Reviews with content warning for Grief - The Drift

Hype is often for good reason!
I had serious FOMO once I started seeing all the fantastic reviews of CJ Tudor's The Drift all around these parts.
Take a bit of The Walking Dead, Alive, and even if current-day goings-on had swerved in another direction, and you've got this novel. (Though it's none of these plot points specifically.)
Chapters alternate between Hannah in a full overturned charter bus in the snow, Meg stranded with strangers in a cable car, and Carter in a mountain chalet known as the Retreat.
Ominous enough for you?
Things get a little nasty at times, as apocalypses (apocalii?) are wont to do. There's action! Twists!
I loved this read. Perfect for cold snap weather reading. Recommended!

Content Warnings

melitta's review against another edition

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adventurous dark tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Content Warnings

chymerra's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

When I first read the synopsis for The Drift, I was initially put off by it. Why? For one, I am suffering from post-Covid burnout. That means I am actively not reading books with pandemic themes running through them. But something about this blurb made me take a second look at it, and that second look made me want to read it. Forget about the pandemic theme; I was genuinely interested in the scenarios and characters portrayed in the blurb. I am glad I did because this turned into a great horror book after a rocky (somewhat confusing) beginning.

There are trigger warnings in The Drift. They are gore, death, blood, body horror, detailed injury, gun violence, violence, murder, child death, suicidal thoughts, medical content, medical trauma, car accident, animal death, rape, suicide, terminal illness, torture, grief, abandonment, pregnancy, addiction, and body shaming. If any of these triggers you, I recommend not reading this book.

The Drift is a fast-paced book set in modern-day and future England. The plotline for The Drift could have been clearer to follow at first. Not going to lie to you all, but I had an issue following the timelines (there are three different ones) and the main characters. But the author does eventually tie them all together, but until then, it isn’t evident.

Getting back on topic, The Drift follows three people – Hannah, Meg, and Carter. Hannah is a student at a prestigious academy who is being evacuated to a place called The Retreat with several other students. On the way there, there is an accident, and everyone on board is killed except for Hannah and five other students. Desperate to escape, Hannah realizes that the virus that has killed half the population and keeps mutating is present in one of the dead. But there are more significant problems, such as a blizzard burying the bus, wolves, and several people on the bus hiding explosive secrets. Will Hannah and the other survivors make it out?

Fast forward ten years later, and the pandemic is still going strong. Meg, a former detective, is woken up and finds herself stuck in a cable car with other strangers while a snowstorm rages outside. When it becomes clear that no one is coming, the group of people starts turning on each other, with tensions ending in murder. Who is killing the other people in the cable car, and why? Will help come, or will Meg have to do the impossible swing on the cable car line to get to safety, which is 200 meters away? And what will happen to Meg once she is at the cable car station?

Fast forward around 2-3 years later, and everything has stayed the same. Carter is part of the science team who is turning out vaccines desperately to stem the pandemic’s spread. But his life at The Retreat is falling apart. Their generator is failing, the infected are closing in on the chalet, and the man who gives them supplies is suddenly wanting more. So, when various crew members are murdered or missing, Carter is on edge. See, Carter has an ulterior motive for being at The Retreat, and this motive, along with everything else, might get him killed. Why is Carter there? Who is he looking for? And, more importantly, will he survive the fallout?

The characters in The Drift were well-written. What I liked the most about them is that they were written to be morally gray characters. Take Carter, for instance. He did awful things to get where he was. But he wasn’t a bad person. He was doing what he had to do to get by in a society devastated by a pandemic that didn’t have a cure.

Hannah— I liked her the most out of the three main characters. In her parts of the book, she brought a clinical, almost detached view of what was happening. She learned to do it after her mother died and relied on it to process everything. She quickly discovered certain things on the bus and was instrumental in helping when things started to go sideways. And it was that reason why I was so mad with how the author ended her storyline.
Meg—She had the most heartbreaking storyline of the three characters. She was the most emotional out of the three because of what she went through. But I liked that she also thought like a cop. She knew something was up with the other people in the car. The scenes where she escaped the car were harrowing, and I didn’t think she would make it during parts of her escape. I disagreed with how her storyline ended, but I got why the author wrote it the way she did.
Carter—I didn’t understand why he was included until halfway through the storyline. Then a lightbulb clicked on in my head. It made sense why he had such extreme frost bit to his face. I also liked how he followed his gut about who was killing the other people at The Retreat.

I mentioned at the beginning of this review that I wasn’t a fan of how the author wrote the timelines. She jumbled them all together, and we had to figure out where in the 12 years this book covers that it took place. It wasn’t obvious. But, a little more than halfway through the book, the author starts tying all three of the storylines together, and by the end, everything makes sense.

