Cara F. (dichten) reviewed on 1/10/2010 + 4 more book reviews

Helpful Score: 1

There were a lot of fragmented sentences. And they were almost enough to drive me crazy. Thankfully, I was able to set that aside and focus intently on the story.

We follow out heroine Mary, who has lived in The Village for her entire life, hearing stories about the ocean and longing to know if such a place exists. Unfortunately, The Village is surrounded by chain-link fence which serves to bar the Unconsecrated from the villagers; no one is allowed in and no one is allowed out.

Not once is the term zombie mentioned, but we get the idea soon enough. Not once is an exact cause for this predicament mentioned, but we can fathom that at some point in time (a very long time ago, back when her many greats-grandmother was perhaps chasing ocean waves) an infection took hold of humanity. Spread through bodily fluids (ie, saliva from a bite) the living are turned into roving, insatiably hungry living dead. Again, the fence takes care of this minor nuisance. So long as no one strays too close the those pesky Unconsecrated, so long as the fence is not breached -- Oops.

Things go to heck in a handbag right quick, Carrie Ryan and her sentence fragments weaving a very subtle and ever-looming sense of doom thick and dark as The Forest itself.

While at times Mary seemed like the typified self-indulgent teenager, the story was able to rise above these tantrums, painting a rich albeit gloomy post-apocalyptic world. I feel as though it did fall short at times, that it could have used more here and less there but overall I liked it (which is not at all to say I loved it). I would recommend it.

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