Utopia

Utopia By Marie-Hélène Lebeault
Publication date: January 15th 2024

Pre-Order: Amazon
Genres: Adventure, Post-Apocalyptic, Science Fiction, Young Adult

A Clean YA Post-Apocalyptic Science Fiction Adventure

Three extraordinary teenagers, each an outcast in their worlds, unite to reshape the destiny of a utopian society. 

Ryn, who couldn’t adapt to life under the sea, Eira, born above the clouds but unable to breathe the thin air, and Aiden, rejected by the subterranean civilization, embarks on a thrilling journey to Vancouver’s utopia. 

They’ll challenge the elders, confront hidden truths, and discover the power of unity in a fast-paced young adult sci-fi adventure that explores the boundaries of human resilience, and the promise of a better world.

Utopia is a What Happens Next? novel developed from the Under the Ice short story.

Review by Melissa: "Floor 21"

 Floor 21 by Jason Luthor
Age Group: Young Adult
Genre: Dystopia
Release Date: June 2nd, 2015
Buy Links:

Amazon ♥ Barnes and Noble

Book Description:

As humanity lives out the remainder of its existence at the top of an isolated apartment tower, young Jackie dares to question Tower Authority and their ban on traveling into the tower's depths. Intelligent and unyielding, Jackie ventures into the shadows of the floors below. But will her strong will and refusal to be quiet—in a society whose greatest pride is hiding the past—bring understanding of how humanity became trapped in the tower she has always called home, or will it simply be her undoing?

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I wasn't exactly sure what to expect when I agreed to read and review Jason Luthor's "Floor 21". I was drawn in, as I usually am, by a dystopian young adult book, and I was hoping that I wouldn't be let down. Thankfully, I was pleasantly surprised and enjoyed the book and its premise more than I thought I would.

The Story takes place in a tower where only the top floors are inhabited, because the lower levels have been infested by this substance that they call "Creep". No one is sure how it got there or when, they just know to not ask a lot of questions and to follow the rules that were set by the Tower Authority. Of course, following the rules would make a bad and boring book, so "Floor 21" is what happens when one girl starts questioning their existence in the Tower and starts to look for answers.

What was cool about "Floor 21" was that it was different. The story was told in a first person narrative, as the characters recorded their story on voice recorders. I liked this idea, because it was a great way to show off the characters' unique voices in a way that is not commonly done.

The recordings, in my opinion, also added more suspense to what was happening. Since the characters are going through their own stories, they aren't able to speak knowingly on what else is going on, or why it's going on. Instead, the reader finds out more information along with the characters on the voice recorder, and everything has a stronger sense of immediacy.

 

I would recommend "Floor 21" to anyone who enjoys dystopian stories as much as I do. I read the whole book in about a day and a half (and that was even with me going out with friends and having a life for a change!), because I wanted to find answers. It seems like Luthor is setting up for another book to follow, and if that is true, I would love to continue reading and learning more about the Tower and the Creep.

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Author Bio:

Jason Luthor has spent a long life writing for sports outlets, media companies and universities. His earliest writing years came during his coverage of the San Antonio Spurs as an affiliate with the Spurs Report and its media partner, WOAI Radio. He would later enjoy a moderate relationship with Blizzard Entertainment, writing lore and stories for potential use in future games. At the academic level he has spent several years pursuing a PhD in American History at the University of Houston, with a special emphasis on Native American history.

His inspirations include some of the obvious; The Lord of the Rings and Chronciles of Narnia are some of the most cited fantasy series in history. However, his favorite reads include the Earthsea Cycle, the Chronicles of Prydain, as well as science fiction hits such as Starship Troopers and Do Androids dream of Electric Sheep?

Website ♥ Goodreads

Review: Revolution 19

Revolution 19 by Gregg Rosenblum
Age Group: Young Adult
Genre: Science Fiction, Post-Apocalyptic, Dystopian
Release Date: January 8th, 2013 by Harper Teen


Twenty years ago, the robots designed to fight our wars abandoned the battlefields. Then they turned their weapons on us.

