A stand-alone fantasy book set in post-Apocalyptic Australia.

Publication year: 2016
Format: epub ebook
Page count: 194
Publisher: The Hive

I got the ebook in exchange for an honest review. Once I realized this was YA, I had some misgivings but in the end I had nothing to worry about. S. C. Flynn is a fellow blogger.

Couple of decades ago a brain disease called the Great Madness swept the globe. It made almost all people violent and they killed each other. It wiped out civilization, leaving a few survivors struggling for existence. They quickly divided to the City People, who live in the crumbling cities and try to bring back the old technology and the way of life which lead into the civilization collapsing in the first place, and people in the Settlements where they live free of tech and even destroying any tech they find. When the survivors started to get children, those kids go through a Change which gives them special powers. However, some the kids come out of the Change just wanting to destroy and kill; they’re called Ferals and the others banish them into the wilderness or kill them. So, people are at first afraid of the kids who come out of the Change. In the Change, the kid falls into a coma and his or her mind travels to the Changelands. They rarely talk about their experiences there, even to each other and never to the adults who haven’t experienced it. Any injury they get in the dream state is real.

Narrah and Arika are 13-year old twins. They’re born to a small Settlement in Australia and are now near their Change. They’ve tried to find out as much as they can about the Change but haven’t succeeded. Only three kids have gone through it before in their village. One has gone Feral, one was kidnapped by the City People, and one doesn’t talk anymore. Because Narrah and Arika are twins, they have a special connection: the Path will allows them to know each other’s feelings and thoughts even from a distance. They’re also orphans and witnessed their parents’ murder.

The book starts when Arika’s Change begins. She falls into a coma and goes into the Changeland where she encounters strange and dangerous visions. She sees the world before the Great Madness and is chased by a blood-thirsty enemy. Eventually, she manages to call her twin briefly to the Changeland to help her. Narrah is very worried about her but the elders convince him to leave Arika in the care of their foster mother and do his chores. One of those chores is destroying a metal tower from the old days. Narrah and a couple of other men go and bring it down. But then they’re attacked and the City People kidnap Narrah.

Narrah and Arika are the two POV characters and we follow their paths in real life and in the dream world. They’re both very resourceful and brave people but they’re also very young. They’re anxious about each other and want to find their own place in the world. Oh, and there’s no romance or love triangles in the book, which was great.

The book has several scenes in the Changeland which is a weird place. It follows dream logic and not natural laws. Of course, the real world is a dangerous place with Ferals that roam in packs wanting human flesh and supposedly sane people wanting to exploit other humans.

I didn’t really care for the ending and I had some quibbles about the enemy, but that’s just my weird taste.

Otherwise, I really enjoyed the book. Siblings are still rather rare choice for protagonists and both Australia and the dream world were interesting settings.