Malorie

A Bird Box Novel

By: Josh Malerman

Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell

Length: 8 hrs and 44 mins

Publisher's summary

In the “fast-paced, frightening” (The New York Times Book Review) sequel to Bird Box, the inspiration for the record-breaking Netflix film starring Sandra Bullock, best-selling author Josh Malerman brings unseen horrors to life.

Nominated for the Bram Stoker Award

“Malorie is even more of a psychological thriller than Bird Box, and all the scarier for it.” (The Wall Street Journal)

Twelve years after Malorie and her children rowed up the river to safety, a blindfold is still the only thing that stands between sanity and madness. One glimpse of the creatures that stalk the world will drive a person to unspeakable violence.

There remains no explanation. No solution.

All Malorie can do is survive - and impart her fierce will to do so on her children. Don’t get lazy, she tells them. Don’t take off your blindfold. And don't look.

But then comes what feels like impossible news. And with it, the first time Malorie has allowed herself to hope.

Someone very dear to her, someone she believed dead, may be alive.

Malorie has already lost so much: her sister, a house full of people who meant everything, and any chance at an ordinary life. But getting her life back means returning to a world full of unknowable horrors - and risking the lives of her children again.

Because the creatures are not the only thing Malorie fears: There are the people who claim to have caught and experimented on the creatures. Murmerings of monstrous inventions and dangerous new ideas. And rumors that the creatures themselves have changed into something even more frightening.

Malorie has a harrowing choice to make: to live by the rules of survival that have served her so well, or to venture into the darkness and reach for hope once more.

©2019 Josh Malerman (P)2019 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

“Another taut, breathless supernatural thriller...[Josh] Malerman masterfully evokes apocalyptic horrors via understatement and suggestion while facilitating suspension of disbelief through nuanced characterization and thoughtful worldbuilding. This is a bang- up sequel.” (Publishers Weekly, starred review)

“I can’t remember the last time I had to set a book down because it was too intense for me to continue. And that’s only the halfway point. Once Malerman hits the gas you better hang on tight, because he doesn’t let up until the stunning finish. Malorie is a relentless thriller that will fry your nerves and twist your heart. It’s absolutely brilliant.” (Philip Fracassi, author of Behold the Void)

“You know how you sometimes begin a series on Netflix and you tell yourself ‘I’m just going to watch one episode’ but ten hours later you’ve binged the entire series because the story is so relentlessly compelling? This is the book version of that experience. Not only did I read this book in one sitting, it still haunts me, swirling in my imagination even as I write this.” (Jamie Ford, New York Times best-selling author of Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet)

Bird Box 2

Very well done story in the continuation of Bird Box - keeping with the same pace and picking up where it was left off they are out for a new adventure and it’s a good one. Enjoy!

Excellent sequel

Malorie is the sequel to Josh Malerman's successful novel Bird Box, and it revisits Malorie and her now adolescent children a decade later at the camp Bird Box abruptly ended at. A tempting piece of news takes the family out of the camp's safety, and we venture through the creature-filled wasteland once again, but the children are older, stronger, and are ready for independence.

As a mother of a teenager, Malorie was that much more horrific to me, because letting go is not an easy thing in any circumstance, much less during apocalyptic times. Malerman gets all the emotions right, all the protectiveness and guilt. It's all there and I couldn't look away because I feel it everyday. But it also teaches about admiration for this risk-taking age in life. The confidence that nothing worse can ever happen. After all, this is the age of immortality. I miss being fearless, don't you? Malorie is a winning sequel. Check it out!

Not as good as Bird Box

Was still entertaining. You learn a lot more about the kids in this one. You’re instantly dropped into chaos. A few parts had me nervous but nothing as bad as Bird Box. I didn’t really like the ending either.

Lazy writing

The ending was rushed and lazy. Such a disappointment as I truly enjoyed The Bird Box.

not as great

not what I was expecting. I honestly felt that more then half of the book had no meaning, no story.

*spoilers*

Malorie the character is one that is both sympathetic and the farthest thing from it. this is my one frustration with the two books, especially in this sequel. Bird Box sets up what could have been a great arc for Malorie to take. She was a person who fought against madness and the metaphorical damage of mental illness and abuse, but in her quest to fight this she became the very traits she fought against abusing her children. she did this mostly mentally in Bird Box culminating to outright slapping Tom. This could have been a great chance for character redemption, but we are then told that yes Gary was following her around all this time, yes the community of forward thinkers are crazy with leaving bodies all around unburied, and even in her moment of triumph over Gary she still clings to her dedication to "the fold" and he dies anticlimactically. I thought Bird Box was an amazing story and "Malorie" was too up until the reintroduction of Gary. we are meant to sympathize was Malorie despite her obvious paranoia and mistreatment of the kids. Rather than forcing her to come to terms with her own version of madness she is vindicated. This severely damaged the ending of what otherwise was a great book.

Ending felt rushed

The story was pacing well for a majority of the book, and then right when the action peaks, the ending just sort of rushes to conclusion with a big red bow on top. Everything just feels too convenient and lazy at the end. My guess is the author was rushing to meet a deadline, or ended up hating his original ending and did a quick re-write.... something was off.

Still solid, but ending just disappointed a little.

excellent riveting great read

Excellent read. I could not stop listening to this audible book. The reader was wonderful. Riveting, very exciting and suspenseful. You will finish this book in no time. It's that good. I want more.

Very Satisfying

This was fantastic, I thoroughly enjoyed every moment of this book. There may even have been a tear creeping up here and there. Beautiful story, brilliantly written, on point emotions and top notch narration. 3 Thumbs Up!

great

loved it. only beef is that I've now read two books and still don't know what the F the stupid creatures look like. lol. other than that it's great