SILO by Hugh Howey

 4.5 out of 5 stars

On Amazon (universal link)
On Goodreads

How I discovered this book: Started watching Apple TV series, sought out the book.

In a Nutshell: '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.'

As is usual, the actual story differs a fair bit from what I've seen of the TV series so far - only 3 episodes, though, so I'm reserving judgement.  This first installment was originally called 'Wool', and I still don't know why, unless it refers to the stuff that gets pulled over one's eyes.

The book opens with characters who are not seen again once their stories have been dispensed with, leaving a slowly unfurling chaos in their wake - probably, according to 'the rules' of novel writing, a total no-no, but it really worked for this.  The protagonist for the rest of the novel is engineer Juliette Nichols, who works in the 'deep down', keeping the machines running.  As often happens with men writing female main characters, she's a man in all but name, but that didn't matter too much, because I liked her well enough so could suspend any disbelief; also, her backstory provides reasons for her somewhat hamstrung emotions.  The most vivid characters for me were Walk, an elderly technician, Lukas, who studies the stars., and Jahns, the mayor when the story opens.

The theme of the story, throughout, is the growing sense that the inhabitants of the silo are being lied to about why they are there, what happened to humanity before the silos existed and what's really outside, and that's just for starters.  A few who know more are keen to make sure that truths remain hidden; investigating too deeply can be dangerous.

It's good.  I remained interested throughout and loved the concept of one's whole life being governed by one's place on that never-ending staircase from top to bottom.  Look forward to seeing what happens next.

CROW COUNTRY by Emily Sullivan

 4 out of 5 stars

On Amazon (universal link)
On Goodreads

How I discovered this book: freebooksy

In a Nutshell: Bleak post-apocalyptic world in which men are mean and crows are ... huge.

“Everyone was, in one night, made basic again. For when the Lord snapped his fingers, the Devil took the stage. What tremendous music he made”.

A strange book ... highly atmospheric, and that was what kept me reading.  That and wanting to know if the main character, Judge, would make it.

It's almost three decades after some event that caused a blackout across America, a situation never reversed.  Alas, we never find out what happened on October 9th, nearly thirty years before, or why fertility has been affected.  This isn't really a criticism as the book is about the events of the present; I just like to know the full story!  Judge lives in Colorado, in the new town of Genesis, run by a man known only as Law (at first).  Gradually, little bits of information are dropped in to show the reader details about the past.  I liked the way this is done, as by the time this appeared I really needed to know what the backstory between Law and Judge was.

As well as dealing with the usual horrors of a post-apocalyptic world, the inhabitants of Genesis must take cover from the crows, grown huge and predatory.

I found the writing style compelling (in that I couldn't have not read until the end) yet frustrating at times, when something was not explained as much as I would like; at other times, though, this was most effective.  Occasionally there were odd word choices, unusual ways of describing a feeling, the weather, the atmosphere that mostly worked very well but now and again had me thinking, what does she mean?  I noted afterwards that the author writes Westerns, and this book is very much in that vein.  It's raw, bleak, with little comfort for the characters and a dark portrayal of the worst in man.

I liked it.  It's good.  Now I want to read a prequel!

CONVERSION: THE FALL #1 by ST Campitelli @stcampitelli #TuesdayBookBlog

 4 out of 5 stars

On Amazon (universal link)
On Goodreads

How I discovered this book: Twitter

In a Nutshell: Post-apocalyptic thriller set in Australia

The story begins a couple of years after 'The Fall', when Australia is already divided into warring factions - the well-defended 'wallcoms' - communities in which people can live a life that resembles the 'before', and those who have chosen to live outside the relatively safe walls.  Many of the original wallcoms have now fallen, overrun by the infected, feral beings with white skin.  Once bitten, it's only a matter of time before you become a 'jack'.

Then there is the Headhunter - the standard post-apoc psycho baddie.  A trope that never gets old - every book of this genre needs at least one!

The author concentrates on several main characters, each one of whom tells the story from their POV, always in the third person.  John Bradley is a regular guy who goes out with the scavenging teams, though wife Helen wishes he would choose a safer occupation.  Reading this, though, I couldn't help thinking that I'd want to do what John does, too, instead of hiding behind the walls in an illusion of safety.  The sense of adventure is full-on, with missions described in detail.  Anyone who has fantasies of living in a post-apoc world (that's me with my hand up) will be drawn to this.  