The storyline with Hannah, the bus crash, and everything else were well written. I felt awful for Hannah. Not only did she discover something horrible, but she had to do something terrible to save a life. I also felt her trust in a specific person was misplaced. As I mentioned in her section, I wasn’t happy with how her storyline ended.

The storyline with Meg, the cable car, the other passengers, and what happens after is interesting. I say interesting because of what the author reveals. Keep that in mind while you’re reading the book. How the author portrayed that storyline was interesting. There was a mystery that should have been super easy to solve but wasn’t. The breakout scene of this storyline was Meg’s escape while traveling the cable car lines. It was perilous. Again, I wasn’t happy with how Meg’s storyline ended, but I understood why it ended that way. It was something she wanted more than anything in the world, and while it broke my heart, it made me so happy for her.

The storyline with Carter, The Retreat, and the murders was interesting. I’m not going to get much into this storyline because there are major spoilers. But several things surprised me while reading it. Such as the murderer. I thought I knew who it was, and that was wrong. I also liked how the author brought elements from the previous storylines into this one. Again, I was taken by surprise at certain things revealed. Like the other two storylines, I wasn’t thrilled with how Carter’s ended. But it did make sense, and it explained a particular scene.

The Drift fits one hundred percent into the horror genre. The author did a fantastic job of creating a world ravaged by a pandemic similar to Covid. I had no issue picturing what happened in this book happening in real life. There is also a mystery angle to this book that the author did a fantastic job with. I usually can figure things out reasonably early, and I couldn’t in this book.

There are no happy endings in The Drift. I was surprised by who was featured at the very end. What that person did was surprising. All I could think was that this person had a death wish. It left me sad because of everything that had led up to that small chapter.

I would recommend The Drift to anyone over 21. There are language, violence, and non-consensual sexual situations. Also, see my trigger warnings.

Many thanks to Random House Publishing Group – Ballantine, Ballantine Books, NetGalley, and C.J. Tudor for allowing me to read and review The Drift. All opinions stated in this review are mine.

Content Warnings

snacklerackle's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Content Warnings

ericarobyn's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional funny mysterious sad tense fast-paced

5.0

The Drift by C.J. Tudor is an intense, claustrophobia-inducing tale set in a post-apocalyptic world that will chill you deeply.

Content Warnings:
Body horror, car accident, death, grief, suicide, gun violence, & more.

Hannah has awoken to find herself in a real-world nightmare; the bus that she was on has crashed and many of the students are dead, or dying. They can’t get out and they’re running out of heat inside the bus.

Like Hannah, Meg also awakens to a similar nightmare. She has found herself in a cable car that isn’t moving. Her and the group she finds herself in have no recollection of getting there and not only is the temperature dropping, one of them is also already dead.

Carter is a young man that has already met tragedy that left him missing parts of his face. But life isn’t done throwing him curveballs just yet.

In each storyline, it’s not just the things lurking outside the walls of their current prisons that are a danger. There are things sharing their small spaces that are equally deadly.

Organized by moving in and out of these three perspectives, readers will find that this book is absolutely impossible to put down! Each storyline is so captivating, you’ll need to know what happens next. The more you read, the more invested you will be in each of the characters. I personally loved them all equally as they were all perfect survivors. Each of them had been through horrible things, but that didn’t make them give up when faced with even more horror. Instead, it made them stronger.

I really enjoyed that when the story begins, readers get one singular page that really sets the tone for the book. This is by far C.J.’s darkest novel yet and of course, I absolutely loved it. And right along with that darkness, there is also plenty of gut-punch realism and emotion that steers us quickly into heartbreak-horror territory.

Per usual, the author just blew me away with her writing style! I love that in one sentence, I can be terrified, while in the next, I’m laughing! But then not long after, I could be fighting back tears. You truly never know what you’re going to get with C.J.’s work, but it’s always a blast to find out!

My Favorite Passages from The Drift

Then the man turned, and Carter understood why he had been staggering around so blindly. He was blind. One eyeball had spilled from its socket and was stuck, frozen, to his cheek. The other was gone completely, along with half of his face. Eaten away, leaving nothing but gristle and bone.

When you loved someone, you tried to hold on to them because letting go meant admitting you would never hold them again. Few of us were prepared for that. So, we clung on, even when Death’s bony grasp would have been kinder.

“Sometimes life gives us lemons. Sometimes diarrhea.”

When the world started to end, not with a whimper or a bang but with a slow, whistling sigh, Meg didn’t care. She had watched the news from a numb cocoon of grief and medication. As the infections spread and society crumbled, at first slowly and then like a cliff edge giving way and falling to the sea, she had barely raised an eyebrow. Her world had already been destroyed. Everyone else was just catching up.

Not all knowledge was good. And even the stuff that was good didn’t always fall into the right hands. Give the wrong idiot a shitload of knowledge and that was when the world imploded.

