The Dark and Hollow Places (Forest of Hands and Teeth Trilogy)

Authors need to stop waiting a year or more before releasing their next book in a series- I almost died waiting for this one! The Forest of Hands and Teeth series has been a roller coaster ride. Zombies, dystopian settings, fenced towns, and lost family and friends- who could keep up?! With the final book, The Dark and Hollow Places, Carrie Ryan exceeds expectations and brings a great series to a bittersweet end.Annah has survived for three years in the Dead City without Elias. When he left to join the Recruiters, he did it to find Annah's twin sister- the one they left behind in the fences and never found again. Annah survives day to day in the horrible city, but she has never gotten over her guilt for leaving Gabry behind. When she decides Elias is never coming back and she should leave the city, she sees someone at the gate she never thought she would see again- Gabry. She manages to fight her way into to the city just in time to see the gate dogs go after Gabry's companion, indicating he was clearly infected. To Annah's horror, Gabry goes after the Recruiters to help her companion escape into the icy river below.As she watches the Recruiters drag Gabry off, she knows she must find a way to save her sister. On her way home, Annah is surprised by the same guy who Gabry protected: Catcher. Catcher tells Annah he was sent to find her by Elias. He also tells her he is an Immune. Catcher was bitten, but didn't die- instead he can walk among the Unconsecrated (zombies) without being bothered, but the virus is still inside him. When the Unconsecrated start piling into the city, madness begins that is not unlike the horrors of when the virus first broke out. The Recruiters are holed up on their island, the only defensible part of the city, and when Elias is reunited with Annah, the three of them decide to make there way to the island where they assume Gabry is being held.What Annah doesn't realize is that to get onto the island, Catcher must give himself to the Recruiters. The Recruiters love having Immunes to do their dirty work and get food and supplies where the others can't go. They know, however, the only way to keep an Immune is to hold onto someone they love. In order to get onto the island, they must accept that they are prisoners. The island, full of dangerous Recruiters and a leader who can barely keep them from murder and rape (and sometimes doesn't), is almost as bad as the Dark City, now overrun with zombies. Together, Elias, Gabry, Annah, and Catcher must find a way to get themselves off the island and to a safe place where they can be together... but how can they do that when even the river is filling up with the Unconsecrated and the Recruiters put people in cages with zombies for fun?This was an amazing follow up to the first two books, and I think the primary reason for its success is that none of these books are true "sequels". They do not pick up where the story last left off or continue with the same characters, although they are all connected in very important ways. Master Plot Weaver Ryan has the ability to tell completely different sides of the story without losing her audience. She knows how to make you love the characters, even though the characters are flawed and damaged. Catcher was my favorite reprise in this story, as he struggles with loving Annah, feeling responsible for Gabry, and fearing even the slightest kiss will infect the woman he loves. He brings guilt to a whole new level!The language and violence in this book is slightly more mature than the previous books. I would say this was the most dark of the three stories. The Recruiters are simply evil, and there are things that happen on that island I can't seem to forget no matter how hard I try! This is a great series for any student, male, female, young, older. It will appeal to a wide range of students, and it really matures with each book, giving the reader a chance to grow along with the story. I absolutely loved this story and am sorry to see it end!

Annah is haunted by many memories: the memory of leaving her sister when they were young in the Forest of Hands and Teeth, the painful memory of getting caught in barbed wire and being forever scarred, and lastly, the memory of Elias leaving for the recruiters. Elias hasn't come home even though the requisite 2 years is up and her sister was as good as dead left alone as a child in the Forest. Annah is utterly alone and struggling to keep her hope alive in her dilapidated, empty apartment, but loses the battle. Armed with resolve to leave and start anew, Annah sees her sister at the gates to the Dark City with an infected young man. She turns back to find her sister, alleviate her own guilt, and reconnect with her twin. Unfortunately, forces outside of their control seek to keep them from finding a new life, namely the Recruiters (corrupt and brutal military men) and the walking dead.The Dark and Hollow Places is told through the eyes of Annah, Gabry's twin introduced in the previous book. The change in perspective is at first a little strange and then a welcome experience. Annah is completely different than both Gabry and Mary. Her hard life has taken a toll on her and made her more hardened and callous than the others. Her outlook on life is bleak, which isn't surprising considering the world in which she lives: one without hope or love. The scars on her face are just a fraction of the actual scars she has, both physical and emotional. She is strong and self sufficient or she wouldn't have survived very long in the Dark City. Her journey to freedom from the Dark City is paralleled by her journey to self acceptance. Her guilt and hatred for herself has consumed her for so long that she sees herself as a horrible and broken person, unworthy of any real relationship. As the story goes along, she learns to feel comfortable in her own skin and embrace her identity. This aspect of the story is one I think everyone can relate to. The story is really about a girl struggling to find her place in the world and learning to accept herself.The change in perspective is especially interesting because the characters and places all look different through Annah's eyes. The Dark City that Gabry's friends so long to live in is actually not somewhere anyone in their right mind would want to live in. The recruiters that rule it are brutal and violent, stealing from and abusing its citizens. The city is broken and horrible, just as it seems the whole world is. It isn't long before that city is also overrun with the Unconsecrated. The view of Elias is also very different. I remembered liking him in The Dead Tossed Waves, but now I really don't like him. He abandoned Annah to join the Recruiters, which was noble at the time. What really angered me was that he chose to stay with the Recruiters even though he knew Annah was out there on her own, waiting for him. He also leads her on and then acts as if nothing happened. To Gabry, he's amazing, but to Annah, he is an insensitive jerk.The dystopian aspects of the story are still intact and work very well. The Recruiters are awful, but also realistic. They do what they have to in order to survive and lord their power over those who are weaker for entertainment. They prove to be even more monstrous than the zombies and the characters fear them about as much. A wider view of the world is shown as well, but most of it is unfortunately overrun with zombies, dampening the hope that there is some sanctuary still in existence against the undead. This installment is the darkest and best of the trilogy. I recommend this to any zombie or dystopia fan.