The book is plot- rather than character-driven, which meant that I sometimes had trouble remembering who everyone was, but the dialogue totally works and the writing is such that some characters were still three-dimensional to me: John, his mate Matt, rockers Skylar and Harley (loved them!), and the Headhunter.  I loved the inventive details about the technology, the spectacularly good world-building, and the chapters from the POV of the infected. 

Good stuff, post-apoc lovers.  Book #2 is also available, and I believe Book #3 is in progress.

WHAT WAS ONCE HOME by B K Bass @B_K_Bass #RBRT #TuesdayBookBlog

4.5 out of 5 stars

On Amazon (universal link)
On Goodreads

How I discovered this book: it was submitted to Rosie's Book Review Team, of which I am a member.

In a Nutshell:  Post-apocalyptic, alien invasion, set in southern USA.

Jace Cox is a young teenager when the 'twigs' invade - and after one August day in 2034 his life will never been the same.  Fast forward a few years and he's part of the militia fighting against them.  A few more years, and the town of Lewisburg has been reclaimed by its inhabitants, with Jace as its the sheriff - but the troubles are far from over.

Although I'm first in line when it comes to a post apocalyptic book, I wasn't sure I'd like one about an alien invasion, thinking it might be too comic book-like.  But this isn't.  B K Bass has made the subject totally convincing, and I really enjoyed it.  It's got a great structure that kept my attention throughout - although the main story is told from Jace's third person point of view in the early 2040s, there are occasional flashbacks to earlier, and also excerpts from the autobiography he wrote as an old man.  Aside from this, I loved the 'interludes' - sections told from other points of view in other areas, for a wider look at the situation.  These diversions from the main story were perfectly placed, and I could see how well thought-out the whole book is.

Bass has an easy writing style, creating good dramatic tension with a feeling of foreboding.  Every aspect of the book feels feasible, from the people who take charge in the new Lewisburg, those who want to be guided and given instructions, the fighting force, to the independent who want to do their own thing outside the walls - and, of course, the opportunity for the power-hungry to take over.

One small aspect I appreciated was how Jace, having been so young when the twigs arrived, knew little about life outside his immediate environment.  At one point an older person referred to a settlement as a 'hippie commune', and Jace didn't know what he meant.  I loved that!

This book gives food for thought about war versus murder, what is 'right' when it comes to defending your home and your people, what it takes to live in harmony alongside those who are different from you, and leaves a couple of unanswered questions, which made me think that another book, perhaps after Jace's time, would be most welcome.  I'd most certainly recommend What Was Once Home as a fine example of the post-apocalyptic genre.

A Boy and His Dog at the End of the World by C A Fletcher

4.5 out of 5 stars

On Amazon UK
On Amazon.com
On Goodreads
On BookBub

 
How I discovered this book: Amazon browse

In A Nutshell: Post-Apocalyptic Journey

Over a period of three generations humanity almost petered out, as the world population became cursed with a mysterious infertility.  Griz and his family are some of the few survivors not affected by this blight; he was born many years after society collapsed.  They live on a remote Scottish island, with little knowledge of how the ways of the world since the technical revolution; there are still many history books from the 20th Century and before, but since the collapse of the world began, record exists mostly via word of mouth.  The 21st Century has become the new Dark Ages.

One day, a traveller arrives, on his boat.  Brand appears friendly, but he has a hidden agenda.  Because of Brand's actions, Griz sets off down to the mainland to track him.  His only company is his dog, Jip.

Griz's exact age is not mentioned, but one gets the impression he is around fourteen. The story consists of the dangers, joys and discoveries of his journey, and is written in the first person, with Griz addressing a boy from the old world whose picture he found.  A large part of the narrative addresses the difference between the world as it was and as it is now, and his thoughts about it, which I loved.  It flows well, in a conversational, easy-read style. 

On the whlle I enjoyed this book, though now and again I felt it could have benefited from a more ruthless edit; some of the description is a bit skip-read-worthy, and I spotted a couple of errors (including my pet peeve, the use of the word 'I' when it should be 'me').  Half-way through, Griz meets up with a French woman, with whom he travels.  She can't speak English, but they find ways to communicate.  Everything she says to him in French is spelled out phonetically, as Griz would have heard it, which became irritating; much of the time, I couldn't work out what she was supposed to be saying, even when I read it out loud.  A little would have been fine, but there was too much.  

