I read Shadows Have Gone, book three in this series at the beginning of this year and I found the book very good. But it has taken me ages to get to reading the first book in this series. But now as I'm going through my NetGalley books have I finally gotten to this one.

Carly Daniels has survived a terrible virus that has devastated the planet and she hides in her apartment in Juneau, Alaska with her puppy Sam. One day she sees a man outside her apartment and, at first, she is wary, but slowly the man persuades her out of her hiding place and she learns that the man's name is Justin and he is an ex-soldier. Together they decide to travel to Florida where it is warmer and where they will have a better chance to survive.

What I like with this series is that there are no zombies or any other kind of monsters, if it is a "monster" is it people that still have the flue or ordinary people that have turned ruthless to survive. Carly and Justin have a rocky start, but they she slowly learns to trust him and realize that he is right, that they must leave Juneau if they are going to survive. I found that part and then ending the best in the book, Unfortunately, I started to get a bit annoyed somewhere along the way. Annoyed that Carly was so incompetent and Justin was so well trained in surviving. Could be the scout in me that just found her unbearable ignorant sometimes. Either way, it seems that she has lived a very sheltered life and hardly set foot outside a town. One moment that really mad eme annoyed were when Justin ripped a wedding dress to pieces to use as a bandage for future needs and she got upset because he was ripping apart someone's dream. I mean, come on, they are on the way to Florida, she doesn't know the women whose dress it is and they are trying to survive.

And, then we have the romance part. I can understand the need for human contact, for warmth and for the basic need like sex. But suddenly it's a love story. It's a Hallmark movie. After that part, the story just felt meh! Fortunately, the ending was tragically good. yeah. Except for one thing that I didn't like, someone that I liked very much died.

2.5 stars

Thanks to The Writer's Coffee Shop Publishing House and NetGalley for providing me with a free copy for an honest review! ( )

Okay leaving aside how horribly the author anthropomophized the horse, it was a pretty good book. Pretty well thought out post apocalyptic happenings. I will probably go on with the series after a little break. Not sure why I thought reading a post world wide pandemic story was the way to go right not. Maybe because it was mostly already over with and this was mostly a road trip survival story. ( )

DNF.

Read all my reviews on http://urlphantomhive.booklikes.com

I was going to read this book at the start of the year, but somehow I never managed to. That is, until I drew this book from the TBR bowl, which was very nice since I actually was looking forward to another apocalyptic read.

The story starts with Carly being stuck in her apartment after her parents and the rest of Juneau, Alaska, died from some kind of virus attack. While she's living her simple life of collecting food cans waiting for rescue a mysterious camper shows up opposite her street. They embark on a road trip to Florida. (Yes, from Alaska to Florida, I kid you not).

Well, it wasn't completely what I expected because the story really focusses a lot on the developing romance between the two main characters. The apocalyptic events are all quite tame but overall it was an enjoyable read even though there were some things that bugged me.

First there was a lot of Carly thinking that Justin is far to good for her and being angsty. I could have easily done with out all that. She also gave me some Ayla-vibes from Earth Children series because every living thing is attracted to Carly, some of which are a wolf and a horse. Sounds familiar, huh? Obviously, she's also perfect, despite her angst...

Also, what I never understand from the view of the characters is why Carly and Justin go try and find the origins of their immunity against the virus. The whole time they are only focussed on (eachother and) their survival, but near the end there this 'we must find out where it's coming form' journey that they suddenly embark on.



At first I was just laughing at the enormous amount of talk about contraception, but after she got pregnant it just felt ironic. Not necessarily in a good way though.



The ending however I thought was really good, and I'm looking forward to find out where the story is going from here.

The End of All Things is the first book in the series with the same name, the other books are The Land of The Shadow and Shadows Have Gone. There's also a short story collection called Tales of the End.

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for providing me with a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review! ( )

You can read my review here:
http://abshepherdsreinventedreader.blogspot.com.au/2013/01/the-end-of-all-things... ( )