I didn't care much for this book. It seemed quite a bit unrealistic to me. I was more so hoping for an apocalyptic read which was only touched on in the last 3-4 chapters. This book mainly focused on the main character Liz, who resides in a bookstore and refuses to leave. Although she is young and should be able to adapt, she is incredibly inept at absolutely everything. I'm honestly not sure how she survived up til when Maeve showed up. In addition, she is incredibly stubborn and refuses to leave the bookstore even when she knows the bookstore won't survive the incoming storm (which in some senses is slightly admirable to want to save the books, but it wasn't written very well, she kinda was written like a toddler stomping her feet and throwing a tantrum). She also over analyzes absolutely everything which I found to be incredibly annoying. Like after someone tries to kill you, you're first thought shouldn't be "Oh they didn't have a choice. I should tell her I understand why she did that to me."

Maeve is the saving grace in this story. She is at least reasonable. She is the only reason the bookstore has a chance of surviving the storm.

Finally, I hated that during one of the fight scenes when someone Liz cared about was hurt, everyone stopped fighting to watch her cry over her. Helloooo? That's not realistic at all!!

Lily Braun-Arnold’s The Last Bookstore on Earth is a love letter to books and the magic of storytelling. Set in a post-apocalyptic world where stories are a precious relic of the past, this heartwarming and imaginative tale celebrates the resilience of humanity and the power of literature to unite and inspire. With vivid world-building and unforgettable characters, this book is a must-read for bibliophiles and anyone who believes in the transformative power of stories

Liz Flannery has been living in an abandoned bookstore in New Jersey. She took refuge in it after a storm hit that decimated civilization and killed millions. She barters books for supplies with other survivors and rumor has it another storm is about to hit. How will she survive it? She isn't ready.

Maeve breaks into the bookstore during the night seeking shelter and Liz catches her in the act. Both teens are wary of one another but they push thru and form a friendship. They decided to work together and prepare for the storm.

Things seem to be going well until Maeve's past comes back to haunt them and they are left to fight for their lives.

The Last Bookstore on Earth wasn't exactly what I was anticipating. I expected more about the storms rather than little glimpses. This left me feeling disappointed. I wanted to know and "see" the fall of society however survivors guilt and learning to live in a world which society has changed vastly plays an important role.

The characters are realistic and my favorite moments took place between Liz and customers who visited the bookstore. Braun-Arnold paints a perfect picture of the bookstore. I could easily imagine it and place myself inside it. Reading this book was a bit of a struggle but I'm glad I read it despite disagreeing with the ending.

** I received a free copy of this book from NetGalley in exhange for an honest review.

Starting the new year with a very competent first novel from a pretty young author!

This book scratched a number of itches for me—even in the worst timeline that we're living, and kind of especially in this worst timeline, I really enjoy stories about people surviving the end of the world. This one has the added bonus of girls falling in love, and a bookstore! Two of my favorite things. I was very charmed by the narrative voice of Liz, the POV character, who just wants to hunker down with all the books and make whatever kind of quiet, contained life she can make for herself. And I was equally charmed by Maeve, her tough guy attitude and her useful baby butch fix-it skills! The way these two clashed—until they didn't—was fun, and predictable in a pleasant way rather than an irritating way. And of course, the whole thing made me so nostalgic for my bookselling days!!

That said, I finished the book feeling like i hadn't gotten enough of anything. I wanted to be even more in love with their love, and even more devastated by their backstories and their pain. I wanted to feel even more tense about what would happen when the second world-ending Storm inevitably blew through, or how they would get out of the various scrapes and dangers they got into. As with so many things, this is a matter of taste! I'm the kind of reader who wants to wail and gnash my teeth, and I like being surprised by twists and outcomes and obstacles. thinking back to how I've sobbed over other apocalyptic books, this one didn't quite achieve those high highs and low lows that I look for, or the level of tension that makes those extremes work in a story like this. But I think for some folks that will make it more appealing than something devastating.

So it depends on what you're looking for, but either way, I'll be keeping an eye out for more by Braun-Arnold! I think the potential is there for her to write something that destroys me.

