dnf’d ~

i really respect ava reid as an author because i have heard endless good things about her from a lot of people on here and a lot of the booktubers that i really trust and love <3 but this just fell flat for me, i ended up dnf’ing at like 30% but i tried picking this up a few times and just couldn’t get into it. maybe my mood influenced it as well, but i’m not sure.

i also wish authors stopped describing books as the hunger games. in general, i have never been a dystopian fan (minus a FEW outliers) and never seek them out. i think they are often flawed structurally and what it seems like they’re trying to accomplish, especially ones that brand themselves as being similar to the hunger games.

still, i an interested in seeing more books from ava reid in the future and possibly picking up one of her other books! thank you so much to netgalley and the publisher for providing me with an ARC of this book (:

**Review for *Fable for the End of the World* by Ava Reid**

Ava Reid's *Fable for the End of the World* is a stunning, dystopian romance that captivates with its beautifully bleak world, complex characters, and a heart-pounding journey of survival, sacrifice, and love. A gripping combination of high stakes and emotional depth, this stand-alone novel weaves together survival instincts with the raw emotions of two people on opposite sides of a cruel system.

The story is set in a decaying, post-apocalyptic world controlled by the powerful corporation Caerus, which has forced the impoverished underclass into a cycle of debt they cannot escape. Inesa, a strong and resourceful young woman, lives in a town half-sunken by time and tragedy, running a modest taxidermy shop with her brother. Life is tough, but they survive. When Inesa learns that her estranged mother has offered her as a sacrifice to Caerus’ deadly and televised spectacle known as the Lamb’s Gauntlet, her world shatters. The Gauntlet is a brutal event in which the corporation forces the debt-ridden to offer their children for public slaughter. It’s a game of life and death that leaves no room for mercy.

Inesa, though initially despairing, is not one to give up. She’s spent her life learning how to survive in the wastes, and now she’ll fight to the bitter end with the help of her brother. On the other side of this deadly spectacle is Melinoë, the cold and calculating assassin, who has been conditioned by Caerus to hunt and kill the sacrificial Lambs. Trained from a young age, Mel is the perfect weapon—deadly, efficient, and emotionally distant. However, following a particularly traumatic Gauntlet, she finds herself questioning everything, torn between her brutal training and the desire for redemption.

What follows is a riveting, high-stakes chase through a world full of broken landscapes and broken lives, where survival means more than just staying alive—it means retaining your humanity. Inesa’s fight for survival is juxtaposed with Melinoë’s internal battle to reconcile her role as an assassin with her growing doubts and her longing for something more than just violence. These two characters—one running for her life, the other hunting her—are richly drawn, with complex emotional arcs that elevate the story beyond its dystopian framework.

Reid masterfully develops the relationship between Inesa and Mel. The slow-burn romance between these two women is as tender as it is fraught with tension. At first, their connection seems impossible—one is a victim and the other a weapon—but as the story unfolds, the deep emotional resonance of their bond emerges. The themes of survival, guilt, and redemption intertwine with their growing feelings for each other, making their romance not just believable but inevitable. It’s a love story that is as much about healing and self-discovery as it is about the forbidden connection between two people who should be enemies.

Reid’s world-building is beautifully crafted, with a vivid and haunting atmosphere that makes the dystopian setting feel both alien and painfully familiar. The portrayal of the corporation Caerus as a ruthless force is chilling, but it's the way that Reid draws attention to the personal cost of living under such a system that hits hardest. The characters are not just fighting against an external enemy—they are also grappling with their own fears, traumas, and the choices that define them. This adds a layer of emotional complexity that makes the story resonate on a deeper level.

In essence, *Fable for the End of the World* is a stunning exploration of survival, sacrifice, love, and redemption. Ava Reid delivers a narrative that keeps you on the edge of your seat, while also pulling at your heartstrings with its nuanced, layered characters and its compelling romance. It’s a dystopian story that transcends its genre, offering a deeply emotional journey that will stay with you long after you turn the final page.

Fable for the End of the World has an intriguing premise, but it struggles under the weight of its many themes. While the romance was compelling and Melinoë’s perspective kept me engaged, Inesa’s characterization felt frustratingly passive. With so many issues tackled at once and little resolution by the end, the story ultimately left me wanting more.

