The Apocalypse Seven

A Novel

By: Gene Doucette

Narrated by: Zeno Robinson, Erin Bennett, Kiff Vandenheuvel, Grace Rolek, Farah Merani, Juliette Goglia, Will Collyer

Scott Sigler called Doucette’s cozy apocalypse story, “entertaining as hell.” Come see how the world ends, not with a bang, but a whatever . . .

The whateverpocalypse. That’s what Touré, a twenty-something Cambridge coder, calls it after waking up one morning to find himself seemingly the only person left in the city. Once he finds Robbie and Carol, two equally disoriented Harvard freshmen, he realizes he isn’t alone, but the name sticks: Whateverpocalypse. But it doesn’t explain where everyone went. It doesn’t explain how the city became overgrown with vegetation in the space of a night. Or how wild animals with no fear of humans came to roam the streets.

Add freakish weather to the mix, swings of temperature that spawn tornadoes one minute and snowstorms the next, and it seems things can’t get much weirder. Yet even as a handful of new survivors appear—Paul, a preacher as quick with a gun as a Bible verse; Win, a young professional with a horse; Bethany, a thirteen-year-old juvenile delinquent; and Ananda, an MIT astrophysics adjunct—life in Cambridge, Massachusetts gets stranger and stranger.

The self-styled Apocalypse Seven are tired of questions with no answers. Tired of being hunted by things seen and unseen. Now, armed with curiosity, desperation, a shotgun, and a bow, they become the hunters. And that’s when things truly get weird.

Good idea but pedestrian ending.

Great, mysterious start with more questions than answers. Really interesting characters introduced but after the midway mark the story sort of peters out and all the character stuff is sidelined for an unfocused ending.

Some things don’t add up

Things just don’t add up. Maybe I’m just a nerd. Plenty of details were lacking.

The performance

I listened to the last third of it twice, but some bits of it still don’t hang together in my mind. But I enjoyed it anyway. I really like Gene Doucette’s work.

Whatever lol

I loved this audiobook! It had such a cool vibe all the way through. Of course, I like some points of you better than others but they all converge really really nicely. I liked all the twists and turns and how unique this spin of the apocalypse was. Some parts left me confused or puzzled while others had me laughing and wanting more. I will admit, little confused by the ending as it leaves some questions on answered but room for expansion of the universe, so let’s keep our fingers crossed there’s more to come for the story. This audiobook had the perfect set up for multiple narrators and all of them were exceptionally good. I loved hearing each narrator spin on other characters that also had a narrator in the book. It was a really good cast of characters and I really really enjoyed this one.

An OK Sci-Fi Adventure

I have listened and thoroughly enjoyed Mr. Doucette’s excellent ‘Spaceship Next Door’ and it’s equally good sequel ‘The Frequency of Aliens’ and so I had high expectations for this novel. These were not met.

The main characters were reasonably well established but with all their competing (and individually narrated) points of view it became a bit distracting. Another sticking point, for me was their pre-Apocalypse life really didn’t hold much importance to them and they showed very little remorse for what and who they’d lost. This caused the characters to be a bit flat.

I will not give away the plot; however I will say that while the characters trials and tribulations are interesting enough and well told, the main plot (the mystery behind their survival) was a little clunky and contrived. The big reveal was a bit “meh”.

Overall best for fans of “B” sci-fi, who are not expecting any compelling insights or plot complexity.