The Last City

By: Logan Keys

Narrated by: Rhiannon Angell

Length: 8 hrs and 48 mins

Publisher's summary

She's a prisoner with a secret gift. He's a soldier with a monster locked inside. Now they will decide if humanity is worth the fight.

"With flavors of The 5th Wave and Lu's Legend, seasoned with a bit of Marvel-type superhero magic and mayhem, two normal teens go from average to extra-ordinary, following the wake of a series of cataclysmic events which alter their lives--and the world--forever. I love every single character." (Best Selling Author Christina Rozelle, The Treemakers Trilogy)

"A magnificently terrifying dystopian world worthy of Justin Cronin's Passage Series, but with a young adult flavor." (Julian North, Bestselling Author of Age of Order)

"World War Z, meets Westerfeld's 'Specials', meets Roth's Divergent! *Ms. Keys, you have written a book that should be hitting THEATRES*. Your writing style and seamless interwoven points of view and plot lines are amazing!" (Lori Garside of Garside's Book Bets)

Grab book one today!

©2015 Logan Keys (P)2016 Logan Keys

Did I read the same book as everyone else??

On seeing this, I hopped over to both here and Goodreads to see some reviews and seeing all the positive ones I jumped at the chance to listen to it. Maybe it was my state of mind but I didn't enjoy it as much as I hoped. I felt like some of the story was missing and disjointed. At one stage when Liza is on the island and suddenly their are some "zombies" there but we never get told how they got there, nor what happened after. This happened a few times throughout the book! I had to keep rewinding the audio to see if maybe I drifted off and missed parts.

Then there was pacing issues. The book is told in dual POVs, which was fine but Lizas journey was a lot less exciting than Tommys, plus felt more disjointed than his. His I could understand but her's was ....., I don't know really. I just didn't connect to her.

While I thoroughly enjoyed the narration, there was a lot of different characters and accents, that at times I was confused by who was talking at any given time. I felt like it was a chore to try to follow every single character to see who was talking!!

Unfortunately this wasn't something I enjoyed too much, but going by the ratings, a lot of people did, so by all means, give it a go and I hope you enjoy it more.

*I received a copy of this for review. This in no way affected my thoughts.*

Fantastic story

What did you love best about Gods of Anthem?

Having read and reviewed the e-book copy, I couldn't wait to see how this translated to audio.

This was my first audio book and it was a great one to start with.

Gods of Anthem is a rollicking good yarn filled with memorable characters, mysteries, tensions, heartbreak and some twists and turns you don't see coming.

I cannot recommend this book highly enough.

What other book might you compare Gods of Anthem to and why?

Although Gods of Anthem fits squarely into YA-dystopian, it is a difficult book to categorise. You could compare it to other works - Alice in No Man's Land, Divergent, Hunger Games, V for Vendetta, but it is more than that. Logan Keys takes the genre and makes it her own. Gods of Anthem is unique.

Which character – as performed by Rhiannon Angell – was your favorite?

Liza

If you were to make a film of this book, what would the tag line be?

Rise. Dare to dream, dare to live, dare to survive.

Amazing

Any additional comments?

I absolutely loved this book.The author did an amazing job with world building and creating characters I care about.I liked that the main female character was intelligent,brave and stuck to her morals.Rhiannon Angell did an amazing job narrating the audiobook.She has a really pleasant voice to listen too.I purchased the Ebook,but received an audiobook from the author in exchange for an honest review.I look forward to reading more from this author.

Great story & Characters w/Spectacular Narration

What did you love best about Gods of Anthem?

I don't read (or watch) dystopian and I rarely read YA so I kind of had no business reading (or listening to as the case was ) this book. But you know what? I freaking LOVED it. Just goes to show that a book with a great story, engaging characters and writer that knows what the heck they are doing will transcend genre.

What was one of the most memorable moments of Gods of Anthem?

I have to admit...when I realized I had gotten myself into a book with all manner or other-worldly heros (insert super heros, undead, vampires) I though oh-no, but with a little willing suspension of disbelief what I got was a great journey, phenomenally interesting back drops, characters I loved and cared about and all the emotional ups and downs a great book can deliver.

What about Rhiannon Angell’s performance did you like?

The narration was spectacular. Probably one of the best narrators I've come across. Her emotion and interpretation was spot on and her voices are perfection.

Any additional comments?

I laughed, I was afraid, I cried....I cared about these people...ALL of them, even the supporting cast. This book is a bit of a cliffy, but not a horrible one. More like everything was resolved but the characters still have more like to live and I want to be there for it.

Emotionally Powerful

I am still suffering a massive book hangover due to listening to GOA. Ms. Keys did an amazing job creating an intricate world into which I escaped as I followed Tom Tom and Liza through their perilous journey. This is one of the best dystopian books I have read by far. The world and characters are complex and believable. This book has the feels as you struggle along with Tommy and Liza and their friends, you feel heartache and pain, love and even simple joy. The audio version was wonderful, it flowed well. The narrator had a pleasant voice and did a great job differentiating between characters, their emotions and voices.

WOW!!! EXCITING BOOK!!!

Liza is sick and dying of Cancer, stuck on Bodaga Island where they send all the sick and dying. Tommy is Underground (UG) trained soldier but he is also so much more, they both are. Since a massive plague or flood as it is called. Zombies are now part of this new world. The Authority that rules the city of Anthem is absolute. Join Liza and Tommy as they discover who they are in this new world. What they don't know is Liza is the key and Tommy is the leader.