This indeed was like a blend of The Last of Us and The Hunger Games. The Gauntlet happens when someone has reached a certain threshold of credits and they have to pay up. Except they don’t necessarily have to do so with their own life— they can choose someone else.
Inesa is thrown into the Gauntlet my her own mother, and Melinoë is the deadly killer sent to hunt her once the game begins. Melinoë is an “Angel” which means she has parts of her that were manufactured to make her a perfect hunter in these gauntlets.
There are a few close calls out in the wilderness, and soon the two find themselves off grid. But without the cameras, it doesn’t really count if one of them kills the other. So a truce is called; with this truce, I found that their surroundings really became the haunting element, with all the mutated animals and just the uninhabitable environment. It’s like modern time and technology but in a apocalyptic setting. I thought between the plot, world setting, and even the romance, this shaped up to be a great dystopian novel.

Thank you TBR and Beyond Tours for having me and for the copy of the book for review! Be sure to check out their site for the rest of the tour!

70/100 or 3.5 stars

I enjoyed what Reid did with the story! She made it feel different enough from The Hunger Games to add a nice twist on the story. I had fun, and if Reid means to write another story in this universe, I would be interested in contiuning this story and learning more about the world.

While this book was not my particular cup of tea, I think many YA readers will enjoy it! This sapphic, dystopian novel left on a cliff hanger and had some plot issues, but the Reid's ability to create moody worlds was a highlight.

This book could’ve been amazing if it hadn’t been for the inclusion of the “wends”, which are a thinly veiled (meaning thinly veiled with clear plastic wrap) version of w*ndigos from Algonquian Native American folklore. What was the point of that? Did we really need another insensitive, grossly represented instance of cultural appropriation from a white author? Did we really? With all the creativity that went into this book and all the things that were surely changed and tweaked throughout, why was this allowed through to the final version? There’s no good excuse any time, but especially in 2025. If we were to disregard that, I thought the book was good, it was compelling, the world building was fantastic, and the ending was perfect for the story. I saw a lot of people complaining about the ending but we need to realize that not everything can be a happy ending romance novel, and that’s okay. This just goes to show that it doesn’t take much to ruin a good book, but I know this is also to be expected from Ava Reid based on her past work.

So, I didn’t *dislike* this, but I think there was so much potential that was left unfulfilled that left me disappointed by this book.
Firstly, it definitely has a huge amount of similarities to Hunger Games. That in particular didn’t bother me, but I could imagine some people getting annoyed by that aspect of the book.
I think because it clearly was heavily inspired by the Hunger Games, there was a ton of world building that felt underdeveloped, which was a huge shame because there were some really strong anti-capitalist, eco-dystopian vibes going on that would have been so cool had this gone into more detail.
The romance I thought moved a bit too fast, while I didn’t dislike it, I wish the tension had lasted longer.


SPOILERS BELOW:
Some specific things that I liked and disliked-

-Espous creek: the description of this drowning town at the beginning of the book was amazing, I loved how it melded geography and climate crisis and poverty. I wish the rest of the book had the same world building energy as this town did.

-Inesa being a taxidermist: At first I thought this was a weird job to persist into dystopian times. Though perhaps it was meant to show the City dwellers could spend money displaying what could be food (while people are starving) as decoration, which was interesting. However this didn’t fully check out as it was mentioned multiple times that Caerus keeps the people fed by dropping food on their doorsteps with drones (is this to keep their approval rating up? So are people actually starving?). Either way, later in the book Inesa tells Melinoe that the actual reason the taxidermy is to preserve these animals that are going extinct. I don’t know if this was meant to show that Inesa is delulu….but killing nearly extinct animals as a way to preserve them is insane.

-The country being ran by a corporation: This is such an interesting concept and I love the idea of it, I just don’t think it was executed to its full potential. I wish it had hit on company towns more, because it seems like essentially the country has been (or should have been) operating like a company town, where everything anyone does puts them in debt to the company that is impossible to get out of, and that’s how they control. Instead the CEO has a 90% approval rating despite a large number of people living in deep poverty…this seems like a very shallow take on the situation and felt really unrealistic. I also don’t find it believable that the majority of people would sell out their loved ones to the Gauntlet. Based on this book basically everyone living in this world is a terrible person besides the MCs and Inesa’s brother.

-The Sciencey stuff: Look, I’ll believe almost anything with science fiction if it’s described in a way that could plausibly check out. The mutations did drive me up a wall though. At the beginning of the book they are described to have evolved to their environment, e.g. the environment is full of water so deer with webbed feet are more likely to survive, etc. All evolution is driven by mutation, so I don’t understand why these animals are actually then presented as freaks of nature. The irradiated sun was mentioned several times, so I believe what the author was going for is that the environment so toxic that it sped up the mutation rate and created these animals. I think this could have been described better to make more sense. Perhaps they evolved to be able to eat the contaminated waste and that’s why their meat is so bad? Like, there is so much that I think could have been done better which is what left me disappointed.