Another take on a dystopian world…..acid rain killing off the population……and leaving destruction in its path.
Liz refuses to leave the bookstore that she worked at before the Storm. Even though it’s falling apart and she doesn’t know how to fix it. Maeve shows up and they become reluctant roommates. But Maeve has a past that is trying to catch up to her and it becomes intertwined with Liz’s past.
This is a very slow book. I mean it literally takes place in a bookstore…..with 2 characters for the majority of the book. Not to mention a lot of it is internal monologue.
That being said, if I had to imagine being a 17 year old who lost my whole family……I would probably be a lot like Liz.
Overall a decent YA dystopian book.
I received an ARC of this title, all opinions are my own.

[arc review]
Thank you to Penguin Teen Canada for providing an arc in exchange for an honest review.
The Last Bookstore on Earth releases January 7, 2024

Elizabeth works at a bookstore and has decided to find refuge there, spending her time trading books for valuable goods and necessities, now that the world has turned apocalyptic. Aside from a frequent visitor in the form of a nameless man donning a peacoat, there’s maybe a few dozen other people lingering around or passing through the area.

With another catastrophic storm quickly approaching, a girl named Maeve seeks shelter at the bookstore, and soon becomes friends with Elizabeth after a rocky first impression as an intruder. But a storm with acidic rain might not be the worst thing they’ll have to face together.

Over the past several months, Elizabeth has made a utopia for herself in the bookstore, never having to leave its premises to defend herself or hunt for food, unlike Maeve, who has lived a vastly different experience in the outside world.
Though they’ve both lived a rather solitary life thus far, the two of them could not be more different. But then again, just like grief, survival looks different for everyone.

This debut had a lot of potential, but ultimately fell short of my expectations.
Elizabeth was too naive of a character and felt rather one-note; I wanted to see her achieve a much greater character arc.
Had this story been told exclusively from the pov of Maeve, the post-apocalyptic worldbuilding would’ve been more expansive, and there would’ve been more depth and grit overall.

Their reckless fumble with the generator stuck out like a sore thumb and its unrealistic depiction left an unfavourable lasting impression of the plot and character conflicts that followed.

Another thing I found hard to believe was the fact that Eva was in walking distance from Elizabeth the entire time yet never once thought to come back out of curiosity… surely she would’ve heard about the postal service exchange point that was set up through word of mouth?

I would like to suggest a new sub-genre: cozy dystopian scifi.

I mean, I don't know of any others. Just this one.

But that's what this is.

The story is bleak but hopeful. The setting is apocalyptic, but in a cozy bookstore. And there's still time for a romance (romcom? Can I call this a romcom?)

Delightfully genre bending, at once both tender and angry, with a main character who feels more real than some real people I know in real life.

And what better spot to find yourself at the end of the world than a bookshop!

"I couldn't understand what value a book had in this new world. I mean, I understood what it meant to me, but to the rest of the world? It soon became clear that I severely underestimated the power of distraction."

If you're looking for a safe place to hide, with a good distracting story, this book might be it. Put on an Alanis Morissette track and curl up with it. In the end, it's still dystopia - but there are flowers and spring.

The Last Bookstore on Earth by Lily Braun-Arnold sounded good to me at first, but this book just wasn't for me. I liked the story itself, minus the post-apocalyptic part! Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an advance reader copy of this title in exchange for my honest review.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for providing this eARC.

The Last Bookstore on Earth is set in an immediate post-apocalyptic New Jersey and follows teens Liz and Maeve as they must work together to survive another climate disaster.

This wasn't necessarily the YA dystopian I was hoping for, but it was a nice little book that I did ultimately enjoy reading. The world the characters exist in felt realistic, but the world at large was not the focus of the story. Instead, the book concerned itself predominantly with character, and with the impact that surviving such a wide-scale disaster has on an individual person. There was also, of course, romance, which was sweet and heartfelt. I did struggle to believe some of the stakes -- often there were moments where it seemed Liz and Maeve should be staring down the barrel of immediate doom, but that intensity is never reflected in the text -- but I do, in retrospect, appreciate the way that this choice contributed to the overall soft tone of the book. This is definitely one of those reads that I think most readers could enjoy, but only if they're willing/able to leave their expectations at the door.

Thank you to NetGalley, Random House Children's Delacorte Press, and Lily Braun-Arnold for the opportunity to read The Last Bookstore on Earth in exchange for an honest review.

In a nutshell: severe storms including burning acid rain destroys the East Coast (and perhaps the world, but who knows?). Once girl takes refuge in a book store where she used to work. Encounters another girl who she starts to like.