The other aspect I was not keen on was lack of speech marks, an affectation made popular by Cormac McCarthy.  Sometimes it works well, and is actually more effective; this was the case earlier on in this book, but not later, when there is more dialogue; now and again I had to re-read to differentiate between spoken word, inner thoughts and general narrative.  As McCarthy himself says, it's not just a matter of taking the quotation marks out. 

As the book nears its hugely unpredictable end, there are two great twists about which I didn't have a clue.  And, despite all the 'if only I had known' foreshadowing - which other reviews complained about but I liked - the book actually ends fairly positively.

I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who likes character-driven post apocalyptic novels, as there is plenty off that stuff-we-love about lost civilisation and survival, though if you like your post-apoc more action-packed, this probably won't be your thing.  Despite the elements I was not so keen on, I was anxious to keep turning the pages to see what would happen, which is much of what it's all about, really.  I'm glad I discovered it.

 

THE END OF THE ROAD by Anna Legat @LegatWriter

5 GOLD stars

On Amazon UK
On Amazon.com 

On Goodreads

On BookBub

 

 

How I discovered this book: a passing tweet

In a Nutshell: A world war to end all wars - nuclear missiles, nerve gas, biological weapons, and then meteorites.  But a handful of people survive...

Brilliant.  Absolutely loved it.

The year is 2027, and conflicts between nations reach crisis point - nuclear bombs, nerve gas and chemical weapons, followed by meteor showers, wipe out the entire population of the world, apart from a very few.  The End of the Road is the story of those who survive - philandering English lawyer Tony, two nuns in Liege, a scientist in Siberia who lost his family in the Chernobyl disaster forty years before, ditzy vlogger Bella in New Zealand, and a few others.

Some of the scenarios intertwine, and indeed they all do eventually, but I was completely engrossed in each one.  There was not a single weak point; when I was reading Reggie, the caretaker of a billion dollar estate in South Africa, I'd got to about 86% and started reading it as slowly as I could because I didn't want it to end.  

At first I was a little confused because there are no actual chapters; each new scenario begins with the location and the name, and that's all, and I wished there was a date, because I wasn't sure exactly when they were all taking place, but I soon got used to the unusual structure, and saw that the actual time frame did not need to be stated.

The narrative is stark and shocking, but the characters and their backstories (just enough, never too much) are written with a light touch and, sometimes, a glimmer of humour - and at the end, even though humanity has finally succeeded in wiping itself out (almost), certain areas of hope remain.

This is currently tying with another for the 'best book I've read this year' award - it's fabulous.  Can't recommend too highly.  And the moral of this story is: don't ignore those passing book tweets.  If you think 'that looks interesting', go download it!

 

THE WORLD WITHOUT CROWS by Ben Lyle Bedard @BenLyleBedard

5 out of 5 stars

On Amazon UK
On Amazon.com
On Goodreads
On BookBub

How I discovered this book: I read the stand-alone sequel, The World Without Flags, in my role as a reviewer for Rosie Amber's Book Review Team, and liked it so much I bought this, the prequel, as soon as I'd read it.

In A Nutshell: Post-Apocalyptic, Pandemic/Zombies

In Ben Lyle Bedard's parallel universe, a pandemic known as the Worm swept across the country in 1989 and 90, ending civilisation as we know it.  The Worm turned people into zombies, some docile, a few 'cracked'; the dangerous sort who try to eat people.  

The main character is Eric, a fat, shy sixteen-year-old from Ohio, who, some time after the pandemic began, begins a journey to an island in Maine, about which he has idyllic childhood memories.  He is making this journey on foot, and joins up with many others along the way, most importantly a little girl called Birdie, who is the main character of the sequel.  

Through the many events of this journey, Eric changes from chubby, self-conscious boy to a lean, hard, brave and sometimes ruthless man, who will do anything to protect those he cares for.  It's extremely well-written, a real page-turner, and though I could not always like Eric (I went off him big time after one particular incident), and there were a couple of editorial slip-ups, I still loved the book.

It's a great series, and I hope there will be more.

The World Without Flags by Ben Lyle Bedard @BenLyleBedard #RBRT

5 out of 5 stars

On Amazon UK
On Amazon.com
On Goodreads
On BookBub

 

How I discovered this book: it was submitted to Rosie's Book Review Team, of which I am a member.