Overall I don’t regret reading this, but it’s not my fave Ava Reid book.

Unfortunately this book was not for me. I usually adore Ava's writing but I found this one to be triggering in multiple ways throughout reading.

Thank you to HarperCollins and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC!

This is my first time reading anything by Ava Reid, and I agree with what most people have said, her writing is beautiful! Her prose is flowery, it's gripping, and, for the most part, easy to understand. But the times where the writing becomes muddled in Fable for the End of the World—typically during scenes with a lot of action or high emotions, which were a large part of the book—REALLY brought it down for me. I couldn't for the life of me understand what was happening, what was going on, and why for most of this book. It was kind of jarring reading a book where all the words were pretty but that still didn't lead to an understanding of what or why. I was really plugged in for the first 40% of the book and thoroughly confused for the rest.

Even though this Sci-Fi, Dystopian Fantasy has been comp'd to The Hunger Games, I've never read or seen that series, so I can't draw connections there. But there is commentary on climate change, marginalized communities, capitalism, social media obsession, a mega corporation who owns/runs the world, and other hot topic social commentary topics that felt underdeveloped/flat. I will say that the sibling dynamic was perhaps the strongest-written part of this story, but they spend most of the book apart so it's like…what's the point in paying attention to this at all lol.

I don't feel like I have yet to pick up a sapphic romance that I enjoyed, fully bought into, and rooted for, and this was no exception. Melinoe and Inesa had NO CHEMISTRY and it seems like Reid knew this because at least one of them felt inclined to show a romantic display towards the other (I can't remember which one of them it was) but they said something along the lines of not knowing why they felt like they needed to do that. Like girl, are you programmed or are you falling in love? It shocked me so badly when proclamations of love came in lol.

I think the most upsetting part about this book is it lends zero hope. It didn't make me as a reader feel satisfied that I'd spent this time with these characters. The concept of angels vs humans wasn't at all captivating, and the villain was a little too mustache-twirly for me. I would've loved to see more world building and a more thorough explanation of how the mega corporation came to be in charge. I think if you enjoy books with gauntlets and a feeling that time is running out, you'll enjoy this, but it didn't work for me.

2.5 ⭐️s

If Ava Reid writes it I will read it! Fable for the End of the World only solidifies Reid's genius for me. This YA dystopia give homage to The Hunger Games and its impact on Reid's writing and an entire generation that grew up with Collins's story. At the same time it adds Reid's particular flavor of horror and anti- institutional resistance. Mix in a hunter/prey sapphic relationship for romantic tension and you have a beautifully told romantic story with amazing atmosphere and stakes. While my personal favorites of Reid's are still A Study in Drowning and Juniper and Thorne, I would still highly recommend this book to anyone who is up for an emotionally moving dystopian tale.

Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

I have lots of thoughts on the resurgence of dystopian YA as Suzanne Collins revisits the Hunger Games with prequels and fantasy authors like Reid and Chloe Gong make new entries into the tradition. Despite being written 2 years back, their prescience captures the inevitability of corporate influence on government, environmental decay, and the monetization/degradation of our cognition by tech/AI. Reid takes these aspects to their brutal end in Fable for the End of the World, her sapphic, sci-fi dystopian romance that centers on Inesa, resident of the New Amsterdam underclass, who is consigned to a livestreamed death gauntlet to satisfy the debts of her callous mother. She is paired with Melinoe, the manufactured-for-tv assassin who must kill her, while contending with the system that cruelly shaped her.

The dystopian premise is great, both chilling in its relevance and social critique, where megacorp Caerus has become de facto government and subjugates society through enslaving debt, then mines societal attention through a livestreamed death match–an obvious nod to the Hunger Games which Reid transparently converses with. I also see similarities with Margaret Atwood’s MaddAddam trilogy. Reid explores bodily autonomy in the age of AI, how internet/livestreaming culture has festered in an increasing crisis of empathy, and ways we are radicalized/victimized in the interests of an oppressive state. However at 400 pages, there are constraints to worldbuilding and developing an “enemies-to-lovers” romance that Reid doesn’t quite overcome. The quick reversal of Melinoe’s/Inesa’s relationship required wider suspension of belief, and sometimes the world felt partially formed.