A more thorough explanation: due to climate change, sever storms have demolished much of the east coast. Since the novel is from the perspective of eighteen-year-old Liz, not much is known about the devastation of the world beyond her hometown. She takes refuge in a bookstore that becomes this this little place of passing for people coming through. They exchange goods for books or offer good for Liz's services to help deliver messages from those looking for loved ones who may also pass through. Liz's family is gone, and her co-worker, Eva, left her all alone, so she finds solace in her continued work in the supposedly last bookstore on Earth.

Enter a girl named Maeve. She's fierce. Her gung-ho attitude helps break Liz out of her shell. She hasn't left the bookshop in a year, since the first storm, and a second skin-melting storm is predicted to be coming through soon. Maeve helps Liz repair the shop and use the generator (after a bit of a dumb incident), and the two girls grow ever closer, but Maeve isn't ready to add her story to Liz's collection that she gains from travelers. Not yet, anyway. Trust is a challenge in a world such as this.

Liz will learn that people are not what they once were. The post-apocalyptic world has changed humanity. It's all about survival now, and most don't have what Liz does. Some will do anything to take it.

I loved this book. It is an interesting concept that resonates with a near-future vibe when we consider acid rain and climate change in our world today. The author, through Liz, describes the rain as "blistering...clothing barely clings to her figure. Her pale skin hangs off like it's been melted by a blowtorch" (location 3712). Can you imagine acid rain that devastating?

I enjoyed the LGBTQ aspect being delivered her, but also the fact that it wasn't necessarily the main focus of the novel. Liz has something good going in this post-apocalyptic world and it demonstrates the good that humanity once was and can still be capable of, despite the circumstances. This novel also explores human nature when it comes to survival, and when food and shelter isn't readily available, a person's constitution and self will change.

What a thoroughly enjoyable debut! Teen readers will devour this novel, and fans of post-apocalyptic fiction will enjoy a different approach to the end of the world.

A fun and fast read. I did feel like some of the problems were solved too easily. Though overall it was a good story I would recommend. If you like sapphic, grief, and a little body horror give this one a try.

An acid rainstorm devastates a Jersey suburb where 17-year-old Liz lives, and she takes refuge in her workplace: the last bookstore on Earth, at least as far as she knows or cares. I loved the first few chapters of this book. The post-apocalyptic setting features a girl living in a bookstore where people trade books and leave letters for their friends and family—that's the story I was excited to read. I wish we could have kept it in the bookstore, met interesting people, and heard their stories. However, the main character ends up being frustratingly naïve, and the story is boring. The post-apocalyptic narrative feels underdeveloped and shallow. Conflicts resolve too quickly and easily, failing to create real tension or concern for the characters. I tried to excuse Liz's naivety, but her refusal to leave the bookstore despite her friends' warnings about certain death is exasperating.

Absolutely adore this author and will read anything they have written or will write. New favorite! Will purchase for libraries.

YA dystopian tale with a twist!

The Last Bookstore on Earth is a new YA dystopian/speculative fiction novel from Lily Braun-Arnold, and it offers a fresh twist on the plethora of end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it tales. While Liz, the main character, has suffered the loss of her family, friends, and the life she knew (like everyone else in the story), she retreats to the only place of safety she knows left standing (the local bookstore where she had an afterschool part-time job). She creates a little beacon of “normal” for others as she continues to open the store daily, offering book recommendations and a place to leave messages. However, as a repeat of The Storm looms on the horizon, the bookstore faces a much more imminent threat. A small group of organized survivors are out for revenge against her new partner, and they’ve tracked their prey to the bookstore’s doorstep.

Liz Flannery is the unusual protagonist of the story. She and her twin, Thea, were only a few weeks away from heading off for their first year of college when The Storm arrived, changing everything. Liz was the only one in her small family to live through it and suffered the burden of survivor’s guilt and more. When circumstances allowed, she fled to the familiar safety of her workplace and the comfort and companionship of another coworker who apparently had the same idea.

Liz, escaping her grief and guilt, is content with the setup and begins to feel a responsibility to maintain the facsimile of normal operations for the occasional survivor who happens upon the open store. Eva, though, chafes to escape the claustrophobia of the routine and her feelings of responsibility for Liz, and she abruptly abandons her. Locals and transients alike express their gratitude and appreciation for the continued existence of the story and their ability to leave messages there for friends and loved ones and trade supplies for what they need, which keeps Liz from ever having to forage through the rubble and death of her New Jersey hometown. Their generous offerings, though, isolate her further and keep her from understanding just how much the world outside the bookstore has changed for the desperate.

