October 11, 2022

That is a brief question to describe what The 5th Wave series is about. When a perceived alien invasion tears apart society as they know it, a group of kids come together to try to save the world, or what's left of it. As cliché as that sounds, Yancey depicts the minds of his characters on the page in a unique and compelling way. A lot of the series is the character's going back and forth with different concepts as they try to find and understand the truth and what's right and wrong. They find that what matters a lot to them is their promises. Their promises prove to them what is important and become equal parts motivation and imprisonment for each of them. In the second book, The Infinite Sea, Cassie, one of the most central characters in all three books, thinks this after she makes a promise: "And the promise a sentence handed down, a cell door slamming shut, a stone around my neck to carry me down to the bottom of an infinite sea" (Yancey 171).

This series is something I've been wanting to go back to for a while. I read the first book as a young teen and never picked up the other two, but rereading the first book and finally getting to the rest of this series has definitely been worth it. In fact, this series has been one of my favorite reads this year. One thing about Rick Yancey's writing that is so interesting is that he doesn't shy away from carnage. There is blood and there is pain in these YA novels, because they are all about humanity.

If you are a fan of YA dystopian or apocalyptical fiction, then this is a good pick. It might also be a good choice if you liked Stephen King's Under the Dome but want something a little bit easier to read.