3.5* rating – I liked the title for this book. Five authors, collaborating on this story that ends up in Texas. Five sets of characters, with mostly independent journeys towards a common safe haven. I’ve read a fair number of zombie novels over the years and I typically find something engaging and unique about each book or series that I read. Thus, this story was interesting for me because I wanted to see how seamlessly the five-author collaboration would work out. One of the things that I enjoyed about this story was how the pacing and action/danger differed for the different story lines. I liked some of the main characters more than others, a sign of how well fleshed-out the characters were. I imagine that this would reflect reality: some folks might choose to hunker down and wait til things cooled down, while other folks choose to travel to an isolated sanctuary, while other folks don’t know that the apocalypse has hit until the disaster is essentially at their doorstep, and so on. But all roads nevertheless lead to Texas.
The main reason why I gave this story less than a five star rating was because it became apparent in the final chapters that this was book 1 of a multi-book series. No where in the book cover, book title, or book description does it say that this is the first book of a series. I was expecting a resolution, but instead we were introduced at the very end to some entirely new characters and a cliffhanger that will clearly move us into the next book in the series. I was in the mood for a stand-alone zombie book, not a series, so I felt like I was on the receiving end of a bait-and-switch tactic.
I’ve listened to audiobooks narrated by Andrew Wehrlen in the past. On the whole, I’ve found his style more appealing for some stories, less so for others. I suppose my enjoyment of his narration depends on a variety of factors, such as the topic of the story, the length of the book, the number of characters, and the writing style of the author. For this book, which has numerous intense plot-driven moments, I think his narration was a bit too intense. In this book, there were times when I felt that the narrator packed a paragraph’s worth of emphasis into each sentence. He has a very unique narration style, and sometimes it’s a bit overwhelming when listening for a long span of time in a single sitting. I did notice that his intensity levels seemed to even out part way through the book, but I’m not sure if it was because he was settling into the narration, or because of the authors’ wordcrafting during that portion of the story. Regardless, I’m not put off by the narrator and have enjoyed his past work – it wouldn’t surprise me at all to give him a full five-star rating for a different audiobook in the future.
“I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.”