by Wendy Higgins
Synopsis:
In this first installment of NY Times bestselling author, Wendy Higgins's debut New Adult series, a frighteningly realistic apocalyptic America is brought to life, entwined with searing romantic tension that will leave you eager for more. *** Amber Tate believes the worst thing she'll suffer in life is dealing with the unrequited love she feels for her brother's best friend, Rylen Fite. She also believes war is something unfortunate that happens places far, far away from her rural Nevada town. She's wrong on both counts. When an unknown organization meticulously bombs major cities in the United States and across the globe, a trickle-down effect spreads to remaining towns at an alarming speed-everything from food and water sources to technology and communications are compromised. Without leadership, the nation is split between paralysis and panic, but Amber isn't one to hide or watch helplessly. She's determined to put her nursing skills to use, despite the danger, even if it means working alongside the man she can never have.
My Thoughts:
I received a copy for an honest review
I gave this book 3.5 stars. It was a good start to the series, definitely not my favorite, but it was a good place to start. As someone who’s read and loved Wendy Higgins’ books in the path, I was a bit harsh with the rating, just because it wasn’t quite up to the standard I hold her to.
I sort of jumped the gun and started the second book and almost finished the second book before writing this review. In my defense, It was only a couple hours later that I started writing this, I’m just a really fast reader, and the story was too good for me to stop.
I must address the elephant in the room. I got about 25% into this book and was just nauseated because, would you look at that, a wild love triangle appears! You know how much I detest them. It wasn’t that much about the love triangle as it was the situation it put the characters in. Our protagonist has been in love with this guy for a very long time and he seems to have feelings for her and we all know from the get-go that these two characters are going to end up together. So the fact that these two characters who obviously love each other start seeing other people it feels like their cheating. I know they aren’t actually but whenever I read s book where we know who the love interest is and then one of the characters gets into a relationship with another character, it feels wrong. It doesn’t matter if that other character is actually this person's significant other while the “Love Interest” is the one on the side, it just feels like cheating to me.
What I also didn’t like about this was that there really wasn’t any lead in to their relationships. Our protagonist sees this man for a while and they just sort of happen and we don’t get that much out of it, we just sort of meet him, get a description and how the protagonist feels about him and we are expected to feel the same even though we get no character depth. I really wasn’t feeling it and it actually made me nauseous at one point. This, however, is not the main love triangle I was referring to above.
The main love triangle of the story is a huge spoiler so I won’t get into that. I wanted to hate that other character so much as they were the one thing standing between our couple getting together. However, it is handled so well, this character is given a lot of depth and I grew to really care about them. I also really appreciated how our protagonist didn’t treat them terribly despite the situation they were in.
I really do love our protagonist, Amber, she is sweet and obviously smart. She makes really bad decisions sometimes, but it isn’t enough for me to hate her for it. It’s nice to know she isn’t a Mary Sue, she does have flaws.
As someone who has already pretty much finished the second book I can say that it is definitely worth it to continue reading the series and I’m intrigued by this world that the author has created. It has lots of potential for all sorts of cool twists and turns. I would suggest giving this book a read.
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