Based on the description for this book, I felt like the story was going to be really promising. That being said, I just didn’t connect with it. I finished this book a few weeks ago and forgot to write the review. The book has already started to save for my memory, which is never a good sign. I wasn’t a huge fan of the characters and had a really hard time connecting with them. By the end of the book, I really didn’t care what happened to them. It just felt really boring to me, between the slow pace of the book, and not caring about the characters or the plot.

I received an ARC from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

This book hits all of the points that I find fascinating (and terrifying) about the rapid and long-term effects of climate change. Marlo, the adopted daughter of two people who read the writing on the wall two decades ago, lives in a compound in rural Oregon. Among them in their community are other wealthy people who picked up and left their old jobs, friends, and lives to get ready for the collapse of society, which they expect to happen in their lifetimes. When a stranger shows up at the gates of the community and throws a wrench into Marlo's life, she wonders if it's worth leaving the safety of the community and going back out into the Disaster.

The author used to write long-form journalism, and it shows in the writing; there are many carefully-crafted sentences and lovely descriptions, but I feel that the craft of the writing took precedent over the crafting of the story. It took nearly half the book to get to the inciting incident that gets Marlo's story really going, and by then I almost didn't care anymore. Marlo's everyday routines, relationship with her parents, relationship with the newcomer, all of it felt like we were just being pushed along in the story instead of pulled forward with curiosity. I never felt a burning question about what was going to happen next.

This ended up being a lot more dull and anticlimactic than I would have liked. Which is a shame because the premise is so promising. Debut author though, there's potential

The title itself was rather distracting and the overall story was hard to follow.

Disaster's Children was not what I expected and unfortunately I did not finish the book.

This book had an interesting premise but I just could not get into it. I ended up DNFing after only a few chapters.

This was a fairly predictable story about a dystopian post apocalyptic society. I see a lot of other books in it which left me feeling like maybe I've been here done that before. I still enjoyed it overall.

I was very excited to read this, the premise sounded so interesting, but in the end it turned out to be a bit dull. I loved the world the athor created, but I wish we saw more of it. I didn’t really connect to the characters, the mc especially felt too young.

Thank you for the opportunity to read this book. A full review will be posted on Amazon and Goodreads

This wasn't bad, and expanded on some interesting themes, such as group dynamics in a closed community and parent-(adult) child relationships and expectations. However, I never really felt fully engaged with the plot or characters - it always seemed something was about to happen, but didn't and the genuine points of conflict and drama seemed quite quickly glossed over in favour of the central character's musings. Given the open-ended nature of the ending, I'm wondering if the author is primed for a series? Thanks to NetGalley, the author and publisher (Little A) for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Disaster’s Children is a doomsday story revolving around Marlo, a Chinese American woman, whom after being adopted as a toddler has lived her entire life in an insulated community. Now 25, Marlo feels torn between accepting the role of successor to her parents community they have built, and accepting an active role in the ravaged world outside her gates. A world decimated by climate change, it is known simply as the Disaster. Deeply conflicted, Marlo feels obligated to honor the legacy her family started, but also to give of herself to humanities suffering. Having come to a conclusion that she will leave and join her friends in service to the disaster, a wrench is thrown in her plans when a mysterious stranger shows up. Consumed by unexpected feelings for this new arrival, Marlo wonders if making a life inside the protected community makes more sense than risking life and limb in a forsaken wasteland. This is an eerie tale all the creepier because this could be the path we may walk down if we don’t change our ways. Perhaps the only downside to this story was that I was kinda waiting for the pickup, an oh wow moment, and that never really happened. The pace of the story was steady and consistent, but lacking major, dramatic plot twists. This is a debut novel, and is a competent start. Not sure if this is an ongoing storyline, or if this is a solo effort. It could actually benefit from being a first novel in a series. Thank you to Netgalley for the early copy. Review posted to Goodreads, LibraryThing, and Amazon.

Marlo has spent her entire life on the ranch, insulated from the goings-on in The Disaster of the rest of the world. Isolated from the truth of what’s happening outside of their idyllic ranch, she can’t help but be drawn to leave the safety of the ranch when her best friends, ex-ranchers Alex and Ben, notify her that it’s getting bad, quickly, and offer her an opportunity to fight the good fight, instead of hiding behind the walls o the ranch. Prepared to leave, Marlo’s plans are derailed with the abrupt appearance of Wolf, the first person her age to move onto the ranch since Ben and Alex left. As she grows closer to Wolf, and things get worse out in The Disaster, she has to decide where her loyalties lie.
Sloley takes on a huge task to create the idyllic ranch her characters reside on, while taking truth from the world today. As we plunge towards total ruin, Sloley competency conveys the fears we all face as bacteria becomes antibiotic resistant, weather shifts due to climate change wreck havoc, and resources become depleted. The Ranch seems like the perfect solution, and Sloley has done a wonderful job answering the question of how her world will play out in the case of electricity becoming inaccessible, natural disaster striking, or any myriad of real life threats striking.
I throughly enjoyed Disasters Children, and hope that there’s a follow up novel in the works.

