Ok, I will admit I wasn’t sure what to expect from a sapphic zombie love story. I was prepared to struggle, but very quickly into this one and I was entranced. The story is told from two narrators Mara a 17 year old girl who was turned by a “Tick” but is part of the new trials on a medication that pushes the Tick back and lets the human be in charge again. The other narrator is Rory, a girl who has had to grow up far too fast as she has protected and cared for her family. Before the world ended Mara and Rory were neighbors, friends, and had stolen their first kiss right before everything fell apart. Mara is sent to live with her godparents, Rory’s parents, because her own were dead. Mara isn’t sure about going, but she doesn’t want to stop getting the daily injections that keep her in charge.. Rory is disgusted to hear that the Altered (the medicated and re-humanized Ticks) are being brought to the island especially Mara. Not everyone on the island was ok taking the group of 15 Altered in, so they are all struggling to find their footing and figure out this new world order. Among all the mixed feelings and fighting Mara and Rory have to (re)discover how they truly feel about each other. Overall I gave this one 4.5 stars rounded up for a really realistic and creative zombie apocalypse.

I usually stay away from all stories containing zombies or zombie-like creatures because they are not my cup of tea, but I couldn't help but be drawn in by the premise of this book. A sapphic love story between two girls who reunite after one of them is infected? Yes, please. I'm so glad I gave this book a chance because it had plenty of action and survival elements to keep the plot moving forward, and also a well-rounded cast of characters who's flaws, doubts and love for each other keep the heart of the story beating. All the characters have made difficult decisions to survive and those choices are explored with nuance.

The beginning of the story starts on the slower side, as we are introduced to Mara, who was infected by the Tick virus that turned her into a zombie, but has now been returned to life - mostly - due to a new vaccine that was developed. Now that the vaccine helps control the Tick side of her that wants to eat other humans, she is released into the care of the Blake family - her godparents, Isaac & Sam, and their daughter, Rory, the girl Mara loves. Together, Mara and the Blake family have to untangle the complicated relationships left in the aftermath of the horrors they have faced and caused. Additionally, pressure mounts when a community leader decides to blame a Tick attack on Mara and the other resettled humans.

I loved the romance between Rory and Mara. They have to work through so much history and angst, but their love for each other is so genuine and it made me root for them the entire time. I also loved the portrayal of Rory's family, who welcome Mara into their midst the same way they decide to take care of the adopted younger siblings.

Given that this is set in a post-apocalyptic world with zombie like creatures, there is an understandable amount of violence and gore as the story progresses; however, it was never excessive to the point where it detracted from the story.

I recommend this to anyone who wants a satisfying dystopian story, a sapphic - almost star-crossed lovers-esque love story, or a zombie book that isn't just about the gore!

Thank you to Penguin and NetGalley for the review copy!

A sapphic zombie story? Let's just say I had very, very high expectations. And this book did not let me down. At. All. Holy cow. I LOVED this book. I'll be thinking about this book for a long time.

This review has be posted to Goodreads and StoryGraph

In a world ravaged by a deadly virus that reanimates the dead, seventeen-year-old Mara finds herself grappling with a second chance at “life” after being given medication that tempers the virus living inside her. Now an Altered, and therefore technically no longer a Tick, Mara is placed in an experimental resettlement program where she is sent to live with the family of her long-lost best friend Rory, who also happens to be the only girl she’s ever loved. Rory, whose nightmares are haunted not only by the virus and the undead but also the one shared kiss she had with Mara, is anything but happy when she finds out Altered Mara will be thrust back into her life. As the Island, their home and sanctuary from the Tick-infested mainland, faces internal strife and the threat of an outbreak, Mara and Rory must confront their shared history and rely on each other to navigate the dangers lurking in the shadows. With the little semblance of peace the Island has hanging in the balance, their bond becomes the key to survival in a world where love and loss intertwine amidst the ever-present threat of the undead.

Overall, I found this book to be very entertaining and enjoyable! While it was a little slow at the start, it was definitely difficult to put down once the plot really got going. I always love a book with duel point of view, and this one did not disappoint. Mara and Rory’s history is woven in well through flashbacks that provide the reader with a better understanding of why their relationship is the way it is in the present. Although, I did find Mara’s sister, Carter, and Rory’s anger towards Altered Mara a little much and unfair, considering I don’t think it is fair to blame Mara for what happened while she was under the virus’s control as a Tick. It would be understandable for them to be weary of Altered Mara, but to be so angry, each for their own reasons, seems unjustified. But besides that, I really enjoyed the characters, plot, and suspense that this book offered. Since it is a book centered around a life-altering virus turning people into the undead, make sure to check trigger warnings if you have certain situations to which you are sensitive. There is definitely a decent amount of gore, blood, and death, as well as some accounts of torture and child death. If you are ok reading about those types of events, then I would highly recommend this young adult book if you are looking for an adventurous and suspenseful story about love, loss, family, and finding oneself set against the backdrop of a world hanging on by a thread.

Thank you to Penguin Group and NetGalley for the opportunity to read an electronic ARC of Hearts Still Beating in return for my honest review.