In A Nutshell: Post-apocalyptic, 10 years after pandemic

I have an endless hunger for post-apocalyptic and dystopian fiction, but it has to be well-written, feasible, properly researched and edited, with great characters, realistic dialogue and a plot that keeps me turning the pages.  I am delighted to say that this ticked all the boxes.  I loved it.

It's actually a Book #2, but it's completely stand-alone; I didn't know of the existence of Book #1 until I looked up the Amazon links for this review.

Birdie is around sixteen (she is not sure of her exact age), and lives in the Homestead in Maine, where she shares a house with Eric, who she thinks of as her father.  She has only vague recollections of the Worm, a disease that hit the world a decade ago, around 1990, rendering most of the population zombie-like, though only a few 'cracked' and became flesh-eaters.  She is happy enough in her world - but then a traveller appears with news of a coming war between two factions, both of whom want to rebuild the country under their command.

This news leaves the community in a state of extreme anxiety, but worse is to come.  Much, much worse...

Most of the story is about a journey that Birdie must make to ensure her own safety and that of those she loves, through land she doesn't know, where she will come up against much danger.  The hazardous journey is a post-apocalyptic standard, but it works every time if done well, and this was.  It's exciting, unpredictable, and Birdie's development, as she learns more about the world outside her safe enclosure and finds much strength within herself that she didn't know existed, is a joy to read.

If you love this genre, I recommend highly; even if you think you don't, I still recommend.  Suffice to say that I've downloaded Book #1, and started reading it as soon as I'd finished #2.  One word of warning: it's rather gruesome at times.  Don't read it while you're eating.  I say this from experience.

AMONG WOLVES by R A Hakok

5 out of 5 stars

On Amazon UK
On Amazon.com
On Goodreads

How I discovered this book: Amazon browse

Genre: Post Apocalyptic, Dystopian, SciFi, Horror

Gabriel is sixteen, and has been living in a bunker inside a mountain since the world went to hell ten years before ~ he and his classmates were on a school trip to the White House on what turned out to be the Last Day.  The US President was already dead from the virus, but the newly sworn-in replacement insisted that the children should be saved too, and taken to the bunker.  Now, Gabriel goes out scavenging for anything that can help the inhabitants of Eden survive.  Outside, the world is cold, silent, where ash storms rage.  No one know what started the virus that precipitated the end....

I loved this book.  It's one of those stories that builds up gradually, so that, chapter by chapter, you begin to understand why the situation is as it is now, and this makes it a real page-turner.  The narrative goes back and forth between then and now, which is one of my favourite structures.  The sense of suspense is so good, all the way through, as Gabriel begins to uncover the truth about his situation.  Much of the book is taken up with the trips outside Eden that Gabriel makes with former soldier Marv; there is much practical detail that in a less well-written book would be boring, but R A Hakok had me glued to every page.

Alongside Gabriel's story is that of Eliza, an analyst sent to Korea back before the Last Day, to look at the nuclear reactors.  But she has another, far more sinister mission to complete.  Slowly, the two plot threads come together.

The action really revs up in the last 20%, and the ending is great, making it a complete story but kind of a cliffhanger as well - now excuse me while I go and download the next one!

 

PANDEMIC DIARY: SHELTER IN PLACE by K W Callahan

3.5 out of 5 stars

On Amazon UK
On Amazon.com
On Goodreads

How I discovered this book: Amazon Browse

Genre: Post Apocalyptic, Dystopian, Pandemic

This is the first in a three book series about a pandemic, the Su Flu.  It is told in diary format, the diarist (Chris) being an every-day sort of guy in his thirties, living in Chicago with his wife and two kids.  I wasn't sure about it at first; I liked the writing style, but one aspect was badly thought out: he and his wife watch the news about the flu and the increasing panic on TV news, but no reference is made to social media.  No mention of videos uploaded to Youtube, of posts on Facebook or Twitter ~ most people of his age use social media as a regular part of their lives.  The wife is supposed to have an internet shop—she would need to be social media savvy for this, but 'the internet' seems to be a little-used facility that appears only on her laptop, not on their phones or the TV, in the way of people more than twice their age.

The virus spreads, and within a week or so the fabric of society is breaking down, big time. It's well-written, flows nicely, and I wanted to keep turning the pages; I liked it.  Now and again I felt there was too much practical detail, such as the complicated layout of the condos, staircases, doorways, etc; too much, I couldn't visualise it.  Callahan would have done better to skip this and let readers form their own pictures.

