The Remaining

By: D. J. Molles

Narrated by: Christian Rummel

Length: 8 hrs and 39 mins

Publisher's summary

In a steel-and-lead-encased bunker 20 feet below the basement level of his house, a soldier waits for his final orders. On the surface, a plague ravages the planet, infecting over 90% of the populace. The bacterium burrows through the brain, destroying all signs of humanity and leaving behind little more than base, prehistoric instincts. The infected turn into hyper-aggressive predators, with an insatiable desire to kill and feed. Someday soon, the soldier will have to open the hatch to his bunker, and step out into this new wasteland, to complete his mission: Subvenire refectus. To rescue and rebuild.

The Remaining is the first book in the best-selling series, which tells a gritty tale of survival, perseverance and fighting to get back what has been lost.

©2012 D.J. Molles (P)2013 Audible, Inc.

I am hooked!

Zombies and apocolypse books are my favorite escape, and this series delivers! I went through the series one after the other because I could not get enough; then when I ran out of books, I listened to them again. The premise is unique (well, as unique as a zombie apocolypse can get) and presents different difficulties and challenges along with the usual end-of-the-world issues encountered when the zombies take over. This is not to say that there aren't a few things that bother me or that seem really illogical, but I don't know that you could keep the story going without a few ridiculous coincidences or really stupid moves. And speaking of the story, as I went through this series, I marveled at the author who could create this world, write it well and keep it going -- he is amazing, I can't wait for his next installment.

Stick With It, The Listening Rewards Come Later

I gave up on this book several times. OMG. I could not be less interested in the journal entries of a Special Forces Captain as he awaits a status report on what will be -- and this is hardly a spoiler -- the Zombocalpse. However, once Captain Harden leaves his bunker and starts carrying out his mission, we watch as if through a helmetcam the well-detailed journey.

Granted, a lot of details have to do with weapons and small-scale combat. This is not a psychological investigation of humanity's encounter with the undead or the various kinds of degradation into which some of our species fall after The End of Civilization As We Know It. There are simply the givens of the new normal in which an archetypal hero fights his way through setbacks, near-mortal wounds, treachery, and mischance to reach his grail.

The reward for listening to this book is that you will most likely be hooked and want more. Subsequent books are equally full of fast action, dangers, reversals and gritty hope. Expect the usual reductions of undesirables to laughable caricatures: the mealy-mouthed politician, the book-learned professor unsuited to survival outside his ivory tower, the incurious and easily misled dross of humanity, etc... Also expect typical female gender-roles, sadistic crooks, and the usual whiney sell-outs. Only the damaged-but-dogged military men and their gun-trained lieutenants are the natural leaders we can trust in an undead world.

Although Captain Harden and I would probably not exist in the same universe in real life, I find myself guiltily binge-listening to his progress. If I'm this susceptible to his blood-and-guts-soaked charms, I think anyone will be.

Excellence incarnate

I would recommend this series to anyone interested if you read this review then do your self a favor chip in and buy this. The book is excellent, the narration is excellent, the range of voices is excellent. Overall yep you guessed it, excellent.

Realistic View of a Zombie Apocolypse

I don't read a lot of zombie apolocolypse books, but this one gives a very realistic view of what might occur if one were to happen. The realism is the most notable part of this story, done very well by the author. It starts off very slow for a while, but eventually gets into some more intriguing situations. It's not really my kind of book, so I can't give it a truly objective critique. It's pretty well written, and the characters seem realistic. No romance or any frills with this one. It's straight to the point survival all the way. I wish it were my kind of book so I could give it a better rating since it's well written.

Felt Like I Was Inside The Characters Head!

Simply fantastic! Worthy of keeping the television off. Love the narration as well and am investing a credit for the next book in this series.

Awesome

I've finished the series and the novella so I'm posting this same review for each of the books. This series is awesome. Really entertaining.

Lee Harden is such a great protagonist. You want to shake some sense into him, you want to stand up and applaud him, you want him to stop being an idiot and then marvel at his genius. Mainly you want to grab a rifle and join his squad.

The story is suspenseful, intriguing and funny (at times). Is it believable.... it's a freaking zombie story, of course it's believable'ish. Great twists, some great wins, terrible losses and a lot of "what would I do".

The narrator is really good. I'm pretty critical of most narrators because you have to be pretty strong to fill my ears for 40, 50, 60 hours without annoying me. He was a perfect choice for the series.

Will there be more books? There have to be. There are too many bad guys to fight, too many bunkers to breach and not enough series out there of this quality. It can't end, we're all geared up and ready to fight. Keep typing DJ, keep typing.

Nice change

I like the different twist on the zombie novel genre. Having a government somewhat prepared for such an event. Great story, interesting characters and we'll read

Nice introduction to the series

This is a series of books that are meant to be read one after another as in the story stops and picks up in the next book, almost at the same point its not something that is sorta the same - so that being the case this review will sorta be the whole review of the series while the other books will have reviews just shorter ones.

The zombies in this series can sorta plan ambushes and sneak attack which makes for a more interesting zombies or "infected" as they are called, its not like you are used to seeing in movies or TV shows like TWD - the infection effected about 90% of the population and its unclear if there are any immune people but its unlikely and the other 10% are just the people who survived and they can get infected as some do but it takes direct blood to open wound contact or something close to that just getting blood on you isnt enough but if you swallowed some you would probably get infected.

This series starts off without much of a back story for the main character but as you get into it you pick up on things that help you understand who he is better, Lee is in a bunker that the government built for him and its his job to go into it when they tell him to and he is given a set of instructions to follow which include that if he looses commutation with command he is to wait 48 hours and open a special box that has more instructions in it and to wait 30 days before leaving the bunker after the last contact with command.

Well to make a long story shorter he leave a little early because of what he is told is happening outside, which is crazy stuff.

Lee gets out and things keep going wrong for him and its like whats on the board in his bunker "The only easy day was yesterday" really is his motto as things progressively get worse for him as his plans keep failing.

There are a few things I think were missing from the series or things that should have been done differently but for the most part I really liked it.

This is a good story and at times you think you know whats going to happen next and you are wrong, people get killed that you didnt think would and everything like that - I liked the whole series and I hope that its not the end I would like to see more books in the same world that continue this story because there are some unanswered things a whole other story happening with the command of the military that isnt in contact with Lee and I hope it gets written

my new favorite author.

I am looking forward to listening to the rest of the books in this series.

Great performance sort of saves it

Kind of a plotless zombie apocalypse story. However, the narration is one of the best I’ve heard.