An apocalypse doesn’t happen because of evil men, zombies or even a virus. It happens because of ordinary people. Because somewhere along the way we lost society, lost cohesion. We forgot to try to see the other side. Instead, we all bunkered down harder in our trenches, refusing to be moved, lobbing missiles at those who dared to challenge our myopic view. No good guys or bad guys. Just a bunch of scared motherfuckers trying to find their way home.

My Final Thoughts on The Drift

These storylines entwine so perfectly into one. I had an absolute blast with each perspective and had various moments of shock when I started putting puzzle pieces together.

Not only was this book truly scary, it had wonderful mystery and thriller elements mixed right in! If you enjoy novels that don’t hold back from laying the terror on, but also keep you totally captivated while making you emotional, then this is a perfect book for you!

While recording Dead Headspace, Pat asked me what my favorite book of C.J.’s is. And while The Chalk Man will forever hold a special place for me, I have to say that The Drift is my favorite! I loved hearing that this was a bit of an experiment and creative project for C.J. I gotta say, I hope to see more in this vein from the author!

Content Warnings

dogearedbooks's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

Content Warnings

shelfofunread's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

Spend enough time in crime/thriller forums and blogger groups and it probably won’t be long until the name C. J. Tudor crops up. Tudor has been a fan favourite ever since the publication of her debut novel, The Chalk Man, with a reputation for edge-of-your-seat rollercoaster plotting and ‘you-won’t-see-it-coming’ twists. Her work has been on my ‘To Read’ list for a while so I was thrilled to get the opportunity to read her latest novel, The Drift, in advance of publication.

Like Tudor’s previous books, The Drift provides plenty of twists and turns. Unlike previous books, however, Tudor has amped up the chills – both literally and metaphorically – for this tale of three groups of snowbound survivors, set in a near-future dystopia. Alternating between boarding school student Hannah, trapped onboard a crashed coach; former police officer Meg, stuck onboard a precariously-perched cable car with a group of strangers and a dead body; and Carter, who calls an isolated chalet known only as The Retreat home, The Drift cleverly weaves together three separate locked-room mysteries, before adding in a dash of apocalyptic terror in the form of deadly virus and the terrifying entities known only as ‘The Whistlers’.

Fans of Tudor’s previous works might be slightly taken aback by the novel’s drift into horror, although those who have encountered her short story collection, A Sliver of Darkness, may be more prepared for the tonal shift. Having not read her previous novels, I can’t comment on how much tonal difference there is between The Drift and Tudor’s usual fare. Personally, however, I think the novel has a foot in both the ‘thriller’ and ‘horror’ camps, with the horror gaining the edge as the novel progresses.

That isn’t to say that there aren’t thrills here. Indeed, unravelling the connections between Hannah, Meg, and Carter is a brilliantly twisty adventure (and when the penny drops as to what does link the three, I promise that your jaw will hit the floor!). But as the backdrop to the novel becomes more apparent – and it becomes clear what these three survivors are really up against – there’s a definite shift into apocalyptic dystopian territory and the horror that you would expect to be associated with that.

In terms of how that reads on the page, I don’t think there’s anything that will trouble anyone but the most squeamish of readers. There’s a bit of gore but no more than you get in the average serial killer thriller. Indeed, most of the ‘horror’ comes from the increasing knowledge of the situation the characters find themselves in and from Tudor’s careful management of atmosphere and tension. Combining several nail-biting moments with deliciously slow-burn reveals and some explosive set-pieces, The Drift definitely delivers the ‘edge-of-your-seat’ factor, whilst providing more than a few ‘don’t-read-with-the-lights-off’ moments too!

Given that the novel features three separate storylines, there are a lot of characters to wrap your head around in The Drift and this was, for me, the novel’s weakest point. Whilst each of the central characters – Hannah, Meg, and Carter – are well-drawn and interesting, the supporting cast felt indistinct. In many cases this wasn’t an issue as those characters weren’t especially vital to the plot and (mild spoiler alert) a lot of them end up adding to the book’s fairly hefty body count. However, in one particular instance, I think we’re very much supposed to care – and to understand why a particular character cares – about someone that, personally, I felt I barely got to know.

That minor niggle aside, however, I thoroughly enjoyed The Drift. It’s an unusual blend of horror and thriller but, to my surprise, it works very well and I’m in awe of how Tudor managed to weave together the seemingly disparate strands of the narrative (as I said above, jaw-dropping pretty much covers the moment of revelation about the connection between the three protagonists) without falling down a plot hole or giving the game away before the end! Fans of Tudor’s previous novels might be slightly surprised at the direction The Drift takes but, with its spine-chilling thrills and rollercoaster plotting, it’s sure to delight as much as previous novels. I’ll definitely be going back to read some of her previous work on the basis of this book – and will be eagerly awaiting whatever comes next!

NB: My thanks go to the publisher and to @JenLovesReading for providing a copy of the book in return for an honest and unbiased review.

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