In Disaster’s Children a woman must choose between her own survival and the survival of humanity as the world, as we know it, comes to an end. This was an interesting book to read although apocalypse is not exactly a subject I have thought much about. It was well written and a good vision to what our future could look like. I hope this is not the future waiting for our children. I would like to thank Netgalley, the publisher and the author for providing me with an advance reader copy in exchange for my honest and unbiased opinion of this book.

Ahhh, hello again my dystopian little friend. I do so love an apocalyptic thriller, especially when they use something so realistic as the cause for the proverbial end of days. Talk about hitting onto the zeitgeist - you can't turn on the TV at the minute without hearing more about climate change; its deniers (Trump), its protestors (Thunberg), forest fires, melting ice caps, solar vs wind vs nuclear.....

The world is talking about climate change and so the premise of this book seemed right on the money.

And, in some senses, it was. The characters are great and well fleshed out. There is a sense of impending doom about what is going on outside of the ranch. We are left to question if the news reported into the ranch is in fact true or whether it is being manipulated.

However, this was also its greatest failing. The book focusses almost entirely on the day to day life on the ranch. And actually, for this cast of characters, life hasn't really changed. A lot of the time you'd be hard pressed to know that they are living during 'the disaster.' Instead we focus on the internal politics of the ranch, the weird relationshiops between its in habitants and the strange family dynamics around our protagonist, Marlo.

A few odd things happens, but then are never really explained and so any tension that is built quickly dissapates again. The story builds achingly slowly, to the extent that you never really feel yourself getting wrapped up in it.

If this book actually delivered on its blurb, I would be totally buzzing about it. And actually that's probably the main issue. This isn't really a book about climate change, or the end of the world, or even how people cope in these circumstances. It's more of a family drama; about the things they believe in and the expectations our families puts upon us to conform to their world view. The question is whether their passion and beliefs can make Marlo follow in their footsteps, or whether she forges her own path - and in that sense it's much more of a 'coming of age/discovery' fiction that it is 'dystopia'.


I'm giving this one the benefit of the doubt, as it is beautifully written and although it doesn't live up to its blurb, it has many redeeming qualities.

Long a fan of dystopian, post-apocalyptic fiction, this seemed promising. Unfortunately, I found it boring, with poor character development, and predictable plotting. Only my opinion.

Marlo is twenty-five years old and has been raised on a survivalist ranch in Oregon, cut off from the rest of the world as it crumbles under the effects of climate change, referred to as 'The Disaster'. However the ranch is only populated by the successful and wealthy from similar circles of society that can buy their way in with membership, they purchase supplies off site (so it's not an entirely self-contained ranch, therefore what is the point?) and is inhabited mostly by people over the age of forty, highlighting the problematic scope of keeping such a community active as its population ages.

I'm unsure whether my expectations based on the description of the book and the narrative I had envisioned in my head were set too high; my assumptions too lofty to appease. But this just seemed to romanticise circumstance and fortune whilst watching society collapse. There were secrets, but none that were surprising. The characters weren't overly likable; they seemed content to neglect the struggling communities surrounding them to ensure the society they had grown accustomed to had the opportunity to survive within their ranch walls. It was somewhat uncomfortable to read; almost like reading about the effects of climate change through the eyes of the 1% and emerge wanting the pop the bubbles they're living in.

The writing style was enjoyable, the book free-flowing and easy to read. I liked the amount of description in Sloley's words and the structure of the plot. I just didn't find this narrative relatable; it just didn't resonate positively with me.

2.5 stars.

The draw of this book was the apocalyptic theme, doomsday preppers and how a society could function outside the traditional norm. You are drawn into the small society and gradually realize they just aren’t likable.

The group is made up of professionals such as doctors, journalists and architects – also those with farming knowledge and apparently many of those from a wealthy station in life. The isolated life these people lead could be described as a gated community (think very large scale) where you must apply for membership. They drink wine and eat Brie as they meet on various subjects.

