The riveting follow-up to the New York Times bestselling The 5th Wave, hailed by Justin Cronin as “wildly entertaining.” How do you rid the Earth of seven billion humans? Rid the humans of their humanity.Surviving the first four waves was nearly impossible. Now Cassie Sullivan finds herself in a new world, a world in which the fundamental trust that binds us together is gone. As the 5th Wave … trust that binds us together is gone. As the 5th Wave rolls across the landscape, Cassie, Ben, and Ringer are forced to confront the Others’ ultimate goal: the extermination of the human race.
Cassie and her friends haven’t seen the depths to which the Others will sink, nor have the Others seen the heights to which humanity will rise, in the ultimate battle between life and death, hope and despair, love and hate.
Praise for The 5th Wave
“Just read it.”—Entertainment Weekly
“A modern sci-fi masterpiece.”—USA Today
“Wildly entertaining . . . I couldn’t turn the pages fast enough.”—Justin Cronin, The New York Times Book Review
“Nothing short of amazing.”—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
“Gripping!”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“Everyone I trust is telling me to read this book.”—The Atlantic Wire
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This book was a little slower to start than the first book. It starts in the middle of where the first one left off. Which was hard because I didn’t read them back to back and I had to wait for this one to come out. If you read them back to back you’ll have no trouble getting into the book. Again this book plays with your mind more than other YA dystopian novels. It gives it a step up on the competition.
In order to kill off the human population, you need to kill the part of them that make them human- their humanity. After the first four waves, Cassie found herself in a world in which people can’t trust other people. Now, with the approach of the fifth wave, she, Ben, and Ringer must accept the true goal of the Others- exterminating the human population- and figure out how to survive. They don’t know how far the Others will go to accomplish this goal; however, the Others don’t know how much this group of humans is willing to fight.
Keep in mind that everyone has their own opinion. This review is only my opinion, and you may have your own, different one. I would take into consideration what I say, but do not make a decision about the book solely based off of this review. Let’s begin:
I enjoyed the first book, but I didn’t love it. I feel pretty neutral to this one. Many authors will say that the second book in a trilogy is the most difficult. They sometimes turn out pretty mediocre because of this difficulty. Unfortunately, this book has fallen into that second book rut in my opinion. I didn’t hate it, but didn’t really like it either.
I will give the same warning I gave with the first book: this book is split into multiple perspectives, so if you don’t like that or get confused easily by it, this book may not be for you. I personally think this helps this specific book. Unfortunately, it still does not tell you which perspective you are switching to, leaving you to figure it out. This is fairly easy, but it took me a page or two sometimes and I would have preferred this not happen.
The four main characters in this installment are Ringer, Ben, Cassie, and Evan. The only one that I really liked was Ringer. Her perspective was the most interesting one. Cassie seemed to be put a bit more to the side for this book, but still had her time in the spotlight- it just felt a bit boring. Evan annoyed me because a couple of things that happened with him are really unrealistic (even with him being who he is) and I am really hoping they are explained in the last book because I do not like the twist with him. I don’t think it makes any sense, and I would have liked what happened with his character a lot more without it. Ben also got annoying because he seemed angry/whiny almost the entire book. The novel always says how little kids are the new adult, even going so far as to call Ben ancient for his age, and yet he acts more immature than the 5 and 7 year olds with how much he can’t seem to move on from the last book and do what has to be done. Maybe that is me being harsh and maybe I should be more understanding of his situation, but everyone else in the book seems to have dealt with what happened by now.
I was fairly bored for a lot of the book. There were scenes here and there that got me more into it, but the first 75% of the book was not too entertaining in total. The last 50 or so pages were where things actually got really interesting and captivated me. Those pages and the twist with the Others were honestly what rescued the plot for me. I almost feel like this book wasn’t really necessary and the author could have summarized it in about 100 pages in the beginning of the third book, making it a duology. Also, I was a bit confused sometimes at what exactly was happening. This may just be me, but I feel like I wasn’t vibing with the writing style this time. Maybe that is why I got confused every once in a while?
Overall, I feel pretty meh about this book. Ringer, the last 50 pages, and the Others twist were what balanced out the things I considered negatives to make a careful neutral. I will be reading the third book because I am invested in the trilogy now, but I do not feel any rush to like I would normally at this point.
Rating: 3/5 stars (-1 characters: annoying, -1 plot: boredom and some slight confusion)
Author: Rick Yancey
Publisher: Putnam Juvenile
# of Pages: 320
Genre: YA, Science Fiction, Apocalyptic (Aliens)
Series: The 5th Wave (Book 2)
This book gets better after the first. It has even more plot twists to it.
The first book ( 5th Wave ) starts to make sense here in this book . Ben Parish is a amazing character personally he is my favorite. I just love his personality especially in the first book he went back for Sammy and that’s how he found Cassie. This book had alot of action but not as much as the next book. I just love this series you get so connected with each character when you know there back round.
#Ben & Cassie 4 ever
#Best couple in book
#Ment to be
#Love them
#Ben & Cassie
Not a fan of the ending
This is the second book in a trilogy. (The 5th Wave) It picks up where the first left off (obviously) – 7 billion people on earth are dead, and the aliens who invaded have started the 5th Wave. Surviving the first 4 was tough enough, but the humans that remain (who are mostly children/teenagers) are fighting back. The aliens are not done fighting to exterminate the whole human race, and the humans are not willing to give up yet.
I was thrilled to be able to find a category that the second book of this series fit into. (the third does not come out until May). I really enjoyed the 5th wave, and made it my first book I read this year (so you can check it out here on the blog). The aliens have been watching the humans for 10,000 years before they attack. They have killed off 7 billion people with plaque, coastal destruction, and general killings, and now they aliens are killing off the last of the small pockets of people that are left. Which are mostly children. I did enjoy that this book told us more about the other characters that came into play in the first book – developing them a little more. But there was definitely not enough story line with our two main characters – Evan and Cassie. Cassie was the heroine in the first book, and we wanted to see that continue. We do – but not as much as I would have liked. They developed another female character and spent many chapters with her and her story – more than was necessary in my opinion.
But – the book was still enjoyable. And not a long book. I am looking forward to what the third, and final, book will bring.
I loved the first book but was a bit disappointed by this second one.
After months of reading this book, I can’t even remember what happened.
There was a lot of Ringer’s POV and I am not a big fan of her.
I had a hard time getting into the story at first. It took about 120 pages until something interesting happened and I could enjoy the book.
Then it was a bit dull again. I didn’t understand everything that’s been going on with Ringer and her conversations with Vosch were often really confusing.
I still want to read the 3rd book because I like Evan and I want to know how the story ends.
Just like the first book in the series, I could not put it down. There were alot of “oh crap” moments that made it even better.
Great!!!
I enjoyed this sequel to The 5th Wave very much. We get to see some returning characters and learn more about them. We meet a new character or two as well. And of course we have our central figures still involved. I love that Cassie is so strong and determined. I love that in this book we get to know more about Ringer and see how strong she is as well. Strong female characters are always a plus. We do end on another cliffhanger and of course book three isn’t out yet, so there will be a waiting game involved. Luckily, we have the movie coming out soon to look forward to in the mean time. If you enjoyed the first book, you will love the continuation. If you enjoy dystopian and sci-fi type novels, you should definitely read the series. It’s well written, engaging and very entertaining.