This is the third in this series and I felt that it was the weakest. The three books are all connected and there is a sort of story arc between them but they don't form a true trilogy. The first book ("The Forest of Hands and Teeth") featured Mary who escaped from her village through the zombie infested forest. The second book ("The Dead Tossed Waves") featured her daughter. This novel carries on more or less immediately after the previous one and concentrates on Annah. The book features characters from the previous book so I would certainly consider that you should have read that to understand this one.The book again concentrates on the zombies and the human cultures which have grown up to protect people from them and also to provide reasons for them. Annah and her companions are kept prisoner to use Catcher's skills for a few people to survive. The book examines human nature in some detail and also poses a lot of questions about what we would do in similar circumstances. The subject matter is grim and there is continually a sense of menace and tension in the story telling.I found the unrelenting grimness of the book slightly offputting but I was more turned off by the character of Annah. I found her remarkably annoying although I am not quite sure why. She was quite whiny and without any real gumption (although I am not sure how I would fare in similar circumstances - although I wouldn't be the heroine of this type of story !). Sadly, she reminded me of Bella in the Twilight books - that is not a compliment.As a trilogy I found these three books unsatisfying because so much was started and not carried through. This novel does have a coherent plot but although there is a resolved ending I thought that there were still more questions raised than answered. This novel dragged in the middle and I found it only too easy to put it down and not finish it - I only continued because I had invested in the whole series and wanted to see how teh author concluded it. It is not a trilogy that I would reread but if I did I would just keep to the first book which is by far the best of the three. Only read this one if you have loved the first two.

I was desperate to read this last book in the trilogy. The books are called companion books, trying to give the impression that you can read them alone but I don't think that is the case. If you don't read Ryan's first two books about the zombie world it would be hard to understand the relationship between the characters and also the history of the current world that they live in.I had to re-read The Dead Tossed Waves book before I began this new book just so I could remember who all the characters were and where they fitted into the story. This memory loss is inevitable when there is such a long gap between books.So this book is told in the words of Annah, the twin sister of Gabrielle who has been living in the Dark City since she left the forest as a young child. The setting of the book is very bleak and dark and there is a menacing air of rape and violence throughout the story. I found Annah's story to be the most depressing of the three books, but this is understandable when you see how difficult her life has been.The main plot of this book is the horde of zombies (or unconsecrated) entering the city. The characters have to try and escape and at many points the author has you wondering 'how will they survive this?'. Lots of action but also a lot of emotional relationship stuff. Catcher really makes this book for me, his and Annah's relationship adds the positive dimension to the book.The book is thrilling and the ending is nail-bitingly good. I didn't give this book five stars because I felt that it would have been even better if we could have seen what was happening outside of the Dark City. For example what was happening in Vista? I would have liked to known what happened to our original heroine from the series Mary, who is briefly mentioned.