The plot just gets established when rumors that another storm is headed their way. Customers leave messages for those coming behind them and urge Liz to evacuate; the store was greatly damaged in the first storm and is unlikely to withstand another. But Liz sees a solution to leaving her safe place in the appearance of Maeve, a drifter about her age, who breaks in one night looking for shelter and salvage and claiming to be able to make the necessary repairs to the building. Maeve, having started her journey in New York City, knows how much life has devolved and has had her run-ins with some of the more organized survivors. She’s tougher and more aggressive than the passive, polite Liz, but they eventually form an attachment and help each other work through the past year of trauma and scramble to prepare for the coming storm.

The author can certainly tell a mesmerizing tale! I read this in one enjoyable evening with no regrets after staying up way past what was prudent in order to reach the finish. The story’s pacing kept me engaged, and I needed to see what happened next. The vivid descriptions of the settings created strong visuals, placing me in the scenes firsthand. Characters are well-developed, and I felt sympathy for even those I didn’t particularly care for or agreed with their actions. I was delighted by the premise, a bookstore all to oneself, but in a Twilight Zone-style twist, staying open for business as usual as the society around it collapses, creating a little island of “normal” and a haven of familiarity, comfort, and even, safety for those left behind. Liz’s collecting the stories of the survivors willing to share them with her was an absolute bonus.

I recommend THE LAST BOOKSTORE ON EARTH to readers of young adult post-apocalyptic and dystopian fiction, especially those who enjoy a positive LGBT, however low-key, representation.

I enjoyed this book. The premise was great. Climate change is a relevant and hot topic currently, yet acid rain was a new take on it. I loved that the refuge for all survivors was a bookstore and books/stories represented humanity. However, the story seemed to drag on. Maybe it was the pacing or perhaps a couple side stories could have been editted out. Overall, I enjoyed the novel.

'The Last Bookstore on Earth' is a dystopian look at the remnants of living after a catastrophic storm brings the kind of Storm that leaves death in its wake to the tune of a post-apocalyptic setting.

Written primarily from the POV of the main character, there are occasional entries from others she has met along the timeline. Just brief glimpses at who they were. The narrative shifts between current day for Liz as she goes about her days inside the bookstore where she worked prior to the cataclysmic event and flashbacks of her life before the Storm arrived.

Only seventeen, she's a bookish girl who's set up a trading post.. using the books she has and her unique ability to maintain a sort of pre-disaster feeling of some normalcy for her customers in exchange for much needed supplies she might not otherwise have access to.

After a break-in brings Maeve into her life, there's immediate distrust between the two girls. But having learned another Storm is on the way, the pair end up combining their efforts in hopes of surviving. There are repairs desperately needed for the bookstore if it's ever to ride out the second Storm. Yet amidst the anxiety and danger the two face as they attempt to ready themselves for another oncoming disaster, something lovely begins to grow.

To be honest, this book started out a little rough for me. It was just failing to hook me I guess.. between Liz's narrative voice and some overly simple phrasing that had me worried the rest of the book was going to be that way.

Though I struggled through the first twenty percent of the book, once the pair started really interacting.. it was much more engaging. I realize in hindsight, the main character just simply seems to lack the charisma to carry the entire story alone.. and that's fine. She's a normal girl in a terrible situation and it makes sense that from her perspective, she conveys the vitality of those in her orbit much more vibrantly than herself.

The story is billed as perfect for fans of Station Eleven and The Last of Us.. and while I don't disagree with that generalization.. know that the biggest difference is it's not as cerebral. It's a YA story with some grit and a couple of really brutally visual scenes. In fact, if you're squeamish.. this might not be the book for you.. but I really ended up enjoying it.

There are a couple of decisions made toward the end of the book that I felt were a little bit of a stretch, but 'suspension of disbelief' and all that. I definitely got plenty of drama and worry, a clear sense of urgency, and an investment in the pair as they found themselves fighting for their lives.

I'm not crying, you are.