I have to say that this book kept me excited from the beginning where Liza was on Bodaga Island to going to Anthem or Ash city. Exciting book with a captivating story line that will leave the reader turning the pages and craving more. New name and new look to this book are perfect. This book is more than a dystopian zombie book, it is about friends, love, family and doing the right thing. I loved this book and I cannot wait to read the next book La La Land. Logan Keys is definitely an author to watch.

The narration was clear and concise, all the while keeping me engaged. I would love listening to this narrator more in the future as her voice and emotion was right on point.

A new world

This book was amazing!! The story that was created and this new world, it's not your every day zombie book. There is more then just the threat of the zombies, there is way way more threats. It was amazing to see that love can still find a way in a world like this one.

Unique zombie goodness

Would you consider the audio edition of Gods of Anthem to be better than the print version?

I haven't read the print version. However, there were so many different voices portrayed by Rhiannon Angell that I can't imagine it would be better in print.

What other book might you compare Gods of Anthem to and why?

This was really different from other zombie stories I have listened to .There was a lot more going on than just the zombies.

What does Rhiannon Angell bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

She is fantastic at portraying these characters that the author has written so well.

Any additional comments?

This is a fresh and unique dystopian book that has many interesting things happen beyond what one would expect from reading the description prior to listening. I really enjoyed it.

This book was gifted to me by the author or narrator in exchange for an unbiased and honest review via Audiobook Blast!

Chills!!

I read Gods of Anthem when it first came out and I LOVED IT. But listening to it, really made the story come alive.
I cannot count the amount of times I got chills. Rhiannon brought a tangibility to the story that caused Logan's genius to resonate.
This will be one I'll listen to over and over.

Intense and Exciting!

I’m a fan of zombie books, but it’s been a while since I’ve had my zombie fix. This book was the perfect solution to that problem. I especially loved that it had a unique angle on the genre – it wasn’t just life as usual and then the zombies hit. This was much more of a dystopia, with a controlling government willing to sacrifice its people and revolutionaries called The Underground who are fighting to regain any sense of liberty.

What Fed My Addiction:

Liza.
Right from the beginning, I liked Liza. First of all, since I was listening to this one, there was that British accent (I have to admit that I love British accents). Even though she was sent off to die and had sort of given up hope that she’d ever see a better life (or much of a life at all), she still fought hard to fight the good fight – especially for the sake of Mimi, a little girl who was on the island with her. She didn’t want Mimi to lose her innocence too soon. When Liza’s destiny completely changed (for reasons I won’t spoil), her journey became much more complicated, but she never lost that will to fight!

Tommy.
Tommy lived his life as a guinea pig for the Underground – a resistance force – and because of that, underwent painful procedures that turned him into a monster for the war – something like the Incredible Hulk. He was accompanied by other specials – one who could control minds (and who wasn’t Tommy’s favorite person), a 13-year-old vampire (who he protected at all costs), and a girl with healing abilities (a possible romantic interest). But Tommy was haunted – both by his monster and by the memory of the girl he regretted hurting. Tommy’s struggle was one of my favorite aspects of the book!

The action.
From the very start, the danger factor in this book was sky high. It started out with Liza on the island where cancer patients are sent to die, but things there weren’t pretty. She was attacked (an attempted rape) and then attacked again (this time by zombies). Tommy’s side of the story was filled with chaos as well, since he was sent off to train for war against the Authority. In this dystopian world, things were never easy!

The climax.
The climax of this book was a spectacular collision of events that ended up changing everything. I can’t wait to see where Keys heads with the story in the next book!

What Left Me Wanting More:

Separate stories.
The book was told from both Liza and Tommy’s POV’s and their stories were completely separate almost the entire way through the book. This isn’t usually my favorite style because inevitably there’s one portion of the story that I end up connecting to more and then I get tired of the other “side” of the story. In this case, that wasn’t a huge issue – I actually think listening to the book helped this a bit because, while I did connect to Tommy’s story a bit more, I wasn’t bored with Liza (okay, I did think there were a couple of points where things slowed down a bit on her side). Since I was listening to the book in spurts anyway (a half hour here and a half hour there), the disjointedness didn’t seem as noticeable. Still, I was eager to see how Liza and Tommy’s stories intertwined – and I definitely had to wait to see it!

The romances.
Both stories had a romance in them (one side more than the other), but I wasn’t completely invested in either. I didn’t dislike the romance element – I just wasn’t overwhelmingly excited about it either. Since there was A LOT of other things going on in this book, that was fine with me.

The Narration:

The narration for this book was really tough because there were SO many accents! Liza was British and Tommy was American, but then there were also characters with other accents – New York, Jamaican, Irish, Hispanic, maybe even more that I’m forgetting. I thought that Rhiannon Angell did a really fabulous job with it, (there were a couple of times that I thought I caught tiny inconsistencies – but, honestly, I would have had to go back and listen to those parts again to even be sure, and it wasn’t important enough to me to do that). I would definitely listen to more books with this narrator.

Overall, an intense and exciting first book in the series. (I have no idea how many books there will be. So far, Keys has just said that there will be a sequel.) I easily give this book 4/5 stars!

***Disclosure: I received this book from the author via Audiobook Blast! in exchange for an honest review. No other compensation was given and all opinions are my own.***