Thank you to NetGalley and Pan Macmillan for providing me with a copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.
Goodreads Synopsis
It's been eighteen months since the Raxter School for Girls was put under quarantine. Since the Tox hit and pulled Hetty's life out from under her.
It started slow. First the teachers died one by one. Then it began to infect the students, turning their bodies strange and foreign. Now, cut off from the rest of the world and left to fend for themselves on their island home, the girls don't dare wander outside the school's fence, where the Tox has made the woods wild and dangerous. They wait for the cure they were promised as the Tox seeps into everything.
But when Byatt goes missing, Hetty will do anything to find her, even if it means breaking quarantine and braving the horrors that lie beyond the fence. And when she does, Hetty learns that there's more to their story, to their life at Raxter, than she could have ever thought true.
Review
I saw this book a lot when it first came out and was very much on the fence on whether this book would be for me or not.
I am so glad that I decided to take the plunge and request this book when it came up on NetGalley.
These characters are unapologetically human with their own complex emotions but throughout it all there is a strong sense of friendship and comradery between all the girls who are trapped on this island. These girls have had to adapt to their situation and learn how to defend themselves. I love a good survival book and this one hit the nail on the head.
Rory Power has an amazing talent of creating this unique atmosphere with extremely graphic horror scenes that I was not expecting but loved nonetheless. I found Power’s writing style captivating and I really struggled to put this book down!
The reason this book didn’t get 5 stars is because I really didn’t like the way it ended. I felt like it left a lot of unanswered questions and was a little bit slow at the start. I would have liked to have more of an introduction to the tox and how it they all dealt with the first symptoms.
Overall, this was an enjoyable, gritty read which I recommend to those who enjoy survival stories with friendship at its forefront. I’m really looking forward to seeing what Rory Power writes next!
Rating: 4/5 stars