A Review of Shadow City
Los Angeles is an apocalyptic wasteland. The few survivors of a horrific catastrophe live under the constant threat of radiation, mutated creatures, and worse... lurking in the shadows. In the ruins of the deserted city, the scavengers Jean and Louis come across a nameless stranger and bring him to the only safe zone, once known as Hollywood. What’s left of society is divided among different factions; mistrust, brute force, and anarchy rule every day’s life. If the struggle for survival wasn’t bad enough, the nuclear disaster has shifted realities as we knew them and brought something into our world which threatens to exterminate the human race. Something so dark, that every living being is horrified of it. Something that feeds on suffering and violence. But humans aren’t alone in this existential fight. Unexpected allies emerge from the shadows and in the final stand, the nameless stranger will decide humanities fate.
I received this book in exchange for an honest review from Netgalley. I was excited to read a creepy paranormal apocalyptic around Halloween. Plus, the concept of this book sounded genuine unique and fun. I was really looking forward to jumping in.
The setting of this book did not disappoint. Having visited Los Angeles earlier this year, I enjoyed recognizing scenes from places I’d seen. The apocalyptic twist on the city worked out well and I enjoyed exploring the world and how it got to its current point. It feels like the author put a lot of time and thought into developing her world and fleshing out the details, which I appreciated.
The characters in this book were interesting. There was an exceptionally large cast for a book of this length, but each character is unique and engaging. Each character had a well fleshed out back story and was dealing with their own obstacles,. The point of view switched often between characters, each character had multiple scenes from their own perspective, which was a unique thing to see in a Young Adult novel. But it also made it very difficult to feel completely connected to any character. By the end of the book, I wasn’t quite sure who the main character was.
I struggled with the plot in this novel. The book was fairly short, so it was quick paced and had interesting twists. However, for a book as short as this, there was too much going on in the story. New plot lines were regularly added in, making an already complicated story more complex. I did appreciate how everything came together at the end, but didn’t feel like I was able to full explore each character and their development because of how quickly the story went.
Shadow City is a quick read, that you can probably get through on long weekend vacation or on the plane there and back. The world is well developed and engaging. The characters were complex but since the perspective shifted so much, I wasn’t able to connect to any specific character. The plot was quick paced but had too much going on for a book of this length.