Review: The 5th Wave

The 5th Wave 

By: Rick Yancey

My Rating: 4/5 Stars

Genre: Sci Fi, dystopia, alien invasion, YA.

The First Section of this Review will be spoiler free.

Synopsis: After the 1st wave, only darkness remains. After the 2nd, only the lucky escape. And after the 3rd, only the unlucky survive. After the 4th wave, only one rule applies: trust no one.

Now, it’s the dawn of the 5th wave, and on a lonely stretch of highway, Cassie runs from Them. The beings who only look human, who roam the countryside killing anyone they see. Who have scattered Earth’s last survivors. To stay alone is to stay alive, Cassie believes, until she meets Evan Walker. Beguiling and mysterious, Evan Walker may be Cassie’s only hope for rescuing her brother-or even saving herself. But Cassie must choose: between trust and despair, between defiance and surrender, between life and death. To give up or to get up.

This is hands down a great book. I wouldn’t have expected a lot from an alien invasion book, honestly I thought it would be somewhere between Independence Day and The Host. I was wrong, it was very well written and almost poetic at times. Cassie was smart, badass and funny, I thoroughly enjoyed reading from her point of view. I found this book to be very realistic. I know what your thinking, alien invasion and realistic are not words that should go together, but if an invasion really did happen, I think it is probable that it would play out a bit like this book. I liked that the book split perspectives between Cassie, Evan and Sam and Ben. It gave me a well rounded view of what was going on, and made it even more satisfying when all the plot lines connected in the end. The ending wasn’t a total cliffhanger but it definitely left me wanting more, and I practically ran to the bookstore when the sequel came out. I will say that because there were two large plot lines and like 4 smaller ones going on at once, I felt like there wasn’t enough time spent with each of them. The book isn’t that long and there were definitely moments when it felt a little rushed.

All in all this is a fun but also dark, well written book, perfect for fans of science fi or dystopia. Please don’t write it off because of the alien aspect, I can guarantee it’s not the kind of alien invasion you are picturing! I would also recommend the movie, I actually think they did a great job on it, and it makes me sad that not enough people were interested so there won’t be a sequel. But check out both book and movie, they are worth it.

 

***SPOILERS***

 

So anyone who has read this book know that Evan turn out to be an alien *gasp* WHAT?! lol honestly it wasn’t that surprising. I liked their whole Romeo and Juliet relationship, they were super cute together. Ben on the other hand was a whole other situation. I thought his transformation from high school jock to badass alien hunter was pretty cool, but I have to say I like Vida and Sam (Cassie’s little brother) better than him. Sam was just adorable and I felt awful for him, but Vida was so awesome, and even though if we met in real life I am sure she would scare the living daylight out of me! Not that Cassie wasn’t badass in her own way too, but I self identified with her so much more (even though I am sure I would not survive an alien invasion). Evan apparently dying at the end of this book was 100% not ok with me. If this hadn’t had a sequel I would have been pissed off, but since it does I can call of the planned mob and re read it! If you have read the rest of the series you know things get weird, crazy and quite tragic but I won’t spoil anything here, you will just have to read them.

Here are some awesome quotes:

“But if I’m it, the last of my kind, the last page of human history, like hell I’m going to let the story end this way. I may be the last one, but I am the one still standing. I am the one turning to face the faceless hunter in the woods on an abandoned highway. I am the one not running but facing. Because if I am the last one, then I am humanity. And if this is humanity’s last war, then I am the battlefield.”

“How do you rid the Earth of humans? Rid the humans of their humanity.”

“Sarcasm doesn’t appear to work on him. If that’s true, I’m in trouble: It’s my normal mode of communication.”

“We’d stared into the face of Death, and Death blinked first. You’d think that would make us feel brave and invincible. It didn’t.”

I have included a link to the Amazon page for this book if you are interested.

 

Do you think you would survive an alien invasion? let me know in the comments!