Hearts Still Beating

By Brooke Archer-a debut author

Publication 4/2/24, read 4/3/24

Rating: 5/5 ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

🙏🏾Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher G.P. Putnam's Sons for this ARC 💚! I voluntarily give my honest review and all opinions expressed are my own.

Genre: Paranormal/UF, YA, dystopia

Tropes: zombies, post apocalyptic, sapphic romance

Summary: Two teenage girls Mara and Rory are reunited after a terrible virus has killed and infected most of the population. Mara was a victim of what they called a "Tick" and went through an experimental resettlement program after getting the "cure." Can they reconnect after experiencing so much death and struggling to survive?

🤔My Thoughts: I have to shout out all the zombie shows and movies I love so much that were used as inspiration. The Walking Dead, The Last of Us, and Warm Bodies are some of the better zombie shows/movie. Mara and Rory's relationship took me back to the show The Last of Us with Ellie and Riley. They were teenage girls and had feelings for each other, but it's destroyed by death. Mara and Rory get to fight their way back to each other at The Island against rogue soldiers and Ticks.

4 out of 5 stars (4 / 5) Mara is a teen who became afflicted with an illness that has swept the country. This illness now has a cure, as long as it is given each day. She is sent to her god parents house to live and integrate back into society. But the girl she loves is there.

The illness was one that made people become vicious, violent and mostly dead. For lack of better term, a “zombie” as we know it. They got what they called a “tick” in their head and it took over their brain and body. With the anecdote, the tick is tamed enough to not have control, but it’s still there. With that being said, there were few details into the Ticks attacking others, it is nothing like most zombie books.

“It isn’t just monsters who end the world. It’s men.”

We are introduced to a little community where people are thriving. Bringing Ticks there is causing an uproar and unsettlement of their lives. Many are against them, many are for them. The contention and the people on each side guide the story into one that evokes emotions but also curiosity.

The romance between Mara and her previous best friend, Rory is contentious at best. Both have feelings that make matters difficult. Their romance wasn’t one I fully was behind. It didn’t feel established enough (oddly) and I had mixed feelings because most of the time they felt like old best friends, not romantic. I also very much wanted more details into how the tick came into play and more about the world or society in general. We are given a very small glimpse into how it changed society. This was not a downfall, just something my curiosity craves.

“Resilience is a never-ending battle.”

The ending was a great one. It felt optimistic and it left me feeling content. I recommend this one to queer romance lovers that love a dystopian society.

One of my obsessions when it comes to the SFF genre is zombies because viruses. I saw that Hearts Still Bleeding was a sapphic, zombie story, so I knew that I needed it…and it delivered!

This story follows 17 year old Mara, a virus infected girl who has been treated and is no longer a mindless “Tick” aka zombie, and Rory, Mara’s ex-best friend that she kissed…and she’s hellbent on killing Ticks. These two must find a way to survive in this new world or risk losing each other all over again.

Even though the story starts off a bit slow as the reader is acclimated to this post-apocalyptic hell, things quickly escalate when Mara and Rory face a deadly mission on a Tick infested island.

I was not ready for just how gritty and down right violent this story was going to be since its YA, but I loved that the author wasn’t afraid to show the brutal realities that Rory and Mara faced. Bravo.

As far as Mara and Rory go, I love that their story doesn’t just pick up as if nothing happened. Every are forced to confront the consequences of their pasts and learn to navigate this new life together….scars and all.

Hearts Still Beating by Brooke Archer is an amazing YA post apocalyptic story!
I love stories like this one and Archer did a fabulous job.
I enjoyed the writing, the characters are entertaining and the storytelling was intriguing.
This author’s writing style is wonderful, compelling and descriptive.

Thank You NetGalley and G.P. Putnam's Sons Books for Young Readers for your generosity and gifting me a copy of this amazing eARC!

Really, my only comment is that I LOVE when a debut author just kills it like this. I actually requested this with a bit of hesitancy, as I am actually a huge baby when it comes to horror, but it is recommended for fans of Adam Silvera and The Last of Us, so I did so anyways.

Boy did I make the correct decision. This book was So Much Fun, and it was heartbreaking, and it was funny, and it was heart-warming, and and and. I actually did not write this review for weeks after reading it because I was having too much fun telling my friends about it.

These characters just made so much sense, which I loved because I am very much not them. It can be heart to find relatability in characters who react in the complete opposite to how you would (or, I guess in terms of the zombie apocalypse, how you think you would). Archer has managed to make a cast of characters whose reactions are all over the map and yet they all make sense.

This book is not perfect, no, books so rarely are, especially books by debut novelists, however it was exactly what you would want from a YA zombie apocalypse novel, and so much more. I am a sucker for an exploration in trauma and this setting let these characters really live in it and I remain so happy and surprised that this ARC delivered exactly what I wanted and more.

I really enjoyed this book! I wouldn't say this book started SLOW but once the action got going in this one I DEVOURED it. I was DYING to know how it would end and couldn't put it down. This book is full of gore and action. I mean its a a zombie book so lots of crushing of skulls, haha! A friends to lovers/ found family trope mixed in with all the gruesome bits though. I absolutely recommend reading this one! It was a fun ride!

