The 5th Wave

This is the way the world ends. Not with a bang but a bitch slap. Yancy gives us dystopia by throwing it all at us: aliens, illness, and tsunamis all at once.

I went into this with high, high hopes. And it is not because of the press machine which has been shoving this book down our throats for months. It was because 1. I read and LOVED The Monstrumologist and 2. I am all about aliens right now. Maybe it's the return of Falling Skies. Maybe it's because I am deathly sick of zombies, vampires, and the fae. Anyway, the point is, I couldn't put this down. No, it's not perfect and I suspect that had I read Ender's Game (don't judge!) I'd have even more to compare it to.

What's very right about this book: the characters. Yancy writes great characters, and so completely they could be your best friends by the end of the book. The plotting-it's quick, quick, quick and for a big book, that's great. The sense of how strong kids really are. Kids in Yancy's books grow up quick and they are very strong but emotionally and physically (we knew all of this from Will Henry).
Here's what didn't work for me-the romance. There are some actual eye-roll inducing moments in here between Evan and Cassie that are so corny they ripped me right out of the story, made me gag, and then I had to jump back in. Also-stupid adults. Almost all of the adults in this story are useless. Not one conspiracy theorist survived the first 4 waves? They are trusting sheep. Thank goodness the kids have brains.
That's about it. Everything else was awesome, hence the 4 star review. I highly recommend it as a summer read. I know the sheer size of it will be off putting to some kids, but it moves fast. I think it's wrong to compare it to The Stand (there are not enough characters and the point of this story is not good vs evil, but what it means to be human), The Hunger Games, or any of the rest of the end of the world standbys.