Publisher: St Martin's Griffin
Publication date: July 9th 2012
ISBN13: 9780312656744
First Line - "Lily, I woke up and the last piece of my heart disappeared"
It's the end of the world. Six students have taken cover in Cortege High but shelter is little comfort when the dead outside won't stop pounding on the doors. One bite is all it takes to kill a person and bring them back as a monstrous version of their former self. To Sloane Price, that doesn't sound so bad. Six months ago, her world collapsed and since then, she's failed to find a reason to keep going. Now seems like the perfect time to give up. As Sloane eagerly waits for the barricades to fall, she's forced to witness the apocalypse through the eyes of five people who actually want to live. But as the days crawl by, the motivations for survival change in startling ways and soon the group's fate is determined less and less by what's happening outside and more and more by the unpredictable and violent bids for life and death inside. When everything is gone, what do you hold on to?
I'm not really sure what to make of this one. It was a good read and it was well written but maybe I was expecting more zombies? Or explainations? Or a resoloution? I'm torn.
I really liked the story and couldn't put it down until I found out what happened to them all... but I didn't get closure. I'm not saying all endings have to always be neatly tied up but I just feel that there's too much has been left unsaid.
A handful of kids end up in a school, sheltering from the zombie hoards outside which roam their town relentlessly. Why are there zombies? I have no idea and I suspect the kids don't either but since they never ask each other those simple question's, "Why?", "Where?", "How?" I'm left wondering if maybe they do know, in which case - why don't I know too?
Sloane is the narrator and we get an insight into her life before the zombies came although I felt that I never really knew the whole story of what went on there either. It's frustrating. There's only one viewpoint really and I only found out what Sloane wanted me to know. Since Sloane herself was mostly fixated on her sister and her need to end it all I didn't get to know half of what I needed (wanted) to know. Enquiring minds need to know.
So, accepting that I didn't find out all that I wanted (needed), how was the story? It was good actually. Dark and sinister and creepy and scary and all the stuff you come to expect from a zombie book...just without many zombies. One or two popped up every now and then and they were the jacked up crazy kind but because I didn't see much of them they were more of a psychological fear than a physical fear. It was scary wondering where they where going to come from...if they were going to come...when they were going to come. Sometimes that's scarier than the actual event of them coming. It's the not knowing.
Anyway, it's a good story which is well told. Sloane's voice is right for the telling of it but I just wish she'd been a little more forthcoming with the stuff I needed to know...
I'd even be happier if I knew there was a follow on book which might fill in some of the details for me (there's not, is there?).
*Sigh* It's a hard one. Good story, well written I just wanted...I'm not sure what I wanted. More? Better? Fuller?
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