Book Review: The 5th Wave by Rick Yancey (plus photos from my vacation!)

I'm back! :D

Okay, you probably know that by now, seeing as I've already posted two entries after my island hopping post. But this is the first post I've written since coming back from my vacation so yeah... technicalities. ;)

For those who are wondering, yes, Coron's amazing. It was like heaven on earth. The place is just sooo beautiful and cameras will not fully capture its beauty. Still, I tried. Here are some of the photos:




[caption id="attachment_789" align="aligncenter" width="538"] That's me, surrounded by fishes![/caption]



[caption id="attachment_787" align="aligncenter" width="662"] How amazing is this view?![/caption]



[caption id="attachment_785" align="aligncenter" width="391"] The beach is breath-taking![/caption]



Trust me, it's a lot more beautiful in person so you have to come and visit.

Anyway, one of the books I read while I was in Coron was The 5th Wave (nice segue right? ;-) ). I read a little of it but mostly I listened to the audio book, which I got for free along with my 30-day Audible trial.

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="317"] Click the photo to read synopsis or to buy the book. :)[/caption]

The 5th Wave was one of the most hyped books of 2013 and I can see why. I wanted to love the book; I really thought I would. But I was so conflicted after reading it and that's not a good feeling. I prefer my books to leave me feeling happy because of how things turned out, or sad because I didn't want it to end -- not relieved because it ended. Unfortunately, that's kind of what I felt after reading The 5th Wave.

BUT, BUT, BUT I didn't hate the book. The proper and organized way of explaining my thoughts and feelings would be a list, and I'd like to start with the not-so-good things first just so we can end on a happier note. :)

NOT-SO-GOOD THINGS:

1. The confusion
I get that this book is supposed to be mind-blowing with all its mysteries and mind-f*ckery and what-not. I'm down with that and hey, mind games are awesome. But in moderation please. Several times, I felt so confused by everything that's happening (or what I thought was happening) and I had creases on my forehead while listening to the audio book, which isn't very nice when you're in public transportation. I was repeatedly shouting WTF and what, what, what in my head. I had too many unanswered questions -- the biggest of which is, why kids?

2. The stress
Have you seen Kelley's (of Oh, The Books!) post about stressful reads? This is one such book. It stressed me out, and in a way that's a good sign because that meant the book affected me. But there's too much tension and problems in this book. The world as we know it is ending, how stressful can that be? Rick Yancey did a good job of making me feel whatever the character is feeling. Maybe too good of a job there, Mr. Yancey.

3. The pacing
So the book started out a bit slow. And do remember that I was listening to the audio book which made things a bit slower for me as opposed to when I'm reading. Then it picked up pace. And then it slowed down again. For a really long time it was just slooow. And then something happened and I said to myself, finally! Too bad it didn't last long. It dragged on some more until I started wishing that it would be over already. That made me feel bad because I really wanted to be excited about The 5th Wave, you know?

4. The romance
I believe in romance, I do. I believe that sometimes, all you need is love, love, love. But this romance element in The 5th Wave that makes me want to go and sing "We found love in a hopeless place..." seemed a little unrealistic and CREEPY for me. I won't go into the details but if you've read the book, you'll understand why I would think that. Kind of sad, because at first I enjoyed it and then later it freaked me out.

GOOD THINGS:

1. World-building
Now on to the more positive points...
The world-building in The 5th Wave is nothing short of EXCELLENT. Rick Yancey rocked it. I could totally picture what the camps, the houses, the characters looked like -- all because the author didn't shy away from the details. Normally I'd skipped the descriptions and all that but in this book the details felt purposeful. The vividness made it a lot scarier.
And oh, that scene at the highway? Totally reminded me of The Walking Dead. Actually the book mostly reminded me of TWD. Sure, there are no aliens in TWD but there are untrustworthy people, too. Lots of them.

2. Character development
As I've said, Rick Yancey doesn't scrimp on the details. And yay for us, readers, because here we got the full sense of what the characters are like. Listening to the audio book also helped in establishing the characterizations because of the voices and the narration. I liked both narrators, Brandon Espinoza and Phoebe Strole, although I was a little bit confused during the first part of Brandon's narration.
I usually like the male characters in books more than the females but surprisingly, I really liked Cassie's POV. She didn't sound whiny to me and I know that if I ever find myself in the same situation as hers, I don't think I'd be as brave or fast or cunning as her.

3. The very unique approach to an alien invasion
We've all seen alien-themed films and most of us probably think aliens are just... meh. With their funny faces and pointed ears and wobbly limbs and occasionally monster-ish appearance, who finds them scary? We're always bound to crush them anyway, right? Uh, no.

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="277"] E.T. phone home?[/caption]

The aliens in The 5th Wave are scary, and what's even more troubling is the idea that people don't know what these aliens look like. They can look like a really hot guy, for instance, and you'll never know. Tell me if that isn't freaky enough.

So, there. I expected The 5th Wave to be great but um, it fell short for me. Mostly because the confusion and stress drove me nuts. But I'm still looking forward to book 2, The Infinite Sea, because I'm really itching to know what happened to this one character. Do I recommend this book to others who haven't read it yet? Yes! I didn't love it but I didn't hate it either. And it's movie adaptation is rumored to come out in 2016 so there's more reason to read it. I've seen pretty great reviews of it and I am perfectly aware that my opinions are not yours so who knows? You might end up liking this book more than I did. Let me know if you do, or don't. :)

[caption id="attachment_338" align="aligncenter" width="143"] Good but not great, eh?[/caption]

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