• Ashes

  • Fire From the Sky, Book 11
  • By: N.C. Reed
  • Narrated by: Lee Alan
  • Length: 13 hrs and 31 mins
  • 4.9 out of 5 stars (166 ratings)

Prime logo Prime members: New to Audible?
Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
Premium Plus auto-renews for $14.95/mo after 30 days. Cancel anytime.
Ashes  By  cover art

Ashes

By: N.C. Reed
Narrated by: Lee Alan
Try for $0.00

$14.95/month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy for $24.95

Buy for $24.95

Pay using card ending in
By confirming your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and Amazon's Privacy Notice. Taxes where applicable.

Publisher's summary

Post-apocalyptic fiction by N.C. Reed.

Its Thanksgiving on the Sanders Farm.

Clayton Sanders and his collection of friends, family, and even a few strangers have managed to keep themselves moderately safe in a vicious new world, brought about by the most massive Coronal Mass Ejection ever seen or recorded. Anything electrical and not protected from the surge of power has been completely fried. Most cars won’t start, the electrical grid has crashed, people with pacemakers in their chests have dropped dead in their tracks, the list goes on and on of things and lives destroyed by an electrical storm that lasted only a few minutes but created a light show that lasted for days. Once the shock wore off, the violence began.

Calhoun County has seen rough times, in some ways much rougher than the other rural counties around them. The seat of the county government is a ghost town and the people who have survived three different waves of violence have moved on to what they hope will be greener pastures. Clay and his family have helped as many people as they can but have had to draw the line for now, as they struggle to ensure that their farm and ranch can produce enough food to help feed far more than themselves. Even with a good harvest, they face lean times before the next harvest can be brought in. Helping others has left them with shallow cupboards once more.

Still facing problems, the National Guard contingent is trying to restore order, and Greg Holloway has been appointed as the new Sheriff. He faces an uphill battle to reestablish not only law and order, but trust among the surviving citizens for their peace officers, the former officers not having done much to endear themselves to the public. But the Sanders clan and their extended family and friends are about to face a problem much larger than any criminals they’ve had to face. A killer is roaming the highways. A killer that cannot be seen and cannot be fought. Their only hope is to once again cut themselves off from the rest of the world and wait things out. If others will only allow them to.

Excerpt:

It was the day before Thanksgiving and the weather had turned colder, with what appeared to be rain on the horizon. "Perfect pneumonia weather", the older folks called it. Greg had decided to make a long patrol on both Tuesday and Wednesday before Thanksgiving trying to cover as much of the county as possible before the holiday. Tuesday had gone by without a hitch and Wednesday was well on the way to doing the same.

“I’m not complaining about anything being boring,” Amanda said as the Hummer sped along, “but-,”

“Shut up!” Gordy, Greg and Shane all said at once, startling her.

“Sorry,” she shrank down a bit in the rear passenger side seat. “Just saying”.

“When you say it, it screws everything up,” Gordy said from behind the wheel. “It’s uncanny”.

“But still true,” Shane nodded.

“How you guys making it back there”? Greg smiled at the antics around him as he checked on the MRAP following them. Stacey Pryor, Tandi Maseo, Heath Kelly, Janessa Haynes and Devon Knowles were riding there, Janessa taking a turn behind the wheel.

“We’re chopping in tall cotton as my grandma used to say,” Stacey replied with a chuckle. “Had to bust up a card game earlier, though".

“I’d rather we play cards than have trouble,” Greg laughed. “At this rate, we may make it home in-,”

Whatever Greg hoped to make it home for would remain forever unsaid as the windshield of the Hummer stared in six different places within the space of two seconds as bullets impacted all over the vehicle.

©2020 N.C. Reed (P)2021 Creative Texts Publishers, LLC

What listeners say about Ashes

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    149
  • 4 Stars
    15
  • 3 Stars
    1
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    1
Performance
  • 5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    122
  • 4 Stars
    20
  • 3 Stars
    8
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0
Story
  • 5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    136
  • 4 Stars
    12
  • 3 Stars
    1
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    1

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.

Sort by:
Filter by:
  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

Frustrating

Having to wait so long to hear the audible version and when it’s finally here and seeing that is was over 13 hours I was beyond excited! But so much of this book is just a set up for the next (I hope?) and it made this more than a little frustrating. The snake bite storyline? What was the point? It literally had nothing to do with anything that came after. The rest of the book was just conversations for the most part with little excitement along the way.

I hope this series never ends, I really do. I listen to about 1 book a day and have over 1530 titles in my library. This series is in my top 3 and I’ll listen to every single book that NC Reed writes from this point forward, but I expect a beginning, middle and an end to each and this was just one long middle. It’s frustrating especially when you have to wait a year or more for the next installment in most series. I can’t explain how excited I get when a new NC Reed book is released on audible and I hope #12 comes sooner rather than later. Thanks Mr. Reed!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Great series

I have passed, many enjoyable hours, reading, and re-reading this series. Highly recommend,tell your friends.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Good series.

Good story … as time goes on, it seems more possible. Not too hyper realistic, but some good takeaways overall.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Great stuff.

I enjoy these books
And the story line is great. Can’t wait to read more from this author

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars
  • BK
  • 03-27-23

Another great book

He keeps it interesting and makes you want to keep reading. This one had a tough moral battle that I believe a lot would struggle with. Great book

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Awesome; BUT one major issue

A couple of the earlier books, I think the two most recent, had some small sections where the audio was not mixed correctly & one where the end of a chapter was simply clipped off.

I didn't mention these, because they weren't THAT bad; BUT in this book, Ashes, in Chapter 18 somewhere around the 16 minute mark, suddenly one can hear what I swear is a television playing in the narrator's background. I can tell you it's probably something like a sports show or sports news. Definitely something about football. It's not like it's way in the background. The level is almost the same as that of the Narrator, now making the book suddenly become a very difficult to listen. I hope this is fixed.

Ok. I went back & listened to this part again. The "background TV" audio comes in during minute 15 & disappears (for now) at 16:17. I hope that's it for the unwanted audio, because the rest of the book is superb.

I am at the end of the book now. It is an excellent story, a well-written & narrated book; & I REALLY like the notes from the author.

On to Book 12!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

background noise

I've enjoyed this series very much. There was background noise that distracted from the story.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

So Good it is Worth a Second Listen

This is an outstanding series! This is my second time listening to the series. I thought I would be bored the second time around but this is NOT SO. See my review on book 12. I was so involved in the story I didn't want to take the time to write a review and by the time I was finished I couldn't remember what happened in which book, but you don't need this from me. Listen for yourself, I am taking the time now to encourage others to give it a try.

At nearly 300 books to choose from in my library, this is one of my favorite series and I wish I could find more like this. If you like this series I highly recommend the Parno series. I don't know N.C. Reed and I rarely review books. Lee Allen is perfect for this series. The characters are rich, and the story is written well enough for me to want more books.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Best book series ever!!

Everything is so realistic & informative in this book series! There hasn’t been a book in this series yet that has disappointed, and this is the 11th book I have read! I am looking forward to book 12!! So incredibly entertaining, along with massively helpful, helping me prep. If you are a prepper or just like to be entertained or like apocalyptic fiction, this book is for you! I never knew that I liked apocalyptic fiction until now!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

you won't regret it

This series of books is one of the best ive listened to. Everything about it is amazing, all the sinarios are down to earth and are accurate on what would really happen. I hope one day that they film a series for these books. Thank you for the awesome stories N.C. Reed

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!