It's a book for the lovers of this genre who are fascinated by survival on a day-to-day basis (like me), rather than those who want lots of guns, explosions, armies and/or zombies; it reminded me of the first 'Surviving The Evacuation' book by Frank Tayell, and provides great detail about how they eat, wash, keep safe from looters (and worse) outside; this was right up my street.  Every day, the family's situation gets a little more worrying, and I very much liked the way in which their awareness that this is the new reality increases all the time. 

The diary format has its limitations; sometimes a scene needed playing out instead of reporting, I felt, but on the whole I'd say the author has dealt with these limitations very well.  

I was going to give it 4* right up until the end....the surprise development and how it was set up for the next book was a great idea and unexpected, but it had one huge flaw.  Much of what I imagine will be one side of the story in Part 2 hinged round them finding a letter from a friend of Chris's called John Stevens, dated 6 days before the diary started, and offering Chris and his family a place in John's bunker type camp in the back of beyond.  All through the diary, Chris had been talking about where on earth the family could go if they left Chicago. He never once mentioned this offer; I didn't think I remembered it, and I checked back to the beginning afterwards, even did some word searches to make sure I hadn't missed it.  I hadn't.  So I reckon the author thought of this great new twist right at the end of the book, but didn't realise he needed to go back and redraft a little, to set it up.   So I've got to take a half star off for that, alas.  I find that this is what lets so many books of this type down: the lack of planning and redrafting to make them as good as they could be.  I liked this book.  It's good, I'm going to download the next one and I'd still recommend it, but it needs some more fine-tuning.

DAYS OF CHAOS by Jack Hunt

3.5 out of 5 stars

On Amazon UK
On Amazon.com
On Goodreads

How I discovered this book: I read the 1st book in the series, Days of Panic, and liked it enough to download this, the second.  Discovered the first via Amazon browse.

Genre: Post apocalyptic EMP survival thriller.  Part II of series

It's a couple of weeks after an EMP strike on New York, and the four survivors from the first book are settled in Lake Placid, a town 300 miles away from NYC.  The tipping point has passed, and civilised society is on the slide.  People divide into groups: those who run about like headless chickens and believe that the army/government will save them, the savvy survivors who see the danger ahead, and the baddies, who are hoping to cash in on others' desperation.

As before, the story is great.  Elliot, the PTSD suffering ex-Marine stands out as the best character, and I very much liked the conflict between him and his old army friend Gary, now a police officer running the town, who doesn't see that he can't keep law and order and expect the townsfolk to pull together in the way that they might have in a lesser crisis.  Meanwhile, Damon's ex-friend Cole and his drug-dealing and violent crew feature large in this book ~ I liked that Cole is the intelligent baddie, who sees ways of putting himself in control of both his town, Keene, and next door Lake Placid, that his more thuggish mates don't understand.  It's pacy and eventful - all good....

....however, the lack of editing and proofreading still bothered me too much.  Run-on sentences and missing commas galore, lazy grammar, and the strange appearance of an philosophical/practically instructive omniscient narrator now and again, when the author wants to make some point about human nature or describe how a gun works.  These passages would have worked much better if they'd been part of Elliot's inner or spoken dialogue.  There are actually a couple of semicolons in this book, but I think whoever put them in must have thought 'hey, what about that little bitty thing with the dot and the comma underneath?  Don't I have to shove a couple of them somewhere?', closed their eyes and stuck them in randomly.  

Jack Hunt obviously knows his survival and gun stuff, though not how women talk to each other - Jack, please know this now: no woman will tell her friend that her husband has come onto her unless she wants to get one over on her.  Seriously.  The potentially interesting Jesse and Maggie continued to fade into minor characterhood, having become attracted to each other (allegedly); other than that, they seem to serve no function apart from being the third character needed to drive a car, or to take a bullet so that Damon can talk about how to deal with gunshot wound.  Talking of Damon, he has gained a long-term girlfriend in this book, who was never mentioned in the last...

....but, I still kind of liked it.  If the books had been given a bit more spit and polish, and a proofread by someone who knows how to punctuate, I'd definitely download the next one.  As it is, I probably won't, at least not for a while.

DAYS OF PANIC by Jack Hunt

3.5 out of 5 stars

On Amazon UK
On Amazon.com
On Goodreads

How I discovered this book: Amazon browse.

