Reviews with content warning for Animal death - Die Berufene

A very interesting take on a much used genre. Compelling characters, even with all their flaws, and a plot that drives you to keep reading.

Finished it in 3 days and it feels like a story that will stick with me.

A brilliant take on the old zombie story, with what seems like a more thoroughly, scientifically thought out cause. It's also rather refreshing to read a book where, in the end, the "bad guys" win. Although in this case it's more of a symbiotic evolution of the species'.

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jelleep's review against another edition

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dark sad tense medium-paced

2.5

men really write books and think they did something. like i didn’t hate this, it’s not a bad story, but it’s told the way a man would tell it

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shieldbearer's review against another edition

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dark emotional sad medium-paced

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

4.0

An extremely strong showing from Mike Carey, who I know from his work on X-Men. The characterizations were very well done for the most part- most of them are quite layered. The worldbuilding was strong, and the reviewers asking questions about motivations and "evolution" clearly didn't pay attention because those things were explained in the text.

Ultimately, a few small things did knock this book down by a star for me. For one, I would have

at least switched the fates of Parks and Gallagher, though I also think you could make an argument for Gallagher's survival being more interesting than his death given the detailed backstory and internal conflict he's given. His interaction with the status quo at the end of the story would have been extremely interesting IMO

Part of this may be because I didn't particularly care for Parks, but this is also because Parks doesn't really have anything interesting going on.

For another, I feel as though

the Hungry children were too easy to corral at the end.

The questions of the long-term viability of Melanie's plan didn't bother me because that's not the point of the story.

Finally, and most glaring IMO,

I feel like Sparks would have encoutnered pregnant hungries if they are able to sexually reproduce. I just have a hard time believing this aspect without a little extra narrative support - especially given how often fatal pregnancy is, and how the fungus wrecks so much of the body and shuts down a lot of its systems. Even mentioning a pregnant hungry in the crowd would have helped. I also can't say I'm a fan of the whole "sex is a human instinct" theme. I expected there to be adult hungries like Melanie that showed up later, if they specified that only the kids were the unique ones earlier I somehow missed it.

Either way, I definitely recommend this even if I feel some elements could have been treated with a bit more care- which is about what I would say about his work on the X-Men, as well.

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