After the Ending by Lindsey Fairleigh & Lindsey Pogue

After The Ending

By:

Lindsey Fairleigh

Lindsey Pogue

Amazon Summery:

The Virus spread. Billions died. The Ending began. We may have survived the apocalypse, but the Virus changed us.

When people started getting sick, "they" thought it was just the flu. My roommate, my boyfriend, my family...they're all gone now. I got sick too. I should have died with them--with the rest of the world--but I didn't. I thought witnessing the human population almost disappear off the face of the earth was the craziest thing I'd ever experience. I was so wrong. My name is Dani O'Connor, I'm twenty-six-years-old, and I survived The Ending.

The Virus changed everything. The world I knew is gone, and life is backwards. We've all had to start over. I've been stripped of my home, my dreams...all that is me. I'm someone else now--broken and changed. Other survivors' memories and emotions haunt me. They invade my mind until I can no longer separate them from my own. I won't let them consume me. I can't. My name is Zoe Cartwright, I'm twenty-six-years-old, and I survived The Ending.

We've been inseparable for most of our lives, and now our friendship is all we have left. The aftermath of the Virus has stranded us on opposite sides of the United States. Trusting strangers, making sacrifices, killing--we'll do anything to reach one another. Fear and pain may be unavoidable, but we're strong...we're survivors. But to continue surviving in this unfamiliar world plagued by Crazies and strange new abilities, we have to adapt. We have to evolve. 

And more than anything, we have to find each other.

My Review:

After The Ending tells the story of two best friends on opposite sides of the country and their struggles to get to each other after most of the population dies from a flu-like virus. 

I LOVED this book!!  What’s funny is it dragged me in despite having two things that I have really started to dislike in novels.

The story is told from two different first person POVs. Dani who is stuck on the west coast and Zoe who is stuck back east.  It is told through text messages, emails and their own direct experiences.  First person POV is not my favorite, so obviously this is the first thing that I generally dislike in stories.  But the authors did an amazing job of making the characters relatable. The main characters are interesting and human, without being overbearing or whiney.  I really wanted to see them succeed.  I even fell in love with some of the supporting characters through their descriptions.   

The second thing it had that I really am getting tired of is a cliff hanger ending.  I mean I know a book is the first in a series, but just because it is doesn’t mean the cliffie has to be such a shear drop off, ya know?  *sigh* Here’s the twisted part.  I had gotten so wrapped up in Dani and Zoe’s lives that I just didn’t care. I mean I knew the book was ending, I could see page numbers getting higher and higher, but I had already decided before that that no matter how it ended I was going to get the next book in the series.   No matter who they killed off, or how right or wrong I was in my guesses as to what would happen next, I would still want to read the next installment.  That’s how pulled in the authors had me.

As I said at the beginning I loved this book. The characters were awesome. (Especially the dogs!) The story is so well written it pulled me in from the first page and didn’t let go.  I had laugh out loud moments and parts that brought me to tears. I definitely recommend picking up this book.   

I received an e-copy of this book from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.  All opinions are mine.