Genre: Post apocalyptic EMP survival thriller 

Days of Panic charts the progress of four main characters during the first couple of days after an EMP strike on New York City, which kills off the power grid for the whole state.  Elliot is a homeless PTSD-stricken Iraq veteran, Damon an ex-con, Maggie has just escaped from an abusive boyfriend, and Jesse is a loner motorbike messenger still mourning his dead wife.

Another story runs alongside, that of Elliot's wife Rayna and their two kids, living in a small town upstate, with the luxury of Elliot's prepper shelter for when society collapses, as it begins to do almost immediately.

I liked how Hunt, in good disaster movie tradition, sets up his characters by illustrating their pre-disaster lives.  As those lives become entangled and they traverse the chaos to escape to Lake Placid and Rayna's house, though, I felt that Jesse and Maggie got somehow lost along the way.  Elliot and Damon were clear to me all the way through, totally 3D, but the other two became just names on a page.  I liked the Rayna story, that worked very well.

The suspense in this novel is terrific, and I enjoyed it all; I particularly liked how feasible it was, with Elliot (Hunt) knowing his stuff about both EMPs and bug out shelters; I found it completely convincing.  My only problem with it was one I keep finding with books of this genre, though this was better than others ~ it reads like it's been written quickly, checked over a few times, then bunged up on Amazon.  Jack Hunt is an excellent writer and I shall definitely download the next book, though only because I can do so on Kindle Unlimited; I may not if I had to pay for it.  There are lots and lots of run-on sentences (I don't think there is one semicolon in the whole book), and lazy grammar and missing punctuation. Then there are instances such as Elliot estimating that the four of them could walk the 285 miles to Lake Placid in four days.  Dude, that's over 70 miles per day.  Even experienced, fit hikers with proper footwear would consider half that distance pretty hard going, and Maggie had an injured leg, which makes me sure that the book has never seen either an editor or very thorough re-drafting.  Shame - if it had a couple of good re-writes and a proofreader/copy editor who knows his/her stuff, it would be terrific and the stuff of which 5* reviews are made.  Having said that, Jack Hunt publishes a new book every five minutes and sells tons of them, so I doubt he will care too much what I think!

I did like it, quite a lot in places, which makes it worthy of 4*, but in the interests of objective reviewing I feel I can only give it 3.5*, rounded up on Amazon and down on Goodreads.

OUTLIERS: Volume 1 by Kate L Mary @kmary0622

4.5 out of 5 stars

On Amazon UK
On Amazon.com
On Goodreads

How I discovered this book: I've read almost all the books in the Broken/Twisted World series by this author, so Amazon kindly let me know when she had a new book out. 😉

Genre: Post Apocalyptic, Dystopian, Futuristic 

I really liked this book, as much as Kate Mary's zombie series.  Protagonist Indra is a member of one of the four tribes of Outliers, in a world where the Sovereign people rule, with the Fortis providing the muscle.  The Outliers are the workers, the weak, who rely on hereditary jobs in the Sovereign's kingdom.  Immediately, I wanted to know where this strange land is supposed to be; a fantasy world, or Earth?  The suggestion that it's Earth comes at just the right time, as Indra is shown the remains of one of the cities.  Centuries before, their world had been overcrowded, with technology so sophisticated that the inhabitants' weapons could wipe out whole kingdoms; this they did, unleashing 'poison' into the world that rendered much of it a wasteland.  'What they had fought over none of us knew for certain, but we know that it had not only destroyed them, but left the earth barren and dry... poisoning it for future generations.'     

Yes, I think it's mean to be Earth, but we don't know.  Books exist, containing writing that no one can understand.  I love that the question was put into my mind but not answered fully, and hope there will be more about this in future episodes.  There are other clues ~ the rich Sovereign have grown weak, small and plump because they are waited upon and spend much time eating and drinking, and the women make all the decisions (!!).  However, in the wilds, where Indra's tribe (the Winta) live, women are the weaker sex; they tend the home fires while the men go out hunting.

The beginning of this new series builds up nicely, painting pictures of the world I know I am going to continue to read about.  I liked how KLM has done this; it's not a big information dump, but she skillfully sets up all the info we need about the Sovereign, Fortis and Outliers within the first few chapters of the story, so we're good to go for the rest.  I was engrossed from the start.

