I positively enjoy reading apocalyptic books and make is a bit of my speciality, but this was not my cup of tea.
Before I start reviewing, I like to say that this book had a lot of potential and could go places if they tweaked their profession a bit more straight to the point. I can see the ideas were absolutely fantastic and also pretty interesting. That is why it is still getting two stars from me.
Remind that this is my own personal view on this book and absolutely not meant to bash them in.
If the outbreak was written a bit more clear and if the writers had stick to just following one group of people, it would be a lot less chaotic and more plot driven. Often times I had no idea where it was going and was surprised when we followed three groups stuck in a different position. It was too much to tackle in 100 pages. Maybe if they did one group in each of their books, it would've been a lot easier to follow and a bit more interesting. I felt like I got tiny bits of every group, and it was not enough.
Often times I got extremely confused by the writing of the book and the character placement. I had a hard time following the characters and who was saying what. Next to that, a lot of characters just get killed of and I was wondering why I was meeting the character if they were getting killed in the next page. The characters didn't feel realistic and I was confused wether I was following a 12 year old or a 18 year old. I had no attachment to the characters and they fell a bit dull to me. The plot however didn't strike me as original.
The unrealistic set of events was what bothered me the most reading the book. An outbreak is supposed to be happening fast and be broadcasted on every international platform you could think of. There would be warnings like sirens, people shouting and screaming and over all total mayhem. I was surprised that none of this happened in the books and that the characters, all kids, suddenly were alone and didn't know what was happening. It all went pretty silent. People were scared, but there wasn't panic. It happened too fast, out of nowhere, with no to little information about the virus or the governmental influence and how the world acts on this virus. Seen as this was happening either at someone's home or school, warnings should be there. Even if you are inside a school, you can understand what is happening on the outside. Write what could be in real life. Write what consequences certain actions have and make certain choices difficult like it would be in real life. How do you treat someone that has a wound? Search up the details and write it down. Make it rememberable.
Now this is however possible that characters don't know what's going on until later, but in this book it all felt very rushed which made it unrealistic. Take the time to set out the event. Make someone very sick and follow what's happening, but don't rush it. Let the characters actually learn instead of throwing themselves into it. Because realistically, we would sit back and take a moment to endure what's going on before we take action. Think about the human fight, flight and freeze effect which was vaguely described in chapter two, but didn't come back in the book.
The other thing I was really confused about were the zombies. In the first chapter they were fast, quick and smart. In the next they were so slow that they almost couldn't stand upward? I had no idea what they looked like as it was a very fast mention. It didn't stick with me, and I hoped that the zombies would be a little more original.
Having said that all, I hope the writers take time to scroll through their feedback and make their writing a bit more accessible. If they do, I'm sure that their next books will be a lot more easy to read.