Better than I expected.

I was voluntarily provided this review copy audiobook at no charge by the author, publisher and/or narrator.

This wasn’t quite what I expected, it was even better! I thought it would be more of an anthology book, considering there were five different authors involved, so there would be five individual stories but that’s not what I got. While each author had their own storyline, they were also connected and felt more like a single author showing a story from different POVs. It really made the story that much more enjoyable and kept me interested. I got to see how different people handled the situation, how they survived and how they handled the aftermath of the event.

I’m not even sure which characters I liked more. They each had their good parts and bad but I found myself either liking a character through the whole thing or not liking them at first and then having them grow on me as their story continued. I found myself really angry at the true villains of the story and their reasoning for what they did both a surprise and not a surprise at the same time. Some of the actions the characters take doesn’t always make sense (did you have to kill the doctor? He could’ve told you so much information! And the army people are complete bastards) but for the most part, I can see normal people doing what the characters do. I don’t want to get into too much detail as it could take away from the story but I found that I wanted to keep reading the rest of the series so I could find out what happens to everyone and how they’re going to stop the villains. I can’t wait for the rest of the books to come out!

Of course, Mr. Wehrlen did a marvelous job at keeping the story going, ramping up the action when it calls for it and slowing things down after to give us a chance to recover. He does a good job at keeping the characters voices separate enough that you’re not completely lost on who’s talking and giving them each their own personality.

If you love End of the World stories with intrigue and captivating characters, make sure you give this one a listen!