Book Review : World After by Susan Ee book review
Goodreads Summary :
In this sequel to
the bestselling fantasy thriller, Angelfall, the
survivors of the angel apocalypse begin to scrape back together what's left of
the modern world. When a group of people capture Penryn's sister Paige,
thinking she's a monster, the situation ends in a massacre. Paige disappears.
Humans are terrified. Mom is heartbroken. Penryn drives through the streets of
San Francisco looking for Paige. Why are the streets so empty? Where is
everybody? Her search leads her into the heart of the angels' secret plans
where she catches a glimpse of their motivations, and learns the horrifying
extent to which the angels are willing to go. Meanwhile, Raffe hunts for his
wings. Without them, he can't rejoin the angels, can't take his rightful place
as one of their leaders. When faced with recapturing his wings or helping
Penryn survive, which will he choose?
My review/book talk on Angelfall.
*Spoilers from now on* My first impression of the book was that the cover
took a darker turn than its predecessor AngelFall with more blues than pinks.
Showing that it is a lot darker than Angelfall, which was pretty dark anyway, not that you would know that from the cover.. This
book is the sequel to Angel Fall and continues straight off from when Penryn is
in the truck. First of all I love Penryn, her inner ramblings, her attitude and
some of the things she did were downright hilarious. Especially at the beginning
when they were on the truck and everyone thinks she is dead, as if it wasn't bad
enough her mum was having one of her insane ramblings and Paige looked like an
extra of a horror movie, the way she figures now when everyone else is terrified of her is a perfectly timed moment to
just sit up and then she seems a bit shocked when everyone starts screaming,
hello girl you were just dead.
I expected to see Raffe quite early in the book, but instead he did not
even come into the picture until around three quarters in and to be honest I
did not really notice, not in a bad way though, due to everything that Penryn was doing. I loved the
reunion scene when she is on Uriels arm and wants Raffe to notice her and to
save him she trips and falls onto Uriel and when they talk and he says….
There is attraction there you can see it. I know I said I loved the fact
that there was no romance there in the first book and there is even less in the
second, but its still there just hinting in the background and you know its
exciting because its forbidden, but I really love that its not the whole we have known
each other for five chapters so we are now in love and I can’t survive without
him.
Pookie Bear, was one of my favourite characters because come on, if she even is a character, maybe a object? But seriously how could
you not? A sword called Pookie Bear. When she was teaching Penryn how to use
the swords in dreams that also gave us some of Raffes backstory, impeccably
done Susan. Impeccably. And I gained even more respect for the sword when we
saw Penryn asking to see Rafes point of view from there kiss and Pookie Bear
refused too. Loyalty, guys. But when Raffe told her that the sword could only have one name
chosen by the owner, and it was Pookie Bear.
Pookie bear this archangel sword that has won wars and battles is hiding
under a teddy bear and make shift dress made out of a wedding dress. Then when all the other angel swords bowed down to Pookie though that was repeatedly running through my
head.
I loved how Claras story ended, how we met her in Angelfall waving away her
family to when Penryn saved her from the scorpion hybrid. And in Angelfall she
was like a phoenix rising from the ashes, but instead of ashes rubble to when
her daughter came running after her. So sweet and the hesitancy that her
husband had. I think it just proved that there is still hope for our main characters in the
post-apocalyptic world.
Paige, Paige where to start with her. She started of Angelfall as a physically weak seven year old in a wheelchair, who then became the sort-of damsel in distress, but by the end of the novel she was a physically scarred looking like a extra out of a horror movie seven year old. But in After World, she could not keep down normal food and you know she craves human flesh and none of the other characters seem to realise what is wrong with her. Penryn can't stand to look at her, as she doesn't seem to realise until we are in the second half of the book that she is still her little sister. Her mum is just babying her. And the rest of the camp are trying to find away to get rid of her. So when she finally attacks someone, she knows it was someone who was nasty to Penryn and Penryn still does not seem to realise this. At Alcatraz when the creepy doctor says how much pain Paige is in and us as the reader and Penryn had not even considered that possibility and the doctor thinks she has Stockholm syndrome towards Beliel, who is the person who de-winged and stole Raffes wings in Angelfall, I’m thinking sh** no, don’t do that Paige, I even understood why Paige could think that Beliel would understand what was wrong with her. But I felt so relieved when she finally finds him and starts attacking him out of vengeance and Paige is the Queen of the scorpion hybrids. It was a proper like yes b****, go Paige! Then when Penryn picked her up it was just a lovely sisterly moment, showing that Penryn did not care her sister was this strange cannibalistic creature, she loved her for being her.
The most heartbreaking scene for me is probably when we are around 1/4 of a way into the book, it's after the scorpion creatures strike and the loved ones of the paralyzed find them and start doing horrible stuff like burying them. That man who buried his wife alive even after Penryn said that she was still alive and when Penryn left and she saw some of the people coming back, a woman is in there who was buried alive by her husband, imagine the guilt he must be feeling when everyone else who was supposed to be dead is walking around when his lover is not. A close second is when Penryn saw the wedding band on one of the scorpion creatures hands and when we realised before Penryn that these scorpion creatures were previously human.
A good touch as well is that the place where they
do these scorpion experiments is Alcatraz a already creepy prison and the
knowledge that there is humans working for the angels, showing the inhumanity
of humanity.Dun. Du. Dun.
I am so excited for the End of Days, which comes out later this year.
I am so excited for the End of Days, which comes out later this year.
Questions from World After
What happened to Penryns father? What is wrong
with Penryns mum? Is she really crazy or does she know something we don’t? Will
something happen between Raffe and Penryn? Why is b- the way he is? What
happened to the watchers wives? Is judgment day soon? Who will the angels align
with? Will the angels realise that it is Raffe? What happened to Penryns body
double M-?
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