Gavin's Reviews > The Reapers are the Angels

This book was one of the more disappointing and frustrating YA books I've read lately. The story offered just enough that I tolerated the many flaws and dragged myself to the end. My endurance was rewarded by one of the worst endings in the history of fiction.

The sad thing is the post apocalyptic setting had potential. This story takes place 25 years after a zombie apocalypse has wiped out the better part of the population. We follow Temple, a 15 year old girl, as she struggles for survival in this bleak dystopian world. She has to contend as much with threats from the other people she meets as she does from the zombies.

One of the main flaws this book had is that Temple just meandered around aimlessly, as did the plot. Initially Temple seeks solitude as a result of suffering a personal tragedy. When her hideout becomes compromised she moves on. However at the first human settlement she finds she manages to attract the attention of two twisted brothers. Both of whom develop a fixation with her, one of them so much so that he proceeds to chase her around in the hopes of murdering her. Despite her reluctance to socialize or bond with other people Temple does manage to pick up a dependent in the form of the mentally disabled Maury which gives her life a small sense of purpose and direction.

Temple was a likable enough character. She was tough and independent and understood what it took to survive in a world such as this one. Her life was a tough one and she was left emotionally scarred by her experiences, but despite that still seemed to retain a fairly positive outlook on life and plenty of compassion. Along the way Temple managed to meet a few interesting characters. The most memorable were the twisted and delusional Todd brothers and the Grierson family.

The world was a poorly constructed one. I can only imagine it was set in some sort of post apocalyptic zombie magical wonderland because despite the story picking up 25 years after the fall of civilization things like fuel, electricity, and food are still abundant. The zombies themselves are little more than a throw away plot device and so slow and useless that it is a wonder they ever managed to decimate the population. In another irritating, ridiculous, and logic bending development people who were bitten by zombies became infected and turned into zombies themselves, but people who chomped on zombies were completely fine.

I was not a fan of the writing style of Alden Bell at all. It was awkward, pretentious, distant, and just plain weird. A lot of the ridiculous descriptions were so poorly placed that they actually managed to steal the tension from the happenings. All of this resulted in me being left so emotionally unengaged by the story and the characters that I did not care much about what happened. Bad writing lead to Temple seeming like an inconsistent character. She has no formal education, awful grammar, and her speech is packed full of regional dialect and colloquialisms. Unfortunately this often gets forgotten as Temple channels her inner Alden Bell. Either that or she swallowed a thesaurus somewhere along the way!

I'm not sure what the purpose or the message of this story was. It all seemed pretty pointless to me.

The ending was as dreadful as it was predictable. I had it figured out before the halfway mark, but still managed to be disappointed by the execution. The book would have made more of an impact had the final two chapters been completely cut.

The sequel has no audio version available which I assume means this book bombed commercially.

Despite all my moaning I did feel like there was a decent story hiding somewhere among the flaws. It just never quite managed to reveal itself. Which is why I was so frustrated while reading this one.

Rating: 2.5 stars.

Audio Note: Tai Sammons did OK.