Only a few escaped the robot revolution of 2071. Kevin, Nick, and Cass are lucky —they live with their parents in a secret human community in the woods. Then their village is detected and wiped out. Hopeful that other survivors have been captured by bots, the teens risk everything to save the only people they have left in the world—by infiltrating a city controlled by their greatest enemies.

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Revolution 19 starts off 14 years after the robots made for fighting human wars rebelled and killed off most of humanity, keeping a percentage of them alive in the cities. The survivors have banded together to form various freeposts where daily life activities are for survival and staying hidden from the bots. The three main characters are siblings Nick, Cass and Kevin that fall into what was termed the second gens as they were too young to remember life before or were born after.

Kevin as the youngest is the tech genius of the group, Cass was adopted into the family after her parents were killed and Nick is the oldest and feels he doesn’t belong with the first gens as they ignore his ideas, but he’s too old to fit with the younger kids. It was nice that there wasn’t just one main character and that they each had their importance. When their Freepost is attacked by bots, they head to the nearest city to find their parents. Once in the City there is challenge after challenge involved in staying hidden from the bots and how to escape. They are aided by several citizens, including Lexi and Farryn who were around their age.

Review: Rage Within

Rage Within (Dark Inside #2) by Jeyn Roberts
Published September 4, 2012 by Simon & Schuster Books For Young Readers
Amazon | Book Depository

Rage Within is the sequel to Dark Inside, so you might not want to read this review if you’ve not read the first one. My review for Dark Inside can be found here.

Aries, Clementine, Michael, and Mason have survived the first wave of the apocalypse that wiped out most of the world’s population and turned many of the rest into murderous Baggers. Now they’re hiding out in an abandoned house in Vancouver with a ragtag group of fellow teen survivors, trying to figure out their next move.

Aries is trying to lead, but it’s hard to be a leader when there are no easy answers and every move feels wrong. Clementine is desperate to find her brother Heath, but it’s impossible to know where he’d be, assuming he’s alive. Michael is haunted by the memories of his actions during his harrowing struggle to survive. And Mason is struggling with something far worse: the fear that he may be a danger to his friends. As the Baggers begin to create a new world order, these four teens will have to trust and rely on each other in order to survive.

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This book starts off several weeks before the disastrous earthquakes, to show a little more into the lives of Aries, Clementine, Michael, Mason, and even Daniel (I got really excited over that part!). At first this glimpse into the time before just added to my confusion about the darkness and how it came about I kept second guessing what I thought I’d figured out in the last book. Once the book returns to the current day, the group has taken up residence in Vancouver for good trying to survive as the Baggers become more organized at rounding up people and it becomes more obvious that they have a plan for everyone still alive.

Review: Dark Inside

Dark Inside (Dark Inside #1)
by Jeyn Roberts
Published September 2, 2011 by Macmillan Children's Books
Amazon | Book Depository

Since the beginning of mankind, civilizations have fallen: the Romans, the Greeks, the Aztecs...and now us. Huge earthquakes rock the world. Cities are destroyed. But something even more awful is happening: An ancient evil has been unleashed, and it's turning everyday people into hunters, killers, and crazies. This is the world Mason, Aries, Clementine, and Michael are living in--or rather, trying to survive. Each is fleeing unspeakable horror, from murderous chaos to brutal natural disasters, and each is traveling the same road in a world gone mad. Amid the throes of the apocalypse and clinging to love and meaning wherever it can be found, these four teens are on a journey into the heart of darkness--and to find each other and a place of safety.

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When I started this I thought I was getting into another post-apocalyptic zombie novel and I was in a way, but these zombies are so much more. It all starts with massive earthquakes destroying the West coast of North America and East Asia, but the trouble is only beginning here. Immediately following the natural disasters people become homicidal killing strangers, friends even family members. These people, later termed Baggers, are overtaken by a darkness that is seen by veins in their eyes and at first only seem to kill, but it turns out there is a lot more this darkness inside them.

