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lauren_may's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.75
Content Warnings
Graphic: Rape, Racial slurs, and Racism
qwerty88's review against another edition
dark
hopeful
mysterious
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Confinement, Death, Death of parent, Dementia, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Murder, Police brutality, Pregnancy, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicide, Terminal illness, Torture, and Violence
Moderate: Abandonment
Minor: Alcohol and Animal death
gwimo's review against another edition
dark
emotional
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Religious bigotry, Murder, Suicide, Sexual content, Sexism, Homophobia, Drug abuse, Dementia, Death of parent, Rape, Racism, Hate crime, Sexual assault, Violence, Terminal illness, Suicide attempt, Suicidal thoughts, Sexual violence, Racial slurs, Xenophobia, Self harm, Pregnancy, Outing, and Gun violence
jenny_d's review
dark
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
1.75
Man... this book could have been a LOT shorter. Lots of repetitive phrases. A few characters that could have been entirely left out, like Pete, without changing the story at all. I feel like the rape scene in the bunker could have been a fade-to-black kind of thing instead. There were parts of the story that were pretty good, but by the time I was two thirds of the way through I had lost a lot of interest in the story. It felt like a slog after that. Plus there were so many things about it that were way too squicky for me .
Content Warnings
Graphic: Confinement, Cursing, Death, Dementia, Gun violence, Mental illness, Murder, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Religious bigotry, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Terminal illness, Violence, Vomit, and Xenophobia
Minor: Adult/minor relationship
abbie_a_'s review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
informative
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Rape, Racial slurs, Racism, Suicide, Gun violence, Death, Death of parent, Blood, and Gore
demiwriter's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Sexual assault, Torture, and Rape
Moderate: Blood, Racial slurs, Violence, Gun violence, and Gore
Minor: Suicide and Animal death
megsib's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Torture, Violence, and Dementia
luckykosmos's review against another edition
mysterious
reflective
tense
medium-paced
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
I have very different feelings about this book depending on the angle taken. This book may have aged poorly - it feels weird to say that, only a year in, but one pandemic and chaotic election season later, I spent half of this book going, "That isn't how that goes!" I had issues with suspension of disbelief from the beginning for that reason. But, adding on to that, the handling of racial politics felt... clumsy. It was a plot point, but not a motivation, and not addressed beyond 'these people are dangerous' (except for Bo and Matthew, which I'll get to in a moment). That section of the book could have been taken out and tried by a different author, maybe one with a less white, cishet perspective (because, yes, I don't feel great about the non-cishet rep either), and I feel like little would have been lost.
That being said, this is a wonderful book when it comes to examinations of leadership and faith. Science and religion weren't pitted against each other, but there were different interpretations of the situation based on whose perspective we were in, and for this reason, Matthew's perspective was my favorite - watching him falling into something he didn't believe, and contending with the different ways he lost Autumn or Bo. Watching Bo's radicalization as Matthew lost his faith was interesting - though, again, the exact nature of that radicalization, the white supremacists, felt weak.
I hated the ending. I hated the final reveal with Black Swan. I can't decide if it was decided from an ecofascist angle, or a poorly optimized artificial intelligence (though this could give it too much credit), but from how the past few months have gone and the ecofascist conversations at the beginning of the pandemic, I could not suspend my disbelief long enough to justify it. Maybe I would have a different perspective eight, nine months ago. I wish I saw in this book what authors I love saw, but I don't think Chuck Wendig was the author to tell this story, and I don't think it dropped at the right time.
(I may have rated this higher if it were shorter, but to feel so lukewarm after almost 800 pages is disappointing)
That being said, this is a wonderful book when it comes to examinations of leadership and faith. Science and religion weren't pitted against each other, but there were different interpretations of the situation based on whose perspective we were in, and for this reason, Matthew's perspective was my favorite - watching him falling into something he didn't believe, and contending with the different ways he lost Autumn or Bo. Watching Bo's radicalization as Matthew lost his faith was interesting - though, again, the exact nature of that radicalization, the white supremacists, felt weak.
I hated the ending. I hated the final reveal with Black Swan. I can't decide if it was decided from an ecofascist angle, or a poorly optimized artificial intelligence (though this could give it too much credit), but from how the past few months have gone and the ecofascist conversations at the beginning of the pandemic, I could not suspend my disbelief long enough to justify it. Maybe I would have a different perspective eight, nine months ago. I wish I saw in this book what authors I love saw, but I don't think Chuck Wendig was the author to tell this story, and I don't think it dropped at the right time.
(I may have rated this higher if it were shorter, but to feel so lukewarm after almost 800 pages is disappointing)
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racial slurs, Racism, Religious bigotry, Terminal illness, Violence, and Xenophobia
Moderate: Chronic illness, Rape, Sexual violence, and Torture
Minor: Adult/minor relationship
altlovesbooks's review
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.5
Maybe not the best book to read in 2020, but I read it on a whim and I'm glad I did it when I did it. It made the book feel like it carried a bit of extra weight, or baggage, or something when I could compare it to what's going on around me. You have a disease sweeping the world. You have a small group (the Flock) immune to the disease, walking like a sleepwalker to an unknown destination and guarded by a group of family and friends (the Shepherds). Then you have society unrest all around them, as fears and hatred become front and center. Things end for America, poorly.
