Oh my goodness. This book grabbed you in and held you tight. It was dark, visceral, and oh so bloody. Would definitely not want to watch this as a television show or movie. I wish we had gotten more of an epilogue but at the same time that’s what life is like. Thank you for the opportunity to follow along.

This book was a TRIP. Thanks to NetGalley for allowing me to read an ARC of this novel. I would most definitely categorize this book as science fiction, particularly in the arena of science gone horribly horribly wrong. The narrator, Lucy, realizes that something is not quite right in her town of Turner Falls when a classmate attacks another student, and then kills the teacher. Shortly after that, other teenagers begin committing horrible acts of violence. Lucy and a crew of ragtag misfits attempt to survive the night and figure out what exactly is happening the rest of the book. I will say as a slight spoiler that if you are expecting a happy ending to this tale, you will be disappointed. Was it satisfying? Yes. Happy? Nope. In that respect the book maintained a sense of realism in the face of all the crazy whacked out science gone wrong of it all. I do recommend this book for anyone that is looking for a fast paced, thrilling trip.

Through Net Galley, I read an advance copy of  The Loop by Jeremy Robert Johnson.      Something is seriously wrong in Turner Falls, Oregon.  First there is a murder/suicide involving a mother and her 17 year old son.  Then there is a classroom incident results in several deaths and injuries.    Outcasts Lucy, Bucket and Brewer are at first witnesses to the mayhem and, later, the last line of defense against the evil the engulfs the town.  

This one works on multiple levels, there is plenty of teen angst, a rogue corporation willing to skirt scientific ethics to maximize profits and a government conspiracy.   Equal parts mystery, thriller, horror and science fiction with touches of humor, this one grabbed my attention and forced me to read the entire book in one sitting.  Fast paced, action packed and featuring a conflicted, yet compelling kick ass heroine this one gets 5 stars all the way.  

An e-book copy of The Loop was the only compensation received in exchange for this review.  My thanks to Net Galley and Gallery/Saga Press for the opportunity to read this book and provide feedback.

A small town starts seeing violence from its teenagers in this story of biotech gone wrong. Lucy survived years of her parents' neglect and has since been adopted by a loving family and moves to a small town. There, the wealthy all seem to work for the same tech company IMTECH, and their children lord over the rest of the school. Lucy, originally from Peru, is an outsider and bonds with Bukit, also known as Bucket, as some of the few non-white kids there who are taunted constantly. Lucy witnesses a kid freak out and attack their teacher, and is trying to get over that trauma when Bucket and a friend of his decide to go to a party and she tags along. There, they learn that someone has been experimenting on the teens of the town and all hell breaks loose quickly. From there it is a fight for survival as the tech seems to have gained a mind of its own and is spreading...

This is a sorta zombie book that takes off and never lets up once the horror starts. It gets gruesome in parts (though the parts that bothered me most had to do with animals, specifically cats) so if that kind of thing bothers you don't read. I really enjoyed the main character and was cheering her on as she makes her way through the apocalypse. I'm still not 100 percent sure I understand exactly what the tech was, but that's OK. Close enough to zombies for me!

Netgalley's describes it as "Stranger Things meets World War Z", Goodreads as "Alien meets World War Z."

Frankly, I feel deceived.

There is a vague passing familiarity, but only in grand concepts that are so common in the genre; what makes Stranger Things, World War Z, and Alien - the heart and intricate storytelling - isn't exactly present. There are bones, and an obvious intention and direction, but Johnson fails to see the story to its full potential. The base concept seems hastily put together, difficult to follow and all-around lacking in complexity. It seems like two ideas he attempted to merge together but they just fail to connect for me. Given the style of narration I didn't expect all the answers but what answers we were given were just told through long paragraphs of dialogue rather than shown. 

I think that limiting the story to only Lucy's point of view is what makes the worldbuilding suffer. I think stories of this genre work best from multiple - but not too many - perspectives; had we seen the world filtered through Steve and even Emmett's point of views, offering a more full and realized narrative, then this would be better. Perhaps not still perfect, but better. Attempting to channel everything through Lucy's inner monologue just absolutely kills the potential, especially when Lucy's mind is very.. awkward. I appreciate the attempt to portray her awkwardness as a young brown girl in a small, white, conservative town, and acknowledging the trauma she's suffered after watching such violence enacted in front of her but it just feels very stilted; there's too many instances where she just rejects her roots and culture, and it feels more like a cop-out than a genuine personality trait, rendering the entire narrative pointless, and the very uncomfortable instances of bringing attention to her 'sexuality' and how her trauma is somehow intertwined with it are difficult to read. Of course, she's not the only character that ends up feeling hollow; the dialogue exchanges near the beginning in the party scene are absolutely (and I don't use this word lightly) "cringey." There's not a moment where any of the teen characters actually feel like teens. The dialogue seems like it's written by someone who's never spoken to a human, much less a gen z teen.

It's almost enough to make you want to quit reading. 

