Devour

Death & Decay, Book 1

By: R. L. Blalock

Narrated by: TJ Richards

Length: 8 hrs and 42 mins

Publisher's summary

An infection is spreading. People are dying, but they don't stay dead.

St. Louis is falling to pieces. In the midst of rioting, a dangerous new disease has sprung up, pushing an already dire situation over the edge. Those who are infected suddenly become extremely aggressive, attacking and even eating those around them.

And Olivia Bennett is caught right in the middle of it.

When Liv comes face to face with the infected, her hectic life grinds to a halt as the city around her begins to devour itself. Forced to flee from her car with nothing but her 18-month-old daughter, Elli, Liv must trek 40 miles on foot across the feral infested suburbs of St. Louis to a safe haven that may not even be safe.

Fight or die. What other hope does she have?

©2015 Rochelle Blalock (P)2017 Rochelle Blalock

great series

loving this series! lots of action and zombie action. Great narration feels like im part of the story.

INTENSELY ENTERTAINING

At first i didnt think i was going to like it. i found myself wanting to slap some sense in the main character. but the intense and frightening journey of the main character kept it hard to stop listening. the story is good, characters are well written and sometimes can indentify with, and the narrator is okay.

about the human aspect of the zompocalyp

This story is an excellent example of the zombie genre - it covers the first 5 days following a zombie outbreak in St. Louis, Liv and her baby Ellie are caught in traffic on a bridge when the danger reaches them and Liv has to do whatever it takes to get them to safety.

This book is about the human aspect of the zompocalypse, rather than the scientific or military sides. It considers how ordinary people would react to this situation and how messed up things would get within less than a week (pretty damn messed up, as it happens). It's the race for survival that gets you hooked, the fear and uncertainty is tangible. Their journey has a few parts to it as they hold up in different abandoned houses along the way and meet other survivors, making it easy to break this audio up into series if you want to listen to it in smaller chunks.

I feel that the fear factor would have been amped up by using the baby as a character a little more, there were long stretches of time without any mentions of her at all when she could have contributed to the feeling of danger. This is an action-driven novel, with moderate gore and a load of loss and violence. It surprised me how quickly characters adapted to sprinting for long distances and taking mallets to the heads of the infected.

The TJ Richards'  strength is voicing the characters, she pulled off a variety of accents and gave them all distinct voices that I really enjoyed. She added to the atmosphere of desperation surrounding the survivors and made this a great audiobook to listen to.

Audiobook was provided for review by the author.

Please find this complete review and many others at my review blog.

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Middling Zombie Entry

This author shows promise. Decent character development and plot Strong female lead. Clearly a paint by numbers Zombie Book Hopefully this writer will continue to hone her craft.

The narrator was just ok. I occasionally zoned out though because she tended to whine/complain.

Great zombie apocalypse action!

Any additional comments?

R.L. Blalock’s Devour is the first in the Death and Decay series and is excellently narrated by TJ Richards.

Devour drops us right into the zombie apocalypse as we join the lead character, Liv, and her infant baby as they desperately try and outrun a zombie horde. They are only moments away from their final destination and safety when things break bad.

We then jump back to hear how they got to that moment.

The story is action-packed and keeps moving as society collapses around the main character. She bands with other survivors to try and make it to her safe haven. R.L. does a great job of pulling us in and leaving us hanging as we wait with baited breath to find out how things will turn out.

What did I like about this story?
I liked a lot of things about this book, specifically some fresh and fun elements the author uses to tell her story, including her unique form of zombie armor. There’s another unique aspect to the way her zombies behave at night that kept me interested and wondering what other new takes on the zombie apocalypse the author might have. I also really liked the transformation that the main character goes through in the book. R.L. puts her through some tough moments, but these shape her into a new woman by the time her story comes to an end.

What didn't I like about this story?
The only area I didn’t like in this story was I couldn’t figure out how the baby survived all of the attacks and fights that Liv found herself in. It seemed like the baby surely would’ve gotten injured in these various encounters.

Narration:
As mentioned above, the narration was excellent. TJ brought the story to life with passion and vigor. She gave unique voices to each of the characters as needed and is the lifeblood that kept the story engaging throughout the listen.

Conclusion: (Aka: Would I listen to more by this author?)
Yes, I am very excited to listen to the next book and find out what happens next!

It was an amazing story

This is an amazing story of a young mother and her young toddler daughter escaping the St. Louis area during the zombie apocalypse and seeking to reach safety with family and friends. It is an extremely poignant view of a mother and her struggle to save herself and her daughter as they travel to safety. At times with help more often than not on their own with hordes of zombies rampaging around and it times chasing them. Wondering where her husband is and the rest of her family and making the right decision to save her self and her daughter. This is my favorite zombie story. You can feel the raw emotion put into the story by the author and you actually become in twined in the story cheering the successes and dreading the failures as they make their journey to safety. A strong female lead character and absolutely exciting and entertaining story of a zombie apocalypse. Check it out it is a definite must read.

very good

it was a very good book. kept me on the edge of my seat looking forward to the next one