are allowed outside. Jules is one of these people. She may well be the last.

I cannot express how much I loved this entire series. Wool is the first installment that kept me awake many nights. The world-building aspect of the novel is absolutely amazing. There are many characters to keep up with, but damn it was worth it. This is a lengthy novel, and so are the other two installments.. but I loved all the detail. It just made everything more realistic and believable. I urge EVERYONE to at least check out Wool, but I know if you do, you'll have to read the entire series!

The Passage by Justin Cronin

An epic and gripping tale of catastrophe and survival, The Passage is the story of Amy - abandoned by her mother at the age of six, pursued and then imprisoned by the shadowy figures behind a government experiment of apocalyptic proportions. But Special Agent Wolgast, the lawman sent to track her down, is disarmed by the curiously quiet girl - and risks everything to save her. As the experiment goes nightmarishly wrong, Wolgast secures her escape - but he can’t stop society’s collapse. And as Amy walks alone, across miles and decades, into a future dark with violence and despair, she is filled with the mysterious and terrifying knowledge that only she has the power to save the ruined world.

This was another lengthly novel that I admit was a bit sluggish at times, but was once again worth it. I love how one of the main character completely changes his course halfway through the book.. and it felt completely genuine. A man decides to stake his entire life for one little girl. She may be the most special girl in the world, but to him, she was just a little girl in need of an adult. This story will always stay with me.

Into the Forest by Jean Hegland

Set in the near-future, Into the Forest is a powerfully imagined novel that focuses on the relationship between two teenage sisters living alone in their Northern California forest home. Over 30 miles from the nearest town, and several miles away from their nearest neighbor, Nell and Eva struggle to survive as society begins to decay and collapse around them. No single event precedes society's fall. There is talk of a war overseas and upheaval in Congress, but it still comes as a shock when the electricity runs out and gas is nowhere to be found. The sisters consume the resources left in the house, waiting for the power to return. Their arrival into adulthood, however, forces them to reexamine their place in the world and their relationship to the land and each other.

I remember reading this book years ago. Two sisters stay in the same house hoping and waiting for the power to come back on, for people to show up alive and well.. for anything normal really. Years and years pass and the sisters learn to live off their small garden and stock of dwindling supplies. The world is bleak and honestly, this book is as well. I think the realism and how the author didn't force a happy ending or any kind of "coincidences" of good fortunes for the sisters on us.

Cross-posted at The Tattooed Biblio

Paula Video Reviews the MaddAddam Trilogy

Hey all - I couldn't quite put all my feelings into a text post... so I made a video review for one of my favorite series: The MaddAddam Trilogy by Margaret Atwood. Check it out below! Since it is about an entire series- I tried to keep it vague and spoiler free- but I did have to mention one or two things in order to make my review coherent (nothing that can't be found on a back of the book blerb though) - so here is your heads up.

If you don't feel like watching a video- my elevator speech review is: I am a fiend for matching bookshelves... and I ignored my paperback copies of books one and two and raced to buy the hardcover of book three because I was so excited to read it when it came out. Great dystopian and apocalyptic series by the talented Margaret Atwood.

Oryx and Crake  5 stars
The Year of The Flood 5 Stars
MaddAddam 4 Stars

Have you read the series? I would love to hear what you think about it! Happy Reading!

Bridget Reviews World War Z by Max Brooks

Title/Author: World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War by Max Brooks
Publisher/Year Published: 2006 by Three Rivers Press
How I Got This Book: Bought it for my boyfriend, probably at Target
Why I Read This Book: See below :)
Rating: 4 Stars

I bought this book for my boyfriend several months ago. He loved it, so I thought I would give it a try, despite being rather annoyed at the whole preponderance of the zombie genre (it’s totally not my thing, although I do fully intend to read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies one day, just so I can say I did). As it turns out, World War Z was actually pretty awesome.

As it says in the subtitle, World War Z is the oral history of a fictional zombie war, compiled by an unnamed narrator. The interviews all show a different facet of the war—there are civilian, military, and medical standpoints from all over the world. That’s about it for an actual summary; since it’s supposed to be “history,” it doesn’t follow a traditional novel storyline, really.

At any rate, World War Z has quite a few things going for it, its hugely imaginative premise (not the zombie thing, but the history-of-the-zombie-war thing) and fantastic writing being the top two. As with most avid readers, I’m sure, I’ve always felt that a great plot can only survive on its own so long without good writing to support it (see: The Hunger Games—after a while, the choppy, fragmented writing style just irked me), but World War Z didn’t have that problem at all. I was glued to it while I was reading. Now, if only more history textbooks were written like this, I might have actually been interested in/done well in history in school.