Can a post-apocalyptic zombie book be full of hope? In this case, yes it can. The world has change dramatically for the Blake and Knight families, and death is around every corner, but hope finds a way to keep everyone plugging along. Rory is so heart-broken by the end of the world as she knew it that she changed her name. Mara is so altered by the events of the past 2 or so years, she barely speaks. And, yet.... there is hope. And a lot of love buried deep beneath the pain. The end of civilization can bring out the worst in people, but it can also bring out the best. At it's core, this book is about never giving up on those you love, no matter what you face. I thought I was sick of the undead, but this book reminded me that they still have a lot to offer. I'm glad I gave it a chance!

I'm so sad that I've reviewed this book so low. I'm not sure if it's just the mood I'm in at the moment so I can't fully say this book isn't good. I only got to around chapter 5 and it was a little repetitive to me. 'I remember this but they think I don't or blah blah this' I don't think some of the anger was justified for the most part. Sure Mara killed people, but it's not like she wanted too so I'm not sure I like that justification. I think I'd try this book again in the future but as of right now it's a very soft and sad no from me.

LOVED LOVED LOVED THIS BOOK.

The summary alone had me already so hyped for this book. Dystopian? Sign me up! Even the YA tag wasn’t going to deter me.

And boy am I glad it didn’t!

Please read this book. Give it a chance because it deserves so many reads.

I was quickly immersed in this book, and I enjoyed it so much. Add it to your TBR or start it right now. You won’t regret it!

I really wanted to like this one, but I really struggled with the pacing. I thought the overall idea, and sapphic representation, was amazing, but I was really bored and kept forgetting to update my progress on this one because it took me forever to work through it.

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

“Maybe hope is long gone, erased by the monsters we made and became.”

“Hearts Still Beating,” by Brooke Archer

Mara has been living as someone who’s in recovery for being something like a zombie. The surviving settlements in California have set up a system to reintegrate the “Tick’s” who have been brought back mostly to life. Now Mara is being sent back to her surviving relatives, which include her sister and to the same place her best friend and the person she fell in love with before the end of the world lives. Rory, Mara’s old best friend, has been living with the surviving and rebuilding of the town she lives in and is not sure how to handle the news of Mara coming back to town after all that’s happened.

I really liked this book. I love dystopian books and I’m excited to read more and more authors writing them right now. Brooke Archer has written a very good post-apocalyptic zombie book. It is very YA but has a little graphic content with the whole zombie stuff. I liked the characters in the book a lot and was fully invested in their wellbeing. The POV shifts made me a little confused at the time, I do wish it was only in Mara POV but that’s just my personal preference of only wanting one POV. I loved the setting, the story, the characters, the imagery, and the cover. I would love to read more books by Brooke Archer. 5 out of 5 stars.

-Zombie
-F/F
-Post Apocalyptic

Thank you for the ARC.

This wasn’t what I normally read, but I enjoyed trying something new. A zombie apocalypse/ YA romance. I liked the premise but this fell a little flat for me at times. I also struggled to connect to the characters. Enjoyable.. but not my favorite.

This was a solid dystopian romance. It was interesting learning about the virus that took over this place and how that affected relationships between all the characters. I enjoyed seeing the relationship grow more between the main characters Mara and Rory even though the relationship was strained due to Mara recovering from the virus. We watched how people had to rebuild their lives, deal with the grief of having lost loved ones and watch as people let their emotions dictate how they lead others. I enjoyed majority of this story but I wish we would have gotten a different ending. There were parts of this story that were brutal and I wished the author would have leaned into that a bit more. Everything wrapped up a little too nicely for me but I would still recommend.

When I saw this pop up on NetGalley, I was sold immediately on the premise. Sapphic, the undead, and post-apocalyptic? Sign me up! I will say my expectations were really high for this one. It wasn't bad by any means, but also didn't blow me away. Definitely middle of the road, which was why I gave it a 3 star rating. I think my biggest cons were the pacing, not fully liking the second FMC, and feeling like not much really happened since this was set after all of the action of the end of the world had happened. On the flip side, I very much enjoyed the main FMC, Mara. I think her story and character development was great! She certainly added more interest to the story. The world was also intriguing, although, I wish there could have been a bit more world building. The idea was solid though. I can't say that I fully felt invested in the love story that was happening. At times, it felt repetitive and forced. But, there were other times I thought it was cute. It just kind of depended on the timing and the characters' chemistry at that time. I definitely think there is an audience for this book and many people are going to love it! Unfortunately, it did feel a little lacking for me though. I appreciate the author and NetGally for allowing me to read and review early!

The premise of this was interesting and I think it's great that was also an LGBTQ+ book. I feel like I haven't read a story with a similar premise from this stance before and it was refreshing

Hearts Still Beating is a gripping tale of love lost and found again, but with zombies. Mara and Rory experience their first kiss the night before the zombie apocalypse begins. They’re separated and eventually find each other again only one of them no longer has a beating heart. I thoroughly enjoyed this gripping love story with a splash of gore.

Thank you @prhaudio for early access to the audiobook, I love a good dual narration! And @penguinteen for an Advanced Reader Copy!