This book was a beautiful tale of healing, of learning to trust, and the importance of not always being unforgiving to yourself. I loved how all the characters and their motivations makes sense, but at the same time we can be frustrated with their thought processes. I appreciated that it took time for them to trust, and it wasn't a overnight thing. I also appreciate that it wasn't unnecessarily gorey like the Walking Dead.

The Last Bookstore on Earth, Lily Braun-Arnold’s debut YA novel, is a post-apocalyptic love and survival story– all set in a suburban bookstore.

Liz is mostly fine on her own. Sure, she thinks about what future alien overlord archaeologists will say when they discover the remains of this world, and sometimes they even get a little judgy over her choices, but for a seventeen year old surviving after the end of the world, she’s really not doing too poorly. Then she gets the news that a second Storm is coming. More acid rain, leading to acidic floodwaters, high winds, debris thrown about– none of this is good, especially since Liz has spent more time reading than repairing since the first world-ending Storm arrived almost a year ago.

Then Maeve tumbles into her life, changing everything. Unlike Liz, who has mostly stayed at the bookstore since the end of the world, Maeve has been on the move. But her tent is busted, and she needs a place to stay while repairing it. Luckily for Liz, Maeve has some DIY repair knowledge.

The Last Bookstore blends a love story and a survival story into one while building a fascinating setting. Liz’s emotional connection the bookstore could very well be her undoing, a topic this novel tackles while exploring themes of prioritizing physical versus mental health.

The climate disaster as an apocalypse serves as the foundation for worldbuilding and invites some of the more gruesome descriptions. Resource scarcity combines with Liz’s knowledge gaps to make survival especially tenuous.

Primarily character-driven with some high-action, high-stakes moments, this YA novel is sure to delight climate disaster fans as well as those who love a YA sapphic romance.

Thank you to the author, Random House Children’s, and NetGalley for a digital ARC such that I could share my honest opinion.

THOUGHTS

I adored this book! It's the perfect bookish apocalypse, ideal for anyone who has ever thought a bookstore would be the best place to hunker down through an apocalyptic storm. It's surprisingly warm and cozy for an apocalyptic story, and I really liked that shake-up of the usual genre conventions.


PROS
New Energy: I loved Liz as a protagonist because she's so different from the usual apocalyptic lead. She's not particularly efficient, talented, or knowledgeable. She's got no special skills. And she's been doing this survival thing for a while now (so she's not just someone waiting to be whipped into shape by a new apocalyptic reality). This new type of main character gives an entirely different energy to an apocalyptic world that I absolutely love!

Bookish Apocalypse: This bookstore might have seen better days, but that doesn't make it any less of an excellent setting. There's just something about a bookstore when the lights have gone off (in this case, permanently). It's spooky but also comforting and familiar to any bookish people out there. And as a bookseller, I can't tell you how many times I've had to shelter in place just like this (though for tornados, not world-ending environmental catastrophe). Overall, a great cozy setting for hunkering down and surviving through this apocalypse.

Human Goodness: Apocalyptic lit really has a dearth of human decency. Decency seems to be the first thing to go out the window when things get really bad. But that's not the case here. That isn't to say there aren't some bad actors here. There absolutely are. But it was nice to see in this quieter apocalypse a general sort of humanity peeking through. Liz isn't the usual apocalyptic protagonist, and the network that has sprung up around her isn't chaotic and dangerous. It's just ordinary people surviving however they can, and that's nice to see. Not everything human has to go away when the end of the world is nigh.


CONS
A Bit... Useless: As much as I liked the shake-up of character conventions that was Liz, she was a bit... useless. And to a point, that's acceptable. Why would she know all this stuff? She's not a survivalist by any means. But she has been surviving for a while on her own now, and she was making some pretty unfortunate choices in this book that did have me wondering how she had made it this far relatively unscathed. It's a give-and-take, I guess.

Insta-Love, 2025 Edition: Hey, I get it. There aren't a lot of people around anymore. The options aren't great, and people are lonely. So I didn't hate how fast these girls fell for each other. But it still is a bit of a sticky point in YA, and a lot of readers won't like how quick the l-word gets tossed out here. It worked for me, but others might not feel the same.

Quick to Anger: It's the end times. Tension is high, and not everybody's as laidback as Liz. I get that. But boy does this book escalate quickly right at the end. It felt a little too quick. It didn't quite match the tone of the book. I don't know that it was unrealistic, necessarily, but it did culminate so quickly and so violently that I was a little bit underwhelmed.