Despite this, the pacing kept me glued and I enjoyed this a lot. Is it a groundbreaking entry into the dystopian genre? Not really. But it doesn’t set out to be. Rather it’s a love letter to the genre, a meditation on hope and intimacy in a collapsing world, that will resonate with readers who prefer character-driven narratives over earth-shattering, dystopian epics.

Ah, this was so amazing! Ava Reid has done it again! Perfect for fans of The Hunger Games, this dystopian world also has televised murdering of teens... except this time with stone-cold cyborgs and a delicious, enemies-to-lovers sapphic romance. Both characters were absolutely amazing to read from their dual POVs, and I couldn't put this book down. Despite the dual POV, a consistent underlying tone is kept, making it incredibly readable for folks who may usually pass on dual POV- it was very well written. The world-building was insane; I loved the way tech, both contemporary and imaginations of the future, were used. This would also make an amazing fable for warning teens of the dangers of credit card debt and global warming. I highly recommend this book for teens and fans of dystopian YA.

This book is a dark, twisty, poignant gem in a world that needs its commentary so badly. The characters have depth and you can really feel their emotions pop off the page. This book will have you yelling and yearning all at the same time. I’m so glad a sequel has been hinted at, because this has been my favorite novel of the year.

I loved the dual POV's which kept me engaged the whole time. I loved the world and felt immersed in it while reading. I really enjoyed this dystopian adventure and the writing is excellent. The only reason I am taking off a star is because of the pacing in the middle. I will continue to read all works by this author.
4 stars

"But I think individuals are capable of compassion. Actually, I know they are. And maybe that's all it takes--at least at the beginning. Just a few people who care. And that caring matters, even if it can't cool the earth or lower sea levels or turn back time to before a nuclear blast."

Oh, Ava Reid, this book and your brain. This book is honestly a lot to handle with our current political climate. It's a YA dystopian novel (a clear love letter to The Hunger Games, as Ava states in the forward), but right now it feels more like a look into the not-so-distant future. Something that I love about Ava's writing is their consistent message that there is strength in being soft, in being emotional, and in loving deeply.

4/5 stars. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an arc in exchange for an honest review.

this was a fun, fast paced read. i wasn't sure to expect hearing sapphic hunger games but this took a different twist to the whole trials plot!

i will say that the connection btwn the characters felt sooo rushed and the enemies to lovers was nowhere in the room with us!

but i had fun and would recommend for a fast paced read

thank you to netgalley and publisher for this arc in exchange for an honest review

Inesa and her brother Luka are barely making ends meet with their taxidermy shop. From the outset, their mother is an unlikable character. Not only is she not providing for them, but she is racking up debt, ultimately leading her to decide to offer up one of her children for the assassination gauntlet. Inesa feels helpless because she knows that at some point, something like this will happen, but she still can't believe her mother would do something like that. Melinoë is such an interesting character, and as she hunts Inesa, she begins to question everything she has been taught. We get to see both girls grow and realize that life could be different. While also coming to terms with their sexuality.


Thanks to the Publisher and Net Galley for the arc!

This book brought me back to grade school when I first read The Hunger Games series and I loved every second. The writing is beautiful and I enjoyed engaging in both Inesa’s and Melinoë’s points of view. It is definitely heavily influenced by THG, so if you enjoyed that series, you’ll love this book. It does touch more on apocalyptic, climate change, and the circumstances of obtaining debt. Thank you NetGalley and Ava Reid for the early copy!

Ava Reid wrote Fable for the End of the World as a love letter to The Hunger Games and the YA dystopian genre as a whole and it certainly shows. As someone who grew up on YA dystopian, this book feels familiar and nostalgic but stands on it's own. I think there are a lot of teens who will love this story.

Initially, the comparisons to The Hunger Games overshadowed my reading experience and couldn't help but compare them in my mind. There's a lot of overlap (a central sibling relationship, a violent game turned into entertainment, a romance), but if you're looking for a book that feels exactly like The Hunger Games, this isn't it. This story is quieter and more character focused (very much in line with Ava Reid's other works). While it's not a Romance, the romance between Inesa and Melinoe is ultimately the plot. Once I understood what Ava Reid was doing with this book - telling the story of two teen girls discovering that they want to live not just survive - it really worked for me. Ava Reid's writing always draws me in and I somehow found the romance believable despite how fast their relationship developed. I particularly loved the ending which emphasized love and hope amidst the bleak dystopian reality. While the door is open for Ava Reid to return to this world, I'm not sure it's needed.