This was a hard book to review. I really wanted to like it, to the point where I caught myself trying to rationalize myself to even just 4 stars "just because". In the end though, while I liked the journey and the concept, the ending was...really lackluster to me. Not a lot really happens over the course of the book, and while you get some really intimate pictures of the walkers and the shepherds painted for you, it's a lot of window dressing on a tire fire of society commentary. There's some red herrings thrown out for the ultimate cause of the disease, but despite that I still managed to not be surprised at all at where it led.
If you like the idea of end-of-the-world diseases, societal collapse, and all that sci-fi dystopian setting, maybe still give this a try. There's lots to like here. The ending didn't click with me though, but maybe it will for you.
This was a hard book to review. I really wanted to like it, to the point where I caught myself trying to rationalize myself to even just 4 stars "just because". In the end though, while I liked the journey and the concept, the ending was...really lackluster to me. Not a lot really happens over the course of the book, and while you get some really intimate pictures of the walkers and the shepherds painted for you, it's a lot of window dressing on a tire fire of society commentary. There's some red herrings thrown out for the ultimate cause of the disease, but despite that I still managed to not be surprised at all at where it led.
If you like the idea of end-of-the-world diseases, societal collapse, and all that sci-fi dystopian setting, maybe still give this a try. There's lots to like here. The ending didn't click with me though, but maybe it will for you.
Content Warnings
Minor: Suicide, Rape, Torture, Racial slurs, Racism, and Sexism
catsy2022's review against another edition
dark
hopeful
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
Rating: B
Wanderers by Chuck Wendig is a tome written in 2019 about a global pandemic, uncomfortably on the nose politically for the times we are experiencing now. Set in the USA, Wanderers follows a large and diverse set of protagonists at the start of a suspected pandemic. People suddenly leave their homes walking in a single direction. They do not respond to outside stimuli and their skin is hard enough to turn away blades and needles. They walk through any weather and can climb over obstacles. Their family members are choosing to follow with the sleepwalkers to their final destination.
In the background there are several elements to this story that the author slowly brings together. In pandemic and apocalyptic books we see many of the same themes; hope, love, life and an idea of the future, but we often see racism, religion, and the government's struggle in the final years.
This book brings a few new ideas to the table that are incredibly interesting but continues to rehash the same ideas we are sick of and make less sense in this currently climate.
Racism reminded him of Lyme, a tick-borne disease. A deer tick would bite a person, passing along a little bugger named Borrelia burgdorferi—the nasty bacterium that caused the disease. When you contracted it, it might look like a case of the flu. Then it could go dormant for weeks, months, sometimes even years—and then when it came back, it manifested ten times worse than it began.
The pacing of the book was really great for the first few hundred pages, then really dragged throughout the middle section from about 450 to 700. I felt like these sections were rife with some unnecessary perspectives and small picture human struggles - as well as some really horrible and very unnecessary abusive scenes. I felt disgusted by their inclusion; after reading Swan Song last month or whatever, I felt like these ideas should be left in the past. If we are struggling for life, wouldn't it be more likely we are struggling as humans rather than struggling as white people vs the other races?
I personally found the ending a bit of a fizzle compared to a bang. I felt somewhat disappointed but elements of the conclusion can be seen throughout the book, especially from the perspective of the sleepwalkers.
I really enjoyed reading some of the character perspectives too, but I couldn't really say that I truly came to care about any of them. The death scenes never hit me hard like they had in Seveneves.
I'm not sure how I feel about this book if I'm being honest. I don't know if it's actually worth reading but it didn't feel like 800 pages long until I got past the middle of it.
Wanderers by Chuck Wendig is a tome written in 2019 about a global pandemic, uncomfortably on the nose politically for the times we are experiencing now. Set in the USA, Wanderers follows a large and diverse set of protagonists at the start of a suspected pandemic. People suddenly leave their homes walking in a single direction. They do not respond to outside stimuli and their skin is hard enough to turn away blades and needles. They walk through any weather and can climb over obstacles. Their family members are choosing to follow with the sleepwalkers to their final destination.
In the background there are several elements to this story that the author slowly brings together. In pandemic and apocalyptic books we see many of the same themes; hope, love, life and an idea of the future, but we often see racism, religion, and the government's struggle in the final years.
This book brings a few new ideas to the table that are incredibly interesting but continues to rehash the same ideas we are sick of and make less sense in this currently climate.
Racism reminded him of Lyme, a tick-borne disease. A deer tick would bite a person, passing along a little bugger named Borrelia burgdorferi—the nasty bacterium that caused the disease. When you contracted it, it might look like a case of the flu. Then it could go dormant for weeks, months, sometimes even years—and then when it came back, it manifested ten times worse than it began.
The pacing of the book was really great for the first few hundred pages, then really dragged throughout the middle section from about 450 to 700. I felt like these sections were rife with some unnecessary perspectives and small picture human struggles - as well as some really horrible and very unnecessary abusive scenes. I felt disgusted by their inclusion; after reading Swan Song last month or whatever, I felt like these ideas should be left in the past. If we are struggling for life, wouldn't it be more likely we are struggling as humans rather than struggling as white people vs the other races?
I personally found the ending a bit of a fizzle compared to a bang. I felt somewhat disappointed but elements of the conclusion can be seen throughout the book, especially from the perspective of the sleepwalkers.
I really enjoyed reading some of the character perspectives too, but I couldn't really say that I truly came to care about any of them. The death scenes never hit me hard like they had in Seveneves.
I'm not sure how I feel about this book if I'm being honest. I don't know if it's actually worth reading but it didn't feel like 800 pages long until I got past the middle of it.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death and Gun violence
Moderate: Racial slurs and Racism
Minor: Animal cruelty
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