After lots of terrible things happen to Indra, her friends and family, she looks around at the women of her tribe ~ women unarmed, women defenceless and useless.  This, she knows, must change.

As I was reading, I thought, 'KLM has been watching Outsiders', and in the Author's Note she thanks the show for giving her the name Asa for the guy I had my eye on as the main love interest/hero of the hour.  Works for me ~ I love Outsiders (I picture Indra looking like G'Winveer, for anyone else who watches it).

This first instalment of the Outliers saga is a real 'easy-read' at the same time as being a totally gripping page-turner, and I read 90% of it in one day.  Any negatives?  There are a few small editing glitches (the same information repeated more than once, a couple of minor instances that seemed like afterthoughts dropped in, instead of being threaded through the story), but nothing that would worry most readers, and I give this a wholehearted thumbs up.  Roll on May, when Book #2 is published!

My Top 25 Books of 2017

I took a long time choosing my favourite 25 out of the just over 100 books I have read this year (not all reviewed on this blog).  Please click the title of the book for my review, which contains Amazon and Goodreads links.  The ratings given to my chosen books range from 4.5* to my rarely given 5 GOLD stars; all come highly recommended.   One writer shows up twice, another four times.

Genres:
Historical Fiction: 10
General contemporary/psychological drama: 6
Thriller: 4
Travel/Memoir/0ther non-fiction: 4
Zombie Apocalypse: 1

Numbers 25-11 are in no particular order.....

Everlasting by Jo Carroll 
Travel Memoir ~ Malawi

A Hundred Tiny Threads by Judith Barrow
Early 20th century family drama

Twisted Memories by Kate L Mary
Zombie Apocalypse

Victims by Joel Hames
Thriller

The Most Dangerous Enemy by Gemma Lawrence 
Book 3 of the Elizabeth of England Chronicles, about Elizabeth 1

Lad by Andrew Webber
Lad Lit

The North Water by Ian McGuire
19th century thriller

Fully Loaded by Blake Crouch
Short stories, mostly crime/thriller

Lion by Saroo Brierley
Memoir, family adventure/drama

Gone: Catastrophe in Paradise by O J Modjeska 
True life 1970s air disaster account

The Heart of the Conqueror by Gemma Lawrence 
Saxon/Norman historical fiction

The King's Mother by Judith Arnopp
Book 3 of The Beaufort Chronicles, about Margaret Beaufort

Faring to France on a Shoe by Val Poore
Travel Memoir

Whispers in the Alders by H A Callum
Coming of Age Drama 

A Tincture of Secrets and Lies by William Savage
18th Century Murder Mystery

 ~ The Top Ten Countdown ~

Shining brightly at Number Ten...

A Shiny Coin for Carol Prentice by Mark Barry
Contemporary revenge drama

Psychologically fascinating at Number Nine:

The Unravelling of Brendan Meeks by Brian Cohn
Contemporary psychological drama

 

Pleasing enough to reach Number Eight:

Pleasing Mr Pepys by Deborah Swift
Based on fact, 17th century drama/mystery.

A modest, unassuming Number Seven:

The Beaufort Woman by Judith Arnopp
Book 2 of The Beaufort Chronicles, about Margaret Beaufort 

Silently cycling along to Number Six:

The Silent Kookaburra by Liza Perrat
Dark 1970s Australian family drama.

First of my Top Five books of 2017 ~ at Number Five:

Strands of My Winding Cloth by Gemma Lawrence
Book 4 of the Elizabeth of England Chronicles, about Elizabeth I.

An outstanding debut at Number Four:

The Unrivalled Transcendence of Willem J Gyle by J D Dixon
Dark drama about a homeless man in Scotland.

Bronze medal: a wonderfully wicked Number Three

Wonders & Wickedness by Carol Hedges
Victorian Murder Mystery

A thrilling silver medallist at Number Two:

Jonah by Carl Rackman
WW2 Naval Thriller

And.... my Number One book of 2017....

Above All Others by Gemma Lawrence
Book 3 of The Lady Anne series, about Anne Boleyn

Thank you, wonderful authors, for many happy hours of reading ~ putting this list together was hard, as there were some I wanted to include that didn't quite make the final cut.  All my reviews have 'labels' at the end, showing author, genre, star rating, etc, and these can be clicked on to find other, similar books.  I hope you will give some of my Top 25 a try.  And if you like them, don't forget to stick a few words on Amazon to say so!