As the third in a Carrie Ryan's "Forest of Hands and Teeth" series, this novel introduces us to Annah. Interestingly, Ryan claims these books can be read as standalone's and considers them "companions" to the first book in the series - I personally felt that in order to fully enjoy each story it's better to read them in order. Why? Well Annah from this third book is the twin sister of Gabry from the second book who is the daughter of Mary from the first book so it's hard to fully connect with the characters if you haven't read the others yet (although you would still be able to follow the general plot).Remember Annah from the last book, is she just a copy of Gabry? No, Annah is very different to Gabry despite being her twin - Infact, despite loving Gabry in the last book, I think I liked Annah more. She's fiesty and comes across as an angry or bitter character; as we explore her story the reasons for this become clear. Annah is scarred and not just from the loss of her sister and her fake-brother Elias but also physically after a barbed wire accident; because of this Annah is resentful of Gabry and the relationship between the two of them is particularly interesting. Speaking of relationships, what about the love triangle between Gabry, Elias and Catcher? Well, with the introduction of Annah this becomes even more complicated because we are introduced to her inner thoughts about Elias, him leaving her and staying with her twin. But for me, the winner of this series as a whole has got to be Catcher. What a fantastic, intricate and well developed character. He describes himself as "broken" but Ryan very cleverly plays on this word and explores the broken pieces of all of the other characters to bring this into perspective.But what about Mary? Unfortunately we don't see anything of Mary or Harry in this book (and secretly I expected the breaker, Michelle, to somehow crop up along the way - even just as remains or something but this never materialised). I found this a bit disappointed but with that said, I'm not sure that Ryan could have gone much further with their stories so I suppose we have to let her off the hook. We did get a bit of an insight into Vista (the town that Mary and Gabry were living in) and it's relationship between the Recruiters (those who fight off the unconsecrated). When I picked this up knowing it would be the last in the series I was a bit worried that the ending just wouldn't be enough for me but it was a great ending - the only thing I would have liked answers about was about Catcher and whether he could spread the infection or make others immune like him because this seemed to be left relatively unsaid and I still feel in the dark about the infection.There's also an underpinning theme running through this book and we're asked to consider many times what we would do in their positions. I felt myself questioning along the way whether fighting for survival is really living, do the unconsecrated really win because they don't have to fight anymore?, can they still remember anything?, if it was inevitable that the unconsecrated would outnumber us eventually would I give up? What's the point in fighting? And Carrie Ryan does offer a couple of suggestions - in particular, Catcher and Annah have differing opinions a lot of the time which was refreshing and showed opposing arguments for the questions I had.Something which I've noticed throughout these books is the interchangeable names of a number of things. The Mudo are also called unconsecrated or Plague-rats in this book and this made the series seem more real to me - it's to be expected that different places will have different names for the "zombies" of their world because people living in each area generally don't stray far from their homes so their paths don't cross and names aren't shared. I've also found this series to be incredibly unique. The concept of the undead is a very over-done one but by displaying over a period of generations within one blood line was an exceptional idea. I've loved following on from Mary's story and again this made the series seem more realistic because they were continually having to fight off hordes of unconsecrated - the true expanse of the damage done is also discussed in this final installment which was a nice touch.So overall, another fantastic installment from Carrie Ryan; it's such a shame that this appears to be the last in the series of companion novels but perhaps if we pester her enough she won't let this series end. It really could go on forever couldn't it? With new generations and possibly a cure someday - who knows! I do know however that there is a short novella available for Kindle users out there which explores Sister Tabitha (remember her from the first book?)so I can't wait to read that. I can't recommend this series enough, go out and get yourself a copy - it's so worth it! Hope this helps.

With this book Carrie Ryan brings her superb zombie trilogy to an end with a breakneck finish. I loved the title as it could refer equally to the New York subways where a lot of it takes place or the dark and hollow places in her characters hearts as they struggle to chose life and love in the face of so much death and trial.This book is much darker than the other two and explores themes of torture and the threat of rape as we discover that even in the face of desperate odds man can still find time for his own brand of cruelty.In this book Carrie re-introduces Annah from book one who has been living in the Dark City and reunites her with her sister Abigail (now Gabry) and her lover Elias providing us with an instant love triangle and also drops Catcher; the Immune, back into the mix. The Dark City is in chaos with the Protectorate overthrown by a Recruiter rebellion and our heroes must fight to survive in the face of an invasion by the Horde.I only decked a point because I felt the middle section in the Sanctuary; which is very dark, went on too long for my tastes.Although Carrie Ryan has brought this trilogy to a successful conclusion I hope she can continue to explore the amazing world she has created with some more tangential tales of life after the Return.

'The Dark and Hollow Places' for me is the strongest book of the trilogy, and more darker, you see what life is like in The Dark City and how living there is a daily struggle of survival with the constant threat of the Unconsecrated who despite efforts still appear in the City where infection can quickly spread. As with the other books, there is the need to survive, to remain human, to make something new in the world that have been ruined by the dead. Despite the book being set in city, I found it more claustrophobic as the characters tried to avoid the Unconsecrated. The characters are well written as always. Annah, who sees herself as forgotten is determined but lost, she sees herself as ugly, when she is not and that was sad to read because you want good things for all of the characters.A great series which I am sorry to see ending, I hope Carrie Ryan returns to the characters of Annah, Catcher, Gabry and Elias again.