This book came out in 2014 but I only got around to reading it last month. I don’t know why I waited so long. It was really one of the best books I’ve read all year. The Girl With All The Gifts is a post-apocalyptic zombie-ish novel. (Which begs the question, can it even be a post-
Despite the fact that I am not actually a huge zombie fan, I couldn’t put this novel down.
Something about the protagonist Melanie in The Girl With All The Gifts is so striking. I think it’s the sensitivity with which the author writes that this young girl’s feelings for her teacher, Miss Justineau. Also, the mystery of these children who are zombies but not zombies. How is it even possible that they exist? Are they the secret to a cure for the pathogen that has infected the rest of “the
Additionally, as a writer I could certainly appreciate the amazing story arcs of each of the four people in the final traveling party. So every single one of them had a slightly different agenda, especially the mad scientist villain Dr. Caldwell. It was a real page-turner. And as you would expect there was a twist at the end. I’m probably not giving away any spoilers which is the plus about being late to the party. One of the things I appreciated about this novel is that it didn’t try to cure the disease. The ending of the novel is that there is no immunity, no vaccine and no conceivable cure.
I look forward to reading The Boy on the Bridge, published later but is actually set about 20 years earlier as a prequel.
What brought me to this novel (aside from the fact that everyone in the known universe had apparently already read this book in the last five years) was a podcast interview with the author, Mike Carey here. If you can’t get that link to play, there is another interview with him (even longer!) here.