It was a little difficult to keep track of all the names of people the narrator interviewed, if only because there were so many unfamiliar foreign names. But that was literally the only thing I could complain about with this book—everything else was incredible. Everything was told with an eerie sense of reality, and the amount of research he must have done for all the military sections, which were all pretty technical, is considerable. Even the amount of geographical research he must have done is mind-blowing. You’re really able to get a sense of complete and total war.

Even as someone who is really not into zombies at all, I found this book utterly captivating. Anyone who wants a good scare and an awesome view of what history just might be like post-zombie-war should definitely give World War Z a try.

Daisy's Review of The Last Princess by Galaxy Craze

Title/Author: The Last Princess by Galaxy Craze
Publisher/Date published: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, May 1st 2012
How I got this book: received it from the publisher through NetGalley

Goodreads summary: "Happily ever after is a thing of the past.
A series of natural disasters has decimated the earth. Cut off from the rest of the world, England is a dark place. The sun rarely shines, food is scarce, and groups of criminals roam the woods, searching for prey. The people are growing restless.
When a ruthless revolutionary sets out to overthrow the crown, he makes the royal family his first target. Blood is shed in Buckingham Palace, and only sixteen-year-old Princess Eliza manages to escape.
Determined to kill the man who destroyed her family, Eliza joins the enemy forces in disguise. She has nothing left to live for but revenge, until she meets someone who helps her remember how to hope — and to love — once more. Now she must risk everything to ensure that she not become... The Last Princess."

You guys, I'm always happy to read a dystopian or post-apocalyptic novel and I'm ALL about the princesses! And I have a huge obsession with anything to do with England and their royalty. So when I saw them combined in The Last Princess, I just knew I had to read it.
But I'm sad to say it has left me... disappointed. And I'm going to do a 'Jana' and let you know through a list what exactly happened for me to feel that way.

1. I found myself wondering if pages were missing: It was a pretty short book and while that's not always a problem, to me with The Last Princess it felt like there was just a whole lot of things that were missing. Like they'd been there but had been cut away to make the book shorter. I found myself actually wondering if the e-ARC I was reading was faulty and missing huge chunks of the story, but I don't think that was the case.

2. I felt lost: The story felt all over the place and everything seemed to be happening at once without a moment to reflect or get to know the characters or to just figure out how much time had actually passed. I felt lost while reading this book and that's not a good way to feel for me personally.

3. Failure for me to get a sense of the main characters' identities: I've finished the book and I'm still not sure what to say to characterize Eliza. To me it's a problem when I can't do that for the main character, cause it all revolves around her right? I mean, I should be able to tell you what makes her Eliza and I can't. I should be able to tell you more about the love interest besides him being blond.

4. The romance: I would like to tell you that the romance was sweet, but instead I have to say it confused me. I mean, seriously, these two were together for a whole whopping day and she's in love? I mean, really? REALLY?

5. Cruelty without a good explanation There's a lot of cruelty going on and sometimes it was horrifying! Also, for those who are sensitive to animal cruelty/dying, like I am, be warned (a dog dying broke my heart). The things that were done by the ruthless revolutionary's army were insane and astonishing in their mindnumbing viciousness and I would have liked to see a bit more explanation as to how it all started and why people were behaving like that! And about the Seventeen Days!
Also: **SPOILER, LIGHT UP TO READ**
With all the killing going on, I thought some of the miraculous survivals were a bit convenient. I mean, I could have handled either Polly or Mary surviving that last fight, but both seemed a bit too much seeing as they both seemed pretty mortally wounded. They had to look EVERYWHERE to find antibiotics, how did they manage to fix these girls up? And Caligula, how actually does a horse survive a lance in the side?

I did like the premise of the book, which is what made me read it in the first place, but I would have just liked a bit MORE of everything. A little more backstory, a little more time for me to get to know Eliza and actually care about what happened to her. A little more description of what was going on instead of just saying two weeks had passed and it had been horrible. Because that doesn't work for me.

I also really appreciated the relationship between the siblings and little Jamie stole my heart with his sweet boyness. The ending leaves me thinking that this will be a series and I'm curious if we will find out all the gaping holes of knowledge that The Last Princess has left me staring at. So while this book didn't really work for me, I might just pick up the next one (if there is one, does anyone know??) to see if it's better and if it will live up to the potential of this premise.

