Saturday, February 17, 2018

The “Vaguely Dystopian” Book Haul


Stacking the Shelves is hosted by Tynga’s Reviews. I get to show off all the books I’ve gotten recently.

Some of these books might not be dystopias, but they all seem to have some dystopian elements.




The “Vaguely Dystopian” Book Haul 










Grief is the Thing with Feathers – Max Porter

In a London flat, two young boys face the unbearable sadness of their mother's sudden death. Their father, a Ted Hughes scholar and scruffy romantic, imagines a future of well-meaning visitors and emptiness. 
In this moment of despair they are visited by Crow—antagonist, trickster, healer, babysitter. This self-described sentimental bird is attracted to the grieving family and threatens to stay until they no longer need him. As weeks turn to months and physical pain of loss gives way to memories, this little unit of three begin to heal.









We Are the Ants – Shaun David Hutchinson

Henry knows that his mom is struggling to keep the family together, and coping by chain-smoking cigarettes. He knows that his older brother is a college dropout with a pregnant girlfriend. He knows that he is slowly losing his grandmother to Alzheimer’s. And he knows that his boyfriend committed suicide last year. 
What Henry doesn’t know is why the aliens chose to abduct him when he was thirteen, and he doesn’t know why they continue to steal him from his bed and take him aboard their ship. He doesn’t know why the world is going to end or why the aliens have offered him the opportunity to avert the impending disaster by pressing a big red button. 
But they have. And they’ve only given him 144 days to make up his mind. 
The question is whether Henry thinks the world is worth saving. That is, until he meets Diego Vega, an artist with a secret past who forces Henry to question his beliefs, his place in the universe, and whether any of it really matters. But before Henry can save the world, he’s got to figure out how to save himself, and the aliens haven’t given him a button for that.









Good Morning, Midnight – Lily Brooks-Dalton

Augustine, a brilliant, aging astronomer, is consumed by the stars. For years he has lived in remote outposts, studying the sky for evidence of how the universe began. At his latest posting, in a research center in the Arctic, news of a catastrophic event arrives. The scientists are forced to evacuate, but Augustine stubbornly refuses to abandon his work. Shortly after the others have gone, Augustine discovers a mysterious child, Iris, and realizes the airwaves have gone silent. They are alone. 
At the same time, Mission Specialist Sullivan is aboard the Aether on its return flight from Jupiter. The astronauts are the first human beings to delve this deep into space, and Sully has made peace with the sacrifices required of her: a daughter left behind, a marriage ended. So far the journey has been a success, but when Mission Control falls inexplicably silent, Sully and her crew mates are forced to wonder if they will ever get home.









The Passion of Dolssa – Julie Berry

Dolssa is a young gentlewoman with uncanny gifts, on the run from an obsessed friar determined to burn her as a heretic for the passion she refuses to tame. 
Botille is a wily and charismatic peasant, a matchmaker running a tavern with her two sisters in a tiny seaside town. 
The year is 1241; the place, Provensa, what we now call Provence, France—a land still reeling from the bloody crusades waged there by the Catholic Church and its northern French armies. 
When the matchmaker finds the mystic near death by a riverside, Botille takes Dolssa in and discovers the girl’s extraordinary healing power. But as the vengeful Friar Lucien hunts down his heretic, the two girls find themselves putting an entire village at the mercy of murderers.









The Last One – Alexandra Oliva

It begins with a reality TV show. Twelve contestants are sent into the woods to face challenges that will test the limits of their endurance. While they are out there, something terrible happens—but how widespread is the destruction, and has it occurred naturally or is it human-made? Cut off from society, the contestants know nothing of it. When one of them—a young woman the show’s producers call Zoo—stumbles across the devastation, she can imagine only that it is part of the game. 
Alone and disoriented, Zoo is heavy with doubt regarding the life—and husband—she left behind, but she refuses to quit. Staggering countless miles across unfamiliar territory, Zoo must summon all her survival skills—and learn new ones as she goes. 
But as her emotional and physical reserves dwindle, she grasps that the real world might have been altered in terrifying ways—and her ability to parse the charade will be either her triumph or her undoing.









The Wolf Road – Beth Lewis

Everything Elka knows of the world she learned from the man she calls Trapper, the solitary hunter who took her under his wing when she was just seven years old. 
But when Elka sees the Wanted poster in town, her simple existence is shattered. Her Trapper–Kreagar Hallet–is wanted for murder. Even worse, Magistrate Lyon is hot on his trail, and she wants to talk to Elka. 
Elka flees into the vast wilderness, determined to find her true parents. But Lyon is never far behind–and she’s not the only one following Elka’s every move. There will be a reckoning, one that will push friendships to the limit and force Elka to confront the dark memories of her past.







Have you read any of these? What did you think?









40 comments:

  1. I have We are the Ants and really want to get to it this year. Hope we both enjoy it. Happy reading!

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  2. I loved Good Morning, Midnight - kind of a quiet book, but so good!!

