Fable for the End of the World

De: Ava Reid

Narrado por: Gail Shalan, Emily Lawrence

The Last of Us meets The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes in this stand-alone dystopian romance about survival, sacrifice, and love that risks everything.

By encouraging massive accumulations of debt from its underclass, a single corporation, Caerus, controls all aspects of society.

Inesa lives with her brother in a half-sunken town where they scrape by running a taxidermy shop. Unbeknownst to Inesa, their cruel and indolent mother has accrued an enormous debt—enough to qualify one of her children for Caerus’s livestreamed assassination spectacle: the Lamb’s Gauntlet.

Melinoë is a Caerus assassin, trained to track and kill the sacrificial Lambs. The product of neural reconditioning and physiological alteration, she is a living weapon, known for her cold brutality and deadly beauty. She has never failed to assassinate one of her marks.

When Inesa learns that her mother has offered her as a sacrifice, at first she despairs—the Gauntlet is always a bloodbath for the impoverished debtors. But she’s had years of practice surviving in the apocalyptic wastes, and with the help of her hunter brother she might stand a chance of staying alive.

For Melinoë, this is a game she can’t afford to lose. Despite her reputation for mercilessness, she is haunted by painful flashbacks. After her last Gauntlet, where she broke down on livestream, she desperately needs redemption.

As Mel pursues Inesa across the wasteland, both girls begin to question everything: Inesa wonders if there’s more to life than survival, while Mel wonders if she’s capable of more than killing.

And both wonder if, against all odds, they might be falling in love.

©2025 Ava Reid (P)2025 HarperCollins Publishers

Finding yourself

I loved that Inesa was finally able to learn something about herself and for a bit experienced a different kind of love

Alright…

I was very excited when I read the synopsis for this book, but maybe it’s because I just came off of rereading the Hunger Games series (with the new book released) that this story felt a little anticlimactic. Clearly, a lot of this book is inspired by the Hunger Games, and while the author did a good job of putting a spin on it, there are lots of moments that feel… too similar, in my opinion. Personally, I thought that there was a lot of promise in this plot, the world building was okay and I did find myself liking the characters. All of that being said, though, I feel we should’ve explored Caerus (i.e the Capitol) more. The other Angels and Azrael really peaked my interest, but they’re barely touched on. The ending was abrupt and left me disappointed. It just feels unfinished, with so much more to explore. This is a standalone book and I feel it would’ve been much better as a duology. The pacing is lackluster, leaving portions of the story to feel slow and a little boring. It picks up but still leaves something to be desired. All in all, it isn’t a bad book, but not one I will be reaching for on my shelf again. One positive note that I will end on— we need more sapphic books on shelves! This author did a fine job at building up a /mostly/ believable love story between the two main characters, and I adore their dynamic.