Possibly the most gripping book I’ve read in a long time. If you are looking a fast paced, edge of your seat, thrilling ride, that never lets up, then this one is for you. I found myself with clenched teeth and sweating while listening to this novel. I was a nervous wreck listening to this one but it was so quick.

The premise seems simple enough. A mother and her son are enjoying the zoo on a lovely afternoon when their world is completely changed in a heartbeat. As a mother myself, I found this story completely relatable and found myself wondering if I would make the same choices. A mother trying to protect her son from the bad guys and the wild animals, made for an angst filled story. It was completely relatable but I was also feeling fragile as I was so nervous wondering how this was all going to turn out for them.

No spoilers but the reason this is not 5 stars for me is because the ending left quite a bit to be desired. I needed a lot more closure than I got. What happened to the other threads of story? Even as I’m listening to the last minute of the story, I’m shaking my head at my phone almost screaming “don’t do this to me”-as if the story cared what I thought. Had there been a tighter bow on the ending this would have been a full 5 Star for me.

Overall excellent premise, wonderful writing, and I can’t stress enough how much I felt like I was in this mother’s shoes the entire story. Fantastic and a definite read.

This is a novel full of triggers so please bear that in mind when making the choice to read this.

I suggested that my public library buy this one. And it has been checked out ever since.

Joan and her four-year-old son were wrapping up a nice day at the zoo when she hears the pops. She isn't sure what they are but as they near the exit it becomes clear - there's a shooter inside the zoo. Terrified but determined to protect her son, Joan runs, searching out a spot that will keep them safe and hidden until the authorities can arrive. But as the hours go by, Joan is faced time and again with decisions that could put them both at risk. Can they outwit the killers and survive the night?

This latest from Gin Phillips is actually my introduction to the author. And it's an interesting read in that it forces the reader to think about what they would do in Joan's situation.

I'm not even sure how to review the book, to be honest. Being faced with the question of what you'd do in Joan's situation hits a little too close to home these days. And I've faced my own, albeit not particularly dangerous, scenario where my reaction was definitely not what I anticipated. I know everyone imagines how they'd react. The zombie apocalypse is one of my own imaginary scenarios (and let's face it, I'm not cut out for physical or seriously stressful situations!). But as a criminal justice major in particular I had thought that I could maintain a cool head in certain situations I've been proven not to be able to. So yeah, faced with the question of what I'd do personally in Joan's situation makes me uncomfortable.

Obviously not to the point of avoiding a book about it, though. This book was intense and, in the end, quite thought provoking.

So Joan and her son are visiting the zoo, hidden away in a little shady area while he plays with his action figures. A quiet afternoon spent together and a way to keep the toddler busy and amused. But closing time is coming soon and they start to head out when the first shots happen. Joan sees bodies, she sees people running, and she takes off, seeking shelter in hopes they can evade the killer.

We get snippets of a few other characters' stories - a retired teacher and a teenager working at the zoo as well as one of the shooters - but Joan is the main focus of the story. And there wouldn't be much of a story if they found a hiding spot and stayed still until the end. So you can imagine, at least vaguely, how the story plays out. It's an emotional roller coaster and an extremely fast-paced read that took me one sitting to get through.

All of that said, I do have to admit that Joan makes a few godawful decisions! Like bafflingly bad decisions! It was akin to watching a horror movie and screaming at the heroine for going up the stairs to investigate the strange noise...

All told, this is a super readable and dark story. Fair warning!

I would rate this book 3.5 out of 5 stars.

I really enjoyed this book.

My favourite thing about this book was probably the bond shown between Joan and her son Lincoln. The author did really well with showing the reader how much this mother loved her son and would do anything necessary to protect him.

I enjoyed the writing and found the story very engrossing.

I did have a few issues with the story, I didn't enjoy the perspective changes, to me they felt very unnecessary. There were also a few parts of that story that I didn't really buy into. My main problem with the story, however, was just the ending. For me it was way too ambiguous.

Overall an enjoyable engrossing thriller.

While this book started as an intense read, I felt it was a bit dragged out. As a mother I couldn't even imagine having to deal with a situation that terrifying. It was a good plot, I just felt it wasn't steady. I was often confused with the way the author jumped back and forth with present time and with things that happened in Joan's life.

Be prepared to hold your breath from start to finish! Incredibly engaging and terrifying at the same time.

This book is not what I thought it was going to be...so I was pleasantly surprised by the twists and turns and ending. It wasn't intense or a page turner, but sometimes you need a book you look forward to picking up again but don't feel compelled to have to read in one sitting.

Joan and her young son are just about to leave the zoo near closing time, when they stumble upon a scene with dead bodies and see a far-away man with a gun. In Fierce Kingdom by Gin Phillips, we live through the next three hours spent inside the zoo, told primarily from Joan's point of view, as she tries to protect herself and her young son from the shooter.

