Malorie

I was in love with "Birdbox", the page-turning quality of it just amazed me. That's why it earned the coveted 5-star rating. It got away with the ending because I knew there would be another book "Malorie" published five years after the first. I thought that questions about the creatures would be answered more in-depth and therefore wrap up the series. That's just not what you get from it though, even Malerman states in the end that this is a novel for Malorie. I like that, don't get me wrong. Seeing Malerman's perception of how a woman changes when the whole world turns against her is fascinating. I just think the idea of the creatures was the more unique and interesting to me. I wanted to get an in-depth interworking of how they worked and why they drove people crazy. You get some vague information at the end, and it leaves you sort of understanding how they work. But the fact that the entire two novels are centered around the mystery of them led me to want a GREAT ENDING. I felt it NEEDED this to cement itself. I just didn't get that personally. I think that you can have the focus on a main character like Malorie in a much different setting and get away with it easily, I would have been fine reading a book like that. A mother struggles with raising her children when her trust has been smashed to pieces. But when you have the worldbuilding and setting you do, when you focus on the protagonist instead, I feel like you're wasting the potential of the world. That may be harsh but I really wanted a strong explanation for the creatures.

With a heavy heart, I give this novel three stars. I'll read more Malerman he's a fantastic author, one of my new favorites, this one was a big disappointment though.