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  3. Ooh dystopian ha ha- even if vaguely. :) The LAst One has been on my radar, can't wait to see more reviews on it, and I've looked at Good Morning Midnight too. Love that cover!

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  4. These are all new to me. I love the cover for Grief Is The Thing With Feathers :) Hope you enjoy all your new books!

    My STT

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  5. I read We Are the Ants and enjoyed it very much! He is such a unique author.

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  6. So many beautiful covers! I think I used to have some of these of my wishlist before I had to delete my Goodreads account. D:

    Vee @ Under The Mountain

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  7. I have We Are The Ants, but I haven't read it, yet. The Passion of Dolssa looks wonderful. I will put it on my TBR. Have a great week.

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  8. Best covers this week: We Are the Ants and Good Morning, Midnight. They look amazing! Happy reading!

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  9. I haven't read a lot of dystopian since it was huge a few years back. I think I just got burnt out. I do own Passion of the Dolssa, though, and have been meaning to read it for aggggges. Happy reading!
    Natflix&Books

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  10. I loved The Wolf Road! I think that I have a copy of The Last One but haven't had the chance to read it yet. All of the other books on your list are new to me. I hope you love them all!

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  11. I haven't read any of these but The Last One and Wolf Road sound amazing! I hope they pan out! :)

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  12. I haven't read any of these books. Grief is the Thing with Feathers sounds really interesting. I hope you enjoy them all :)

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  13. Grief is the Thing with Feathers sounds really good, Aj! I can't wait to see what you think about it.
    Have a wonderful week ahead and happy reading.
    Lexxie @ (un)Conventional Bookviews

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  14. Good Morning Midnight looks awesome! I have read a similar book (minus the dystopia) called The Comet Seekers and I have only good things to say about it :)

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  15. I could not believe how much I liked Dolssa. I think it was one of the first historical fiction books I picked up in my adult life, and was really impressed that Berry made me enjoy the time period and topic. I went on to read and love another one of her books too.

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  16. I like the sound of these! I have a few on my TBR as well. I hope you will enjoy them!

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  17. Most of these are new to me! I have Ants on the TBR monster pile. I loved, loved, loved Dolssa! Enjoy and thanks for stopping by my Stack.

    b

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  18. Oh nice! These are all totally new to me ones! I hope you will enjoy each and every one of them!

    Here's my STS

    Have a GREAT day!

    Old Follower :)

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  19. I love seeing what you are reading but I also love seeing what made you laugh this week! Thank you! We need more laughter.

    I can't seem to comment on your Sunday post.

    https://readerbuzz.blogspot.com/2018/02/the-cybils-winners-single-book-reading.html

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  20. We Are The Ants looks so good! I'm intrigued! :-)

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  21. Enjoy them, they all look good. Especially The Passion of Dolssa.

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  22. I haven't read any of these books. I hope you enjoy your books and have a great week!

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  23. Wow. All of these books have such deep and though-provoking storylines. The Wolf Road one sounds particularly intense. Hope you enjoy your new books!

    Thanks for visiting Shell's Stories!

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  24. I've got The Wolf Road, but I haven't read it yet. It keeps attracting my eye on the shelf, though! Hope you enjoy all these. :)

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  25. I have not read any of these but they look good. I love the cover for The Passion of Dolssa. I hope they are all good books for you! Happy Reading!

    Mary #SundayRoundup

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  26. I'd not heard of any of these.
    We Are The Ants and The Wolf Road look just my sort of books :-)

    Stephanie Jane @ Literary Flits

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  27. I have a copy of Wolf Road and really hope to read it soon. I've also heard great things about We Are the Ants. Another great haul!

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  28. I've read and enjoyed The Last One and Good Morning, Midnight. Both were very good for me. The Last One reminded me of Survivor, and the other was a somewhat melancholy look at aloneness, and being comfortable with one's own self. Enjoy all the books!

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  29. I never heard of these books before now but each one seems like something I would read and enjoy. Hope you have a great week.

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  30. Oh hey, I've actually read some of the books you're reading! XD I read The Last One, Wolf Road, and Good Morning, Midnight. All were just okay for me, but they were all a little slow. I think of them all I enjoyed Good Morning, Midnight the most. I hope you love them all though!

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  31. We Are the Ants sounds AMAZING! I can't wait to see what you think of it!

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  32. We Are the Ants has been on my radar for quite a while and I've heard amazing things about it. Hope you have some real winners here!

    Tanya @ Girl Plus Books

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  33. The Last One is lurking on my Kindle as I like horrible game show books!

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  34. The last one looks really good. Great book haul

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  35. I really want to read Grief is the Thing with Feathers and We Are the Ants, they both sound really quirky and unique.

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  36. I'm excited to see what you think of We Are the Ants, it looks really good! :)

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  37. I hadn't heard of these before but I hope you enjoy them all!

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  38. Oh Good Morning, Midnight looks very interesting.

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