Fierce Kingdom is one intense ride! As you read, your stress level will ride and push you to continue on until the end. This is definitely a genre that I think many appeal to many reads, but may also be a bit of a trigger warning (extreme gun violence) for many. Gin Phillips did an amazing job of slowly building suspense so that you feel like you are watching this unfold in real time.

I think the zoo setting was a clever one, as we have all been to large zoos and thus she doesn't have to spend a ton of time world-building; we can immediately picture where the characters are and what problems this may cause.

Since I am not a mother, it was hard for me to relate to Joan's character while I was reading. Yes, I (somewhat) understand the motherly attachment and devotion, but having no child of my own, it makes it somewhat difficult to relate to when reading. In fact, it was somewhat difficult for me to relate to any of the characters in the novel. I believe Joan's character is portrayed as a working mother, but she has time to take her child to the zoo or a museum after school EVERY day - this didn't seem very realistic with how busy families with two working parents are. There were just a few character development items that didn't make me mesh as well with this novel.

Without giving any spoilers, another issue I had was with the teacher-student dynamic. For some reason, I just didn't find this interaction to be very realistic. I work in a school in an area that has primarily low SES enrollment, but the teacher's views on her students growing up just became a bit defeatist or nihilistic to me.

Overall, Fierce Kingdom was a well-written and highly suspenseful novel. I definitely understand the draw that many readers felt to this one - especially mothers of young boys. Personally, this book wasn't a hit, but I do appreciate Gin Phillips' writing and would definitely check out her future publications.

I received a free e-copy of this book from Netgalley in return for an honest review. I also own a hardcover copy from Book of the Month. All opinions expressed above are my own.

I had really high hopes for this one, the synopsis got me hooked from the start. I could feel the tension building from the beginning of the book, I really feared for Joan and Lincoln. However, as the story progressed, I felt that Joan made some excessively poor decisions which couldn't just be chalked up to her fear overtaking her logic. I felt the best part of the book was actually when her and Lincoln were hiding, the story progressed more fluidly there as she just thought through her options and what had led them to the conversations her and her son were having. I also felt the end was a cop-out, that left me unsatisfied with the whole experience. Up until then, it was a solid 3 star thriller for me but the ending just felt lackluster. There were so many places that this could have gone and I felt the author made things more complicated in the pursuit of making a memorable thriller. However, the setting and narrative choice alone would have made it memorable and enjoyable alone.

Anxiety inducing, edge of your seat reading. Told over the course of 3 hours this book was hard to read, but hard to put down. The lengths a mother will go to protect her son is eye opening and makes you think what you would do yourself in this situation!

Fierce Kingdom is a taut, suspenseful novel that provides a compelling look at the lengths we will go to to protect the ones we love. The novel unfolds in almost real time, as Joan fights to save her son from unknown gunmen inside the zoo. The book is harsh and brutal at times, but the reader will be unable to put it down.

taut thriller with some really scary moments. Felt like it could’ve gone further into some of the themes and missed a few opportunities to push the threat level, but overall glad I read it

To begin, this book preyed on one of my deepest fears: being in a mass shooting situation.  It also touched on another deep emotion: the need to keep my children safe.  Because of those two things, I really wanted to read this novel.  However, it didn't take me long to lose patience with it.

First of all, the pacing annoyed me.  What should have been an edge-of-my seat thriller was instead a protracted, stream-of-consciousness rambling in which nothing much happens.  We hear gunshots.  We see a body.  Joan, the mother, is panicked.  Then...nothing.  Throughout the first three-quarters of the book, Joan's thoughts focus on her child.  Over and over again, we're told that he's smart, precocious and amazing.  He also makes up endless stories that drag on forever.

Readers also gets a glimpse into Joan's private life which is typical of a young mother.  There's nothing shocking or revelatory.  Certainly nothing that adds to the drama.  The other characters, even the bad guys, are equally dull.

It isn't until the last 20% or so that the book begins to move.  When it, finally, does pick up the pace, it becomes much more interesting.  In fact, I couldn't put it down at that point.  If the rest of the book had been similarly written, I would have been glued to my seat the entire time.

I think the biggest reason I didn't like this book was because I'd expected it to be a lot better.  There was so much wasted opportunity.  For example, the entire novel takes place in a zoo.  Why not have more of the animals roaming free?  That also would have been an excellent way to compare the laws of the jungle to the dangerous situation with the shooters.  However, that wasn't mentioned once.

Fierce Kingdom was simply not the book I'd hoped it would be.

An excellent thriller centering around the primal bond between mother and son.

