Review: The Girl With All the Gifts by M.R. Carey

 Summary from Goodreads:

NOT EVERY GIFT IS A BLESSING.

Melanie is a very special girl. Dr Caldwell calls her "our little genius."

Every morning, Melanie waits in her cell to be collected for class. When they come for her, Sergeant keeps his gun pointing at her while two of his people strap her into the wheelchair. She thinks they don't like her. She jokes that she won't bite, but they don't laugh.

Melanie loves school. She loves learning about spelling and sums and the world outside the classroom and the children's cells. She tells her favorite teacher all the things she'll do when she grows up. Melanie doesn't know why this makes Miss Justineau look sad.

The Girl With All the Gifts is a groundbreaking thriller, emotionally charged and gripping from beginning to end.

My Review:


What I Liked:

Characters. Carey did a great job crafting and developing different kind of characters throughout the novel. It switches through various points of view but Carey does so in a way that flows well. The reader comes to root for Melanie and the others as they try to survive in the zombie filled world.

Plot. I went into the novel with zero expectation and pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed the plot. It was a unique take on zombies that I had not read or seen before. It had some good twists that I did not see coming at all.

What I Disliked:

Graphic. I went in blind so I did not know that it was set in a zombie apocalypse future. It had a lot more gore and violent images then I tend to read. I liked the characters and the plot but could have done without some of the violent imagery.

Length/Setting. I felt that that the  novel dragged a bit in the middle. It could have been fifty or so pages shorter. And I would have liked to see the setting change more often.

I recommend checking out this horror/thriller novel if you enjoy great character driven zombie novels.

My Rating:

4.5 Stars Out of 5 Stars