Review: Shadows

Shadows by Ilsa J. Bick
Release Date: September 25th
Purchase @ Amazon

The Apocalypse does not end. The Changed will grow in numbers. The Spared may not survive.

Even before the EMPs brought down the world, Alex was on the run from the demons of her past and the monster living in her head. After the world was gone, she believed Rule could be a sanctuary for her and those she’d come to love.
But she was wrong.

Now Alex is in the fight of her life against the adults, who would use her, the survivors, who don’t trust her, and the Changed, who would eat her alive. 

Welcome to Shadows, the second book in the haunting apocalyptic Ashes Trilogy: where no one is safe and humans may be the worst of the monsters.

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After reading Ashes, I’ve decided to do something different and review Shadows while reading instead of waiting until after the book is through. I’m already in part two, which is only eight percent into the book and I am still extremely confused. While I like seeing perspectives from more than one person because it gives us a better view of what’s going on and where, there is a such thing as too many point of view at once.

Shadows picks up almost immediately where Ashes left off, except from a different point of view. We aren’t with Alex in the Zone any longer, instead we are with Tom! Although we don’t actually know that at first. I can’t tell you how excited I was to find that he was still alive, I knew he would be, but within the first few minutes of found that out he starts thinking about Alex and how something inside of him is telling him she’s in trouble.

At that point I started to feel terrible for Tom, because while Alex had been worried about him for a while she eventually settled into Rule until recently when she found her whistle at the end of the last book. Then of course I got mad because here he is thinking about nothing, but her and she’s getting a little too friendly with Chris. When we finally do see Alex she’s fighting the Changed kids and while the action is great and sort of has you biting your fingernails the end result is lackluster.

Review: Ashes

Ashes by Ilsa J. Bick
Buy @ Amazon

Alex has run away and is hiking through the wilderness with her dead parents’ ashes, about to say goodbye to the life she no longer wants to live. But then the world suddenly changes. An electromagnetic pulse sweeps through the sky zapping every electronic device and killing the vast majority of adults. For those spared, it’s a question of who can be trusted and who has changed... Everyone still alive has turned - some for the better (those who acquired a superhuman sense) while others for the worse (those who acquired a taste for human flesh).

Desperate to find out what happened and to avoid the zombies that are on the hunt, Alex meets up with Tom - an Army veteran who escaped one war only to find something worse at home - and Ellie, a young girl whose grandfather was killed by the electromagnetic pulse. This improvised family will have to use every ounce of courage they have just to find food, shelter, while fighting off the “Changed” and those desperate to stay alive. A tense and involving adventure with shocks and sudden plot twists that will keep teen and adult readers gripped.

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This book is terrifying…Okay that might be slightly dramatic, but I have this super irrational zombie fear and it’s like Ashes went into my mind, stole my worst fears and brought them to life. Like I said terrifying.

Ashes follows Alex, a 17-year-old with a brain tumor, who chose the wrong day to take off and climb off into the wilderness, or maybe she chose the right day seeming as how a worldwide electromagnetic pulse swept through the world killing the vast majority of adults. The people who survived the attack are either spared or changed.

Thankfully Alex is sort of the later. She survived the pulse that shocked the world , but it changed her giving her some kind of super spidey sense, which is way better than the alternate. Now here’s the problem. I’ve literally been finished with this book for a few days and yet I’m having a terribly hard time reviewing it.

I love Alex. I do. Her character was well thought out by the author, Ilsa L. Bick and while she flounders sometimes, which is expected it’s not every day you deal with some kind of zombie apocalypse, she has a lot of great characteristics. She’s strong, smart, loyal and she’s got this overwhelming sense of good that makes me root for her to shoot some zombie brains.