This book wasn't what I expected, but I didn't end up disliking it. It was a very, very quick read and at times eerie. It delved into discussions on motherhood, youth, and nightmares. Trigger warning: dead animals.

INTENSE.

I just finished reading Fierce Kingdom and I'm still adrenaline pumping with it.

the book focuses on a 40 year old mom with a precocious 4 year old son named Lincoln. they've gone to the local zoo for the afternoon after his pre-K and are just enjoying the day when it turns horrifying and brutal with an active shooter situation inside the zoo.

insane amounts of tense hiding, running and moral ambiguities later, I've come out the other side with renewed interest in cataloging all the escape routes and hiding places in all my local haunts. looking at you, Safeway.

I texted my best friend in the middle as she has a 2 year old and an annual pass to our local zoo, despairing at how I KNOW she has zero sense of direction or ingrained knowledge of the zoo layout. let alone the ability to run 6 miles or do 20 cartwheels like the book's over-exercised heroine. seriously, I'm not even 40 and am already pretty sure I'll need knee surgery within the next 5 years. Joan of the book is a fucking badass.

I strongly recommend this book to those looking for a succinct thrill ride as it never let up and is an amazing page turner.

thank you to the publisher via Netgalley for the free advance reader copy.

It is almost closing time at the zoo as mother Joan enjoys the day with her four-year son Lincoln. But as they head towards the exit, a series of gunshots ring out. Joan and Lincoln hide from the unknown gunmen among the various exhibits. There are challenges for Joan who has to try and keep Lincoln quiet and occupied over the next three hours until the siege is over.

The book has an interesting premise but there were slow passages in the book and it was sometimes hard to understand some of Joan's actions. The motivations of the gunmen also seemed weak, and the ending was disappointing.

I received an eARC via Netgalley and Penguin Group with no requirements for a review. I voluntarily read this book and provided this review.

Not a bad story, although not as exciting as I thought it would be from the blurb. The concept is fantastic and kept me reading.
Perhaps it was a function of the digital review copy, but there seemed to be no indication as to when there was a shift in narrator. So it often took a moment, which took me out of the story, to regroup and figure out who was telling the story.
I also found the "good mother" narrative a little overwhelming. Yes, a parent's first instinct is almost always going to be to protect their child, but she could have had interests beyond Lincoln and still been a great mother. Maybe in this situation that is all one would think of, but to the point...I remember Lincoln's name, but not hers.

This review is much harder to write then expected because I feel like this book had so much potential but it just didn't quite reach it. First off, the premise was so intriguing and refreshing, the minute I read the synopsis, I was dying to read this. That being said, it wasn't really used. Pitched as a thriller, which aside from some thriller-y parts was far more a drama and honestly, that was disappointing.

The writing, except for some useless description which had no obvious purpose to it, was generally good. However, at times, there was a lot of telling and not enough showing which bothered me. The characterisation was good in terms of Joan and Lincoln being fully fleshed out characters, however, the secondary characters like Kailynn and retired Margaret Powell, both fellow captives, were although given a voice that piqued my interest but their contribution to the plot was always cut short by the author's continual need to return the focus on Joan and Lincoln. At times, I really wished that the author should have tried a bit to make this story more than exploring just what a mother can do for her child. Robby also had a limited perspective and that was really annoying because his reasons for doing what he did besides the obvious (he's a psychopath) would have been an interesting addition to the plot as a whole.

The novel did elaborate on how our natural helping behavior changes when in an emergency situation and how then we can only think of us and our loved ones, instead of everyone around us - the scenes with the baby were heartbreaking but very realistic and you could feel the conflicting emotions of Joan. The relationship between Joan and Lincoln was also something that grasped my attention, showed how as the books states, "Parenting can be such a system of checks and balances -parenting - of projections and guesswork and cost-benefit ratios." One particular instance that stuck with me when Joan was going through an internal monologue and mentioned how everyone has morbid thoughts but they never say them out loud - I really liked those pages.

However, I felt like there were too many plot holes and some really unrealistic things which completely left me baffled and screaming "WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT? STUPID!!" but then again it can be argued that people do amazingly stupid things when in a situation which generates so much panic and fear.

Overall, don't really regret reading this but as the 2 star rating states it was just okay.

Joan and her son, Lincoln, are having a casual afternoon at the zoo, when, suddenly, everything is turned upside down. Gunshots are fired, and Joan and Lincoln find themselves retreating further into the zoo in an effort to keep themselves alive. We follow them as the minutes tick by, waiting to see what happens. I enjoyed this book, but share a grip that I saw in many other reviews - the ending seemed very abrupt, without any sense of closure. I was hoping for an epilogue, but alas I was disappointed. Lincoln was a great character, and definitely brought out the psychologist in me :) Is it crazy that I would love to read another story focusing on the aftermath of the shooting??