Rating

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
9/10
Those who enjoyed the long-haul of Stephen King's The Stand will like dipping into this world of scraping-by survivors. Those who enjoyed the quieter apocalypse of Jessie Greengrass's The High House will like sheltering in place in this ramshackle bookstore.

|| ARC REVIEW ||

{ The Last Bookstore on Earth }
by Lily Braun-Arnold

★ ★ ★ ★

𝙬𝙝𝙖𝙩 𝙩𝙤 𝙚𝙭𝙥𝙚𝙘𝙩:
📓 ya sapphic dystopian
📓 science fiction elements
📓 survival
📓 acid rain

Length: 320
Source: ARC - TBR & Beyond, NetGalley, Delacorte Press
Release Date: January 7, 2025

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𝘼 𝙩𝙝𝙧𝙞𝙡𝙡𝙞𝙣𝙜, 𝙩𝙚𝙣𝙨𝙞𝙤𝙣-𝙛𝙞𝙡𝙡𝙚𝙙 𝙙𝙮𝙨𝙩𝙤𝙥𝙞𝙖𝙣 𝙖𝙗𝙤𝙪𝙩 𝙖 𝙜𝙞𝙧𝙡 𝙡𝙞𝙫𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙞𝙣 𝙖 𝙗𝙤𝙤𝙠𝙨𝙩𝙤𝙧𝙚 𝙖𝙛𝙩𝙚𝙧 𝙖 𝙙𝙚𝙫𝙖𝙨𝙩𝙖𝙩𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙨𝙩𝙤𝙧𝙢 𝙬𝙧𝙚𝙖𝙠𝙨 𝙝𝙖𝙫𝙤𝙘 𝙤𝙣 𝙝𝙪𝙢𝙖𝙣𝙞𝙩𝙮. 𝙎𝙝𝙚 𝙩𝙚𝙡𝙡𝙨 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙨𝙩𝙤𝙧𝙞𝙚𝙨 𝙤𝙛 𝙩𝙝𝙤𝙨𝙚 𝙬𝙝𝙤 𝙥𝙖𝙨𝙨 𝙩𝙝𝙧𝙤𝙪𝙜𝙝 𝙬𝙝𝙞𝙡𝙚 𝙣𝙖𝙫𝙞𝙜𝙖𝙩𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙝𝙚𝙧 𝙜𝙪𝙞𝙡𝙩, 𝙝𝙚𝙧 𝙡𝙤𝙣𝙚𝙡𝙞𝙣𝙚𝙨𝙨, 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙝𝙚𝙧 𝙛𝙚𝙖𝙧𝙨. 𝙐𝙣𝙩𝙞𝙡 𝙤𝙣𝙚 𝙙𝙖𝙮, 𝙖 𝙜𝙞𝙧𝙡 𝙨𝙝𝙤𝙬𝙨 𝙪𝙥 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙇𝙞𝙯 𝙞𝙨 𝙛𝙤𝙧𝙘𝙚𝙙 𝙩𝙤 𝙛𝙖𝙘𝙚 𝙝𝙚𝙧 𝙥𝙖𝙨𝙩 𝙞𝙣 𝙤𝙧𝙙𝙚𝙧 𝙩𝙤 𝙨𝙪𝙧𝙫𝙞𝙫𝙚 𝙝𝙚𝙧 𝙛𝙪𝙩𝙪𝙧𝙚.

I adored both Liz and Maeve. I loved how as the story progressed so did the stories Liz gathered from all the people who stopped by the bookstore. The way it was interwoven throughout the book was so neat!

The plot was tense and believable and thought/provoking. Liz’s fear and guilt was tangible. Her sweet romance with Maeve was realistic and truly a sign of hope in the world. And I LOVED how the storm destroyed everything. Major dystopian vibes that were *chefs kiss.*

There were some tough parts throughout this story. Some gruesome parts. Some heart-pounding, realistic parts. We’ve all seen the movies or read the stories. The worst of humanity always comes out, but Liz and Maeve’s story of resilience is a cool balm against the destruction.

Absolutely FANTASTIC debut. Lily Braun-Arnold has set the standards high with her first novel and I can’t wait to see what else she writes!

{I received a complimentary copy of this book. All reviews are my own.}
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