Yzabel / June 25, 2012

Feed by Mira Grant

My rating: [rating=5]

I read this book one year ago, but never wrote a review, for want of time to do so. Then, a couple of months ago, I posted one on Goodreads. Since it’s a book I really liked, and whose next installments I definitely plan on reading, I now find it appropriate to leave my review here as well.

I’m no fan of ‘regular’ zombie flicks or stories. If it’s only about gore and killing zombies, it usually doesn’t keep my interest up for long. I am more entertained already when there is something else in it. In this book, I found something that I hadn’t thought of at first, but loved reading about: the analysis of how society would go on. How it would get organized. Security matters. Limiting gatherings. Making sure you’re not contaminated. The developing role of internet and blogging to spread the ‘real’ news. Politics. How the virus was born and got to spread—no mad scientist, no ugly plan to kill the whole human race: merely an accident, and unfortunate circumstances.

For me, this book was an exercise in world building. It could’ve been boring, as many works of that type are (unfortunately). It wasn’t at all. Not only the depiction of society got me hooked, but I found the main characters really enjoyable. Their strength, their selflessness, the way they go about their business, their relationships—all of those made me feel close to them (so close that while I saw the end approaching for Buffy and George, I couldn’t bear it). The book also has just the right amount of ‘politics’ for me: I am mildly interested in it, but not too much, and I found the balance just right enough for me.

Granted, the story has its flaws. I was a little disappointed at the ‘villain’, for instance. And some information seems more like info-dumping, and could probably have been introduced differently; however, the “blogging approach” makes it somehow quite logical, and it wasn’t jarring in my opinion.

I admit I’m far, very far from having read a lot of “zombie stories”, so maybe my advice would be more qualified if I had more reading experience in that domain. As of now, the book does deserve my personal 5-stars rating. I enjoyed thoroughly, it entertained me for long hours, and all in all, it’s really what I ask from such a novel.