2016 Book #1: The 5th Wave

This is what happens when I see a pretty disaster pr0n movie trailer and think I’ll like the book because of it. Okay, it’s not terrible: it’s run-of-the-mill post-apocalyptic YA. You know what to expect. In my defense, I didn’t know it was YA until I picked it up at the library and saw the YA taped to the spine. I cringed a little, then checked it out anyway.

I’m not saying that I don’t like any YA (how many times have I said this after I read one I didn’t like?) – I just usually don’t seek them out because they’re even more of a mixed bag than the adult books I read, and my reading time and attention span are pretty limited at the moment.

So. The 5th Wave. A giant mothership full of aliens has just shown up in the air above Earth. They sit around for a while, then use an EMP to knock out electronics. There goes communication, electricity, etc. The humans take a while to catch on, but they figure out pretty quickly that the aliens’ intentions can’t be good. Things get worse and worse (I won’t ruin the surprise of the waves for you), and sixteen-year-old Cassie finds herself on her own with a mission to rescue her kid brother. There’s lots of disaster and lots of alien mischief and lots of everything else you’d expect. And don’t forget an awkward teenage love triangle.

Which is the part of this novel that really annoyed me. Soooo you’re probably going to die pretty soon, but you have to stop everything to have the awkward teenage moment. Because if something like this was really happening, battle-hardened teenagers would automatically resort to their instincts, like dogs stopping everything to circle around a few times before they poop. Ugh.

Annoyances aside, The 5th Wave was packed full of the disaster I expected – and even more death and horror. Things could have been worse. Oh, and if you’re looking for some kind of closure, note that this is the first book in a trilogy: there is no closure. That said, I don’t think I’m interested enough to read the best of them, and I just heard that the second isn’t even as good as the first. We’ll see. It might happen.

Oh, and here’s the trailer that got me into this trouble:

Happy 2016! On to greener pastures.

Featured image credit: Sea Turtle