My rating: 2 stars

Jessi Reviews Life As We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer

Title/Author: Life As We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer
Publisher/Year: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2006
Where I Got It: My local public library
Why I Read It: It had been on my to-read list for quite a while


Synopsis:


Miranda’s disbelief turns to fear in a split second when a meteor knocks the moon closer to the earth. How should her family prepare for the future when worldwide tsunamis wipe out the coasts, earthquakes rock the continents, and volcanic ash blocks out the sun? As summer turns to Arctic winter, Miranda, her two brothers, and their mother retreat to the unexpected safe haven of their sunroom, where they subsist on stockpiled food and limited water in the warmth of a wood-burning stove.

Told in journal entries, this is the heart-pounding story of Miranda’s struggle to hold on to the most important resource of all--hope--in an increasingly desperate and unfamiliar world.


Review:



Okay, so this book definitely freaked me out. I don't know if it's just because of the wacky weather we've had so far this year, but the events of this book seem completely and utterly possible.

The fact that this book is so realistic is what makes it so good. The after effects from the moon being knocked out of orbit are completely plausible, and it made me all too aware of how much we take for granted. Simple things like electricity and running water. Being able to go to the store if we need something. It freaked me out because, to put it plainly, I would suck at surviving.

Another thing that I found to be realistic was Miranda's voice. The diary thing worked for me, as a whole. There were a couple things I didn't buy, like who really writes dialogue in a diary? But I understand that things like that have to be taken with a grain of salt because they are necessary for the book to work. And to tell the truth, it didn't really bug me all that much. I was too busy being freaked out about how much food we have in our house. I thought Miranda was really authentic, though. What 16-year-old doesn't have their vulnerable or whiny or selfish points? What 16-year-old wouldn't rather be ice skating than sitting in a sunroom reading a history textbook? Especially when the world is ending! I also liked how even though I would have liked to know what was happening in the rest of the world, we couldn't know because Miranda herself couldn't know. Hopefully, we'll see more in subsequent books.

This was compulsively readable for me, and I probably would have read it all at once if I wouldn't have stopped myself. I had this utter need to know what was going to happen and how it was going to end. I will definitely be reading books 2 and 3 to find out!

Tahleen reviews "Ashes, Ashes" by Jo Treggiari

Title: Ashes, Ashes
Author: Jo Treggiari
Publisher: Scholastic, 2011

Rating: ★★ ½

In a world that doesn't seem to be too far into the future, global warming has melted the ice caps and most of the coastal world is now underwater. This wasn't such a big deal for Lucy at first, since she was fine in her New Jersey town, but three years later an even deadlier enemy claimed 99% of the population of the planet: the plague. Lucy somehow managed to survive without contracting the disease at all, but her family was not so lucky. After a year of wilderness survival on her own in the Wilds of what used to be Central Park, Lucy finally finds a group of people who she might be able to live with. But she could spell the end for them all; there is something about her that makes her very valuable to those who are barely holding on to power.

While reading Ashes, Ashes, I often found myself thinking how awful the lives these people led sounded. I was very creeped out during the beginning of the book, when Lucy was still on her own, but I kept flipping the pages, eager to discover Lucy's past and what would happen next.

I didn't find out much as far as back story, unfortunately. We learn that Lucy is largely unremarkable, with no special talents other than survival. I can tell there is more to her, but I never found her history besides brief flashes of memory, which was disappointing for me. The same is true for the secondary characters in this book—we get clues, but no real stories.

What didn't disappoint was the action. There was a lot of it, and Lucy was nearly always at the center of it. I was compelled to find out the mysteries behind the Sweepers, what I'm assuming are government officials who kidnap survivors of the plague. Those kidnapped are never seen again. And when Lucy becomes their target, I wanted to know what made her special.

The next part might be a bit spoilery, just a warning. We never really get the answers to the burning questions in the book, kind of a letdown, especially when much of the book focuses on this aspect of Lucy and how the Sweepers are after her for some reason. I'm guessing there will be a sequel to answer some of these questions.

Overall, I don't feel strongly about this book one way or the other. It provided entertainment while I was reading and did give me something to think about as far as how the way we are treating our planet might turn out, but I don't think the story or the characters will stay with me too long afterward. If a sequel does come out, I will most likely pick it up to find out the secrets behind the characters and the government that were left unrevealed in Ashes, Ashes.

Disclosure: I received an ARC from the publisher at one of their events.