There is a journalist who reports news to them as he goes on the Internet; all others aren’t restricted from web surfing but they just don’t indulge. Marlo is a central character – a 25 year-old who has been sheltered from life. You just can’t warm to anyone in the story and honestly, I almost bailed on the book. Once a new character was brought in (he applied, was turned down and then showed up) it gets a tad more interesting. Overall, this didn’t engage me enough to seek out more of the author’s work.

This book is my sixth book for the Aussie Author Challenge.

This book was published November 5, 2019.
Much thanks to Netgalley for the complimentary copy of this book.

”If you blinkered your view of the world, focusing only on the most encouraging signs of continuity, no matter how anomalous, you could pretend for whole stretches of time that nothing bad was happening.”

Disasters Children follows the story of a tight knit community who have invested their life’s savings into prolonging a project that will see them through to the other side of the end of the world. Referring to the outside world already as ‘The Disaster’, those living in The Ranch are focused solely on saving their existence through new avenues of farming, breeding livestock and ultimately a new way of living to pass this new and cleaner way of life onto the next generation.

Within The Ranch are many different characters with different backgrounds, there are doctors, architects, builders, farmers, scientists, etc. Everyone plays their part and everyone obeys the rules knowing they are for their own good. Marlo, adopted at a young age by her over-protective-and-doting-parents who are among the founders of this project, has never lived outside of the Ranch unlike pretty much everyone else there. Her childhood friends, Alex & Ben, left the community and are not to be spoken of but Marlo keeps in touch from time to time, hearing their tales of saving the planet and fighting the governments. Marlo must decide what will make her stay and what will make her leave.

I’ll be honest, I nearly gave up on this book. At the start it was tedious and lacking any kind of mystery that I found myself quickly disinterested and wanting to start something else. However, I didn’t. For some reason, and not because of my sheer hate for quitting a book, I was drawn to elements of the story I had begun to read. Although it seemed like not much was going on with the characters, also I didn’t particularly like the protagonist, there was this curiosity within the Ranch system that I needed to find out more. Thankfully the book picked up once a stranger arrived to the Ranch shrouded in his own mysterious past. At the same time we start to learn about the inward battle that Marlo faces, to leave or to stay? Perhaps the first 30% of this book being rather dull and slow was part of the point since Marlo later express in the book how before she met Wolf her life was boring and monotonous.

As the book progresses we learn how sheltered Marlo has been, although she denies it and fights this fact all the time, it’s clear to see that she has had everything given to her all her life. Living within the ‘gated community’ of the Ranch, Marlo has had a rather privileged upbringing. Her adoptive parents, who smother her with love and kindness, have always given her whatever she wanted. Only the elite of society get to live in this egalitarian community since you have to pay a pretty hefty fee to get in and to stay, your life savings become the foundation of what holds the Ranch community together so Marlo has never wanted for anything, hasn’t even had to pay for anything in order to have what she wants. It makes sense that Marlo would want to experience a different kind of life having only ever known one thing. She is desperate for a chance to leave and see the world for herself, ‘the disaster’, but her father has been sick for years and she faces guilt every time she considers having to leave them behind, not to mention the fact that it would break their hearts for their only daughter to leave what they feel is the only answer to their survival.

Disasters Children goes on to explore the lengths we will go to, however unorthodox, to keep our loved ones close and safe. It also raises questions about what each of us will do once the real disaster, that we know is imminent, comes. Will we sit and cower in our fancy homes hoping that bricks and mortar and intelligence will protect us or will we stand up for what we know is right and try to make a change. A poignant and timely novel for sure.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.

This was a disappointing book for me. A group of wealthy, privilege people waiting out the end of the world on a ranch in Oregon. The new boy way in is too buy your way in. The 25 year old daughter decides she wants to get out into the world before it’s gone.

I found this slow and the characters never clicked for me. I was awaiting some twist or reveal that would make it interesting. Thank you Netgalley for a copy in exchange for an honest opinion.

Climate change, off the gridders, class struggle all feature in this dystopian novel. Some of the details seem unnecessary and yet others are terrific. Marlo is the epitome of a sheltered young woman and if she seems immature, it's because she hasn't had much exposure to the real world outside the Oregon compound where she has lived since she was 5. She's the one who finds the first dead eagle, which is a harbinger of bad things to come. That includes the arrival of a young man with whom she has a sexual encounter. He's poor, the community is rich. It's an interesting entry into the genre but it didn't have a big enough heart for me- I wanted to feel more for Marlo. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC.

And intriguing premise and an interesting setting, but the book didn't deliver. The story was often brought to a grinding halt, and the plot was hidden under a mountain of descriptive language. The writing wasn't bad but as a whole, the book would have greatly benefitted from of a thorough spring cleaning.