Review: The 5th Wave by Rick Yancey

Note: this review is from 2013.

The 5th Wave by Rick Yancey
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

After the 1st wave, only darkness remains. After the 2nd, only the lucky escape. And after the 3rd, only the unlucky survive. After the 4th wave, only one rule applies: trust no one.

Now, it's the dawn of the 5th wave, and on a lonely stretch of highway, Cassie runs from Them. The beings who only look human, who roam the countryside killing anyone they see. Who have scattered Earth's last survivors. To stay alone is to stay alive, Cassie believes, until she meets Evan Walker. Beguiling and mysterious, Evan Walker may be Cassie's only hope for rescuing her brother-or even saving herself. But Cassie must choose: between trust and despair, between defiance and surrender, between life and death. To give up or to get up. 

Wow. So I LOVED this book. It's been ages since I read a good science fiction story, and this was so well executed. At first, when I started reading it, I didn't really like it; Yancey has a unique writing style and it took me a while to get used to it. But I am SO glad I pursued and finished it. Because, seriously, this is one of those books that I just can't stop thinking about.

It was a fantastic read.

The characters were realistic and they had flaws--hugely important. The main character, Cassie, was one of my favourites. She was honest and just seemed so real. She made mistakes, got embarrassed and, yeah, seemed real.

I really loved Evan, despite how creepily he was portrayed in places. And the big secret about him... although part of me suspected it was coming, I was still blown over when it was revealed.

The other main characters, Sammy and Ben, were great too. And I loved how the book was told from all of their perspectives.

And there was humour too. Admittedly, most of it was saracastic and dry humour, but the part about the pet log literally had me in tears. This humour provided a very much needed lighter edge to this dark, gritty story.

The detail in this book was brilliant too! Absolutely fantastic. I could easily see that Rick Yancey had done lots of research for this story, to get its details correct. This made it more authentic in several places, adding to the overall reading experience.

One thing I will say, is that I wasn't too happy with the ending, mainly because it was a cliff-hanger, and I want to know what happened next NOW. But I am SO glad that there's going to be another book to follow The 5th Wave!

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