But I was determined, and I really do regret that determination. There's just not much I liked. I kind of zoned out a bit, even in the action scenes, because they were just boring. It definitely feels like the intent was to be shocking with the graphic depictions of animal abuse and the weirdly shoed-in discussion of assault, but I don't know if I'm just numb to it or it just wasn't compelling enough to even infuriate. At that point I was just constantly looking at how much I had left to go and wondering if something major was going to happen.

Like I said in the beginning: I do feel deceived. I wish I could have some nicer things to say because it does seem like an Attempt by the author, but. I think if you're going to liken your book to some of the most genre-defining media, you need the story to back it up. This book definitely didn't have it.

With a great opening sequence of a classroom out of control as a high school student seems possessed and a cave scene filled with flesh eating teenagers run amuck, "The Loop" is a cross between Invasion of the Body Snatchers and Stranger Things and Buffy the Vampire Slayer.  It is an action-packed horror story about an isolated town out of control as parasitic-controlled teenagers burst out of control.  The first half is the best though.

This one missed the mark for me. The first half of the book was good; it picked up pace quickly and I was sucked in by the drama as I tried to figure out what direction the story would go in. The gore seemed overly gratuitous at times, but I didn't have a major problem with that. The writing wasn't great - it felt like it was written just to become a movie instead of just being written as a great book, if you know what I mean. A lot of the dialogue was just unnatural. I did think the unfolding of the main character's personality and past was well done, but wish we had gotten that a little more for other characters as well. 

A lot of people seem to have enjoyed the ending, and while I don't have a problem with the ending itself, I did have a problem with the writing leading up to it. The whole end-game plan didn't seem to make a lot of sense and I thought the thought process was just confusing and seemed to contradict itself. 

Overall I'd give this a 2.5/5; I usually round up, but in this case I'm rounding down. Thanks to NetGalley and Gallery/Saga Press for the e-ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Woah. This book was a little more intense then I was expecting. This book is being billed as World War Z meets Stranger Things and I can definitely see why. The level of violence and gore in this book is pretty high so be aware of that before diving into this book. That being said, I didn’t want to put this book down. A lot happens to keep you hooked. This was a really quick read that I enjoyed.

TSK TSK TSK, SOMEONE'S BEEN A BAD LITTLE CORPORATION!! 

Something disturbing has begun in Turner Falls, Oregon. Home to IMTECH, a Science & Biotech Corporation. And it's about to get wild.

Using another specie's tissue, IMTECH created a biotech (like a parasite) and secretly implanted it in some of the town's teenagers. The goal was to control them. Let's just say, it backfired and the opposite occurred. All teenagers implanted became "infected" with an uncontrollable rage to kill and cause pain. The infected torture and kill everyone they come into contact with. A random group of people, including a few uninfected teenagers will spend every second fighting for their lives while trying to also understand what has happened so they can try to stop it before its too late. 

Initially, I was off put at first. I thought it started very slow and felt mediocre. I even set it down for a while. 

Finally around 100 pages in, the story did more than just pick up; it punched you in the face and hit you on the head with a hammer for good measure!! Because WOW folks: This is one bloody disturbing action book. It is extremely graphic and can be overly crass as well. Definitely not for the faint of heart. I think the author was smart to have the POV from a teenage girl instead of a boy. It lessened the graphic attack, only slightly, but it was a good idea.

 On another note: The author is able to create great dialogue among the characters that helps to lighten and entertain. Additionally, character development of the main character was excellent. It gives the book more depth than just a raging kill fest. I think the author had many positive attributes going for him. This book takes you through a myriad of emotions, highs and lows, rotating constantly. Ultimately, this is a highly stimulating read. If not for the long and slow start, and the initial crass tone I would have given 4 stars. 

*Thank you to Gallery Books via NetGalley for the digital review copy.

This may very well be the book that launches Jeremy Robert Johnson into the upper echelon of the scifi/horror genre. Despite some of the blurbs from some of the early reviews, this is not a zombie novel. It's more like man-made Frankenstein plague. 

On the face of it, many readers may want to compare this book to Stranger Things, but it soon is obvious that the resemblance is only superficial. The characters are more damaged, the action is much more frenetic and eventual outcome is much bleaker. If it wasn't obvious, I loved it. We need more cross-genre mashups like this.

5 Gory Stars.

I had heard a lot of good things about this book so I was pretty excited to get my hands on it. It started out very promising. I loved the beginning with the radio broadcast. Honestly, though, towards the end, I just wanted it to be over and felt like it was dragging.

The Loop- Jeremy Roberts Johnson

“But when I try to picture a utopia, where we, like, all rise above, and we’re kind and we grow as a species, I can’t see it. So either I’m too dumb to have that kind of vision, or I’m just smart enough to know that humans could never pull it off. It’s way easier to imagine dystopia, and war, and all the bullshit we’ve been living in.”

