And Then I Woke Up

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Even though her mother is a general in Navarre’s army, 20-year-old Violet Sorrengail was raised by her father to follow his path as a scribe.

It was also the first book I read by her but I have read others since and they have better endings so if you enjoyed the story and it was just the ending that you didn't like it's worth trying some more by her! The plot twists in Devlin's novel turn the archetypal zombie story on its head and make for a thoughtful, if quick, read; readers who balk at metafiction can enjoy it as a horror story, while others can have fun with the novel's genre savvy. The plots and subplots aren’t well-integrated, with the first half purely focused on Violet’s training, followed by a brief detour for romance, and then a final focus on outside threats. But while Australia is wonderful and I do enjoy TV shows and books created there, I think that its global "cultural dominance" may be overstated here--so much so that I wondered if it was meant to imply the events were taking place elsewhere.If that logline sounds overly familiar, don’t worry, there’s a wholly unique spin that sets this story apart that I will try not to fully reveal.

The frightening thing about this story is that what is real depends so much upon our own perspectives. And Then I Woke Up takes place in a not-so-distant future where an atypical illness leaves monsters in its wake. And now we get to the point of the book, the burden of this And Then I Woke Up book review—what is the truth? Horror is still a pretty new genre for me, and I get to have that exciting reading experience of working out what I do and don’t like in a certain genre. It’s that some people have so much charisma, are so invested in their own beliefs in their own side, that they sway followers into their perception of what the “truth”, the true narrative, really is.That ending was a it was all a dream one, but it works because all the clues are there cleverly worked in. Due to the machinations of several traitorous instructors at Basgiath, Xaden and Violet are separated for most of the book—he’s stationed at a distant outpost, leaving her to handle the treacherous, cutthroat world of the war college on her own. Just when you think you understand the sequence of events, Devlin challenges that idea, introducing new variables for you to consider. Spence was working as a dishwasher in a pizzeria when most of the staff and patrons suddenly turned into rotting, ravenous monsters, forcing Spence and his friend Macey to kill their attackers and set the place on fire.

The narrator is one of the bounced ones and we follow his story as he tries to make sense of the strange new world he finds himself in. There isn’t much to say without running the risk of spoilers, but I was fascinated by the entire premise that Devlin came up with and its social commentary on the way people view and spread information and “truth” in the modern age. Interesting take on zombies, where people are essentially zombified by overdosing on negative news media. And though there is compassion for one another and shared trauma throughout society, the story really lives in the attempt to forgive oneself, and if said forgiveness is even deserved. Most students die at the War College: during training sessions, at the hands of their classmates, or by the very dragons they hope to one day be paired with.Part of the world believes certain facts that differ from another part of the world, even though they all are going through the same pandemic. There isn't much to say without running the risk of spoilers, but I was fascinated by the entire premise that Devlin came up with and its social commentary on the way people view and spread information and "truth" in the modern age.