Week of October 3rd, 2012
By Captain Creeper (Mike)
Title: As the World Dies (book 1): The First Days
Author: Rhiannon Frater
Pages: 336
Publication Date: July 5th 2011
Basic Plot: The morning that the world ends, Katie is getting ready for court and housewife Jenni is taking care of her family. Less than two hours later, they are fleeing for their lives from a zombie horde. Thrown together by circumstance, Jenni and Katie become a powerful zombie-killing partnership, mowing down zombies as they rescue Jenni’s stepson, Jason, from an infected campground. They find sanctuary in a tiny, roughly fortified Texas town. There Jenni and Katie find they are both attracted to Travis, leader of the survivors; and the refugees must slaughter people they know, who have returned in zombie form.
My likes/dislikes: First I want to say that this isn’t exactly my original review of this book. I had one planned in my head and had even started typing it up but then I had a conversation with the author and without even realizing she was doing it she changed my thought process on what I was originally going to point out as something I didn’t like about the book.
So. That being said. I was prepared to not like this book almost right from the start. When I picked it up at the local book store (I will no longer mention them by name as I don’t like them but they are my only choice for brick and mortar book shopping) I was a bit wishy-washy. Another zombie apocalypse book. There is a glut on the market. Then I read the back and realized the two main characters were women. OK… that’s new. I finished reading the back and was more inclined to read it until I saw that the author was a woman. Dammit (no offense Rhiannon meant). Now I was worried it was just going to be some light chick lit/ paranormal romance thing with heaving bosoms and ripped bodices. Not sure how that was gonna work with zombies but that’s what my thought process was. I had never heard of a female author who had done zombies before. Now I was really prepared not to like it. But boy was I wrong. Its fast paced its full of action and its believable. I really felt like I got to know the characters and I felt for them. I really liked that they weren’t afraid to use the word zombie. In most books/movies you always lose a good half of the characters you meet in the first part just because they refuse to believe that there are zombies. “Oh no it can’t be zombies… zombies aren’t real… oh my god this dude is eating my face off.” And yes there are a couple of characters you meet in this book to who refuse to acknowledge it and yes they get eaten but for the most part it’s the fact that the ones who accept that zombies are what’s happening are the reason they can adapt and survive. Not the only reason but it’s there.
Here’s where I was originally going to point out the things I didn’t like which was the roles/stereotypes that the main characters fell into (in my opinion). But after speaking to Rhiannon I saw I was wrong and it makes much more sense to me now. I really don’t have anything bad to say about this book. Except don’t get too attached to ANY character.
My score: 5 out of 5 stabs
Price and format: Paperback, Kindle, Audible Audio, and mass market paperback