Strap in, bitches! We are not in a utopia, that’s for sure! This book is a high-octane ride from the very beginning. Lucy and Bucket are best friends, and just about the only brown kids in their crap hillbilly town of Turner Falls, Oregon. But Lucy is confident that they can make it through their senior year and put the town in their rearview as long as they have each other. Unfortunately, their plans fall apart one day in school when one of the rich kids attacks & kills the teacher with a textbook. In a matter of minutes, the room is swarming with police and he is shot. But not before Lucy & Bucket saw his strange blue eyes and saw that weird thing in his neck.
Something very wrong is going on in Turner Falls. And it all connects back to the giant biotech company IMTECH, who has decided to use the children of its own execs as guinea pigs for an insane experiment.
Now Lucy, Bucket, and another of their outcast friends Brewer are on a mission to save the world.
The promo material calls this book a conspiracy thriller, and that’s just about right- it will take you down all the rabbit holes of all the conspiracies you’ve heard out there: drones, government monitoring, implants. But it does it all through the lens of a badass female protagonist, so there’s that! Lucy is easy to root for. This book has everything a horror/thriller lover might want: lots of gore, a fast paced plot, and so much action! 
But it just wasn’t my style. I’m more of a slow burn kind of gal. What really saved this book for me was the ending, where the language shifted from crass teenage dialogue (which was realistic, I thought) to a more poetic style. I won’t tell you why, but I’m glad I hung in until then. It really opened up at that point for me.

I gave this one almost four stars 3.75! But that is just a matter of personal taste. This book is well written and a lot of fun, and I think a lot of other people will just love it!

I did not realize this was a YA book before requesting. I found I was not a good reader for it, as I almost never read YA. The book opened with a dramatic scene, and I was interested for a while because of that. 

The pace slowed dramatically, and I also had a hard time with some of the content in the first 1/4 of the book--references to animal abuse as well as references to "negging" behavior toward a young woman. I get that the author is not promoting these bad things, but I was just not expecting them and found them unpleasant, and so, not feeling caught up in the narrative, I didn't continue reading. I see that the book has a lot of good reviews, and I wish it well, but it was not for me. I am not posting this review.

Modern day Invasion of the Body Snatchers. This was a wild ride and I didn’t want to get off! I loved the strong female lead who wasn’t afraid to get her hands dirty.

This book bills itself as a “heart-racing conspiracy thriller as a lonely young woman teams up with a group of fellow outcasts to survive the night in a town overcome by a science experiment gone wrong.” That is a spot-on plot description.

This book also bills itself as “Stranger Things meets World War Z.” There, I must respectfully disagree. The Loop and Stranger Things both involve teens dealing with something otherworldly, but there is little similarity in tone. And the oral history, reserved storytelling style of World War Z bears no resemblance to this tale.

The writing here is raw, and a little bit over the top. The pace is frenetic. There’s horror and gore, but there are also threads of raunchiness, even elements of a teen sex comedy. It has a clever opening that sets the mood and allows for a quick data dump of backstory. The main character, Lucy Henderson, is well-developed, far more so than any of the other characters. And the book has a really strong ending.

Rather than Stranger Things or World War Z, The Loop reminded me of the books of Scott Sigler and the cult classic movie Return of the Living Dead. Both are compliments. A fun, fast read.

This  is truly the story of the end of the world as we know it.  This was an intensely graphic tale that had me afraid to stop turning the pages,  the characters were  beyond flawed but so very real. The story was well told and easy to follow. High school student Lucy’s life is changed by trauma for the second time when a peer in class gouges out another student’s eye in front of her and the class.  The events that unfold next appear ripped from the screen of a classic horror movie leading Lucy on an adventure to try to save the world from certain destruction.

When I started this book I really didn't think I was going to like it. But the story definitely pulled me in and the ending made it all worth while.

The good news?  This book is an absolutely engrossing, exciting, attention grabbing story from the start.
The bad news?  I finished it.  What's next?

A small town group of teenagers find themselves engaged in a particularly gory battle to survive.  Who are they fighting?  Why, it's the crowd of rich kids that seem to have morphed into a group set on killing everyone in town.  The story line does not sound that exciting but Jeremy Robert Johnson has definitely worked in some unexpected twists and a couple of turns that keep your eyes open and focus'd on the next page.  An action packed thriller that went far too quickly.

Thanks to NetGalley for an advanced copy. DNF at around the 45% mark.

I initially wanted to abandon this much earlier. Beyond the promising opening scene, Part 1 was very boring for me. It felt like a YA novel, but not appropriate for younger readers. Another early review encouraged me to keep pushing through until the action started. 

There's nothing <i>wrong</i> with it -- it's just pretty mindless action. If you want to read about troubled outsider teens trying to survive while their classmates have been turned into killer drones, this will fit the bill. But with the comparison up top to World War Z and Stranger Things I was expecting something a lot more engaging.

This is a great book with lots of weirdness and edge-of-your-seat action, and the ending is awesome. Jeremy Robert Johnson is a great writer and I look forward to more of his work.