Charlie Higson

The Fallen by Charlie Higson is the fifth book in his Enemy series, and I freely admit I am addicted to these YA books. Set in a not-to-distant future, a sickness has struck everyone over the age of 14. The ones that don’t die are left with ravaged bodies and twisted minds. They now roam the streets hungry for the flesh of other living creatures, in particular healthy children.

The author has introduced his readers to various groups of survivors, and the books skip around among these show more groups. He also changes the timing of his books, some happen a few months after the first book, while others are only seconds ahead. This is a series where you can never be sure whether any character is going to live, the author pulls no punches and no one is ever safe. The one constant through the books has been the setting of London. In this particular book, we follow a group of children who are living in the British Museum of Natural History. As characters get killed off, new ones are introduced and in this book, a group of very strange children with special skills come into the story and I suspect they are going to figure prominently in future books.

The action is fast and furious, the books are full of gore and violence. I think of these books as candy for the brain, and I devour them. Although The Fallen was exceedingly brutal at times it was also clever, fast-paced and made for compulsive reading. show less

I feel rather guilty that I liked The Enemy so much. It’s an in your face, dark, violent thriller about children surviving and fighting with zombies that I found extremely gross yet very satisfying. With it’s fast pace, alternative viewpoints and awesome London setting this was a true page-turner. It’s been a long time since I’ve read a book that actually scared me, this book reminded me of watching horror movies with a pillow held closely to cover my face at the scary parts.

There show more was a epidemic that infected only adults, most died, but the ones who didn’t became flesh craving zombies. Children learned quickly to band together in order to fight for their survival. In this, the first book of the series, we follow the adventures of a group of children that have been living in a fortified grocery store. They are slowly losing members of their gang and realize they need to move on somewhere safer. During a zombie attack, they save a boy who tells them about a place of safety and they decide to risk the trip across London to get to this haven.

I realized early in the book to beware of getting too attached to any of the characters, they are indiscriminately killed off, which for me, added to the thrill. Never knowing who was going to survive hyped the book up another notch. A warning however, this book does have vivid and very brutal violence, lots of blood, guts and gore, which, if you are reading a zombie book is probably what you expect. I found The Enemy extremely addictive and I can’t wait to get my hands on the next book. show less

A terrific conclusion to the 5-book Young Bond saga, By Royal Command addresses the issue of the "incident with the boys' maid" that caused young James Bond to leave Eton (for Fettes, his father's school in Scotland). The story is probably the most complicated (adult?) story in the series. As the plot progresses, Bond begins to see what espionage really looks like and realizes that not everything is always black and white. He questions his own beliefs and basic concepts of right and wrong. show more The book serves as yet another excellent opportunity to learn how an innocent young boy grew up to become Ian Fleming's cold spy with a license to kill. The final scene of the book, with Bond sitting alone pondering the lessons that he's learned and realizing that he is alone and will have to learn to rely upon himself is one of the most powerful and moving portion of any of the Young Bond books. For me, this scene ranks right up with there with the death of Vesper at the end of Casino Royale in helping the reading understand the deepest parts of Bond's psyche. Highly recommneded to all Bond fans (but I do suggest reading all five books and reading them in order). show less

The Enemy series overall is absolutely 5 stars. I’m 27 and I’ve been as obsessed with this series as much as I have anything I’ve ever read! I love these books and Charlie Higson has done something amazing in building such a big cast of realistic and engaging characters with so many interweaving plots. This books finally brings it all back together for the final confrontation with St George and his army, but in the end (ha The End) I was left feeling like something was lacking. It’s show more too abrupt and I’m not completely satisfied given just how emotionally involved I’ve been with all these great characters.

I’m going to lay out some negative points but really this book is awesome, all these books are awesome, and you need to read them! (Whatever age you are!)

An epilogue is what this book really needs! As it is the story just ends very quickly following the final battle, and I mean quickly... like twenty pages later. I want to know what happens after! What do the kids do now the threat of St George is over? How to they put their society back together? Do they continue to work as one group or split off again? What about Just John’s squatters at the palace? Just a few pages, or even some notes on a year or five or ten years later. I’m invested in these kids!

I was also left wondering if that really was the end of the parasite/virus threat because this book just focused on London! Surely if it was airborne the rest of the world would be affected (if they weren’t why did nobody ever check on the situation)? The cynical part of me thinks Higson ended it the way he did so he wouldn’t have to tackle that issue!

The last third felt rushed but my main complaint is that there was barely any Ed! I know he pretty much got a whole book in The Hunted but he has been a key character and for me; the one I have the most invested in because he’s been part of the bigger emotional moments of the series. He turns up right at the very, very end to save the day and that’s all you get. Not to mention Malik/Scarface who was built up to be such a great character in the last book! He’s up there with Shadowman as being one of my favourites. He gets a line. This wasn’t enough! I care about these people. If you get to read all the books consecutively they you probably won’t feel that way, but I’ve had six months or so to wait for this.

I hated all the stuff with Paul and it just felt too unbelievable to have him really be able to communicate with the sickos. I can just about buy the Twisted Kids but the Paul stuff just didn’t make any logical sense to me. David infuriated me, as always, and I didn’t really understand why the heck Jester (and the others) stuck around with him when he’d clearly lost his mind! The way things end for David were also not satisfying; he was such a dick and made some dangerous and terrible selfish decisions that I felt he needed to really get what he deserved. The way things go felt like he got off too lightly and it wasn’t a big enough moment. I actually feel that there weren’t enough Big Moments (or main character deaths) for the finale of a series that has been so (Game of Thrones level) high stakes for six previous books.

All that said I didn’t put this book down and it felt amazing to be back in this world, with all these characters again. I was worried I’d forgotten what happened but it all came back to me almost immediately. These books are something special and I’m a bit sad it’s all over now. show less