Monday, October 13, 2014

Thunder by Bonnie S Calhoun

The Time of Sorrows is long past.
The future of Selah and her people is shrouded in mystery.
And the clock is ticking.

Hidden in the tall grasses along a shore littered with the rusted metal remnants of a once-great city, a hunter crouches. It is the eve of her eighteenth Birth Remembrance and high time she proves to herself and her brothers that she can stand on her own two feet. Selah Rishon Chavez waits not for game but for one of the small boats that occasionally crash against the desolate shoreline. Because inside one of these boats she will find her quarry--a Lander.

These people from an unknown land across the ocean are highly prized by the Company and bring a good price--especially if they keep the markings they arrive with. 

Everything falls to pieces when the Lander whom Selah catches is stolen by her brothers, and Selah wakes the next morning to find the Lander's distinctive mark has appeared on her own flesh. Once the hunter, Selah is now one of the hunted, and she knows only one person who can help her--Bodhi Locke, the Lander her brothers hope to sell in the Mountain.

With evocative descriptions of a strange new world that combines elements of disturbing scientific advances, devious political conspiracy, and survival in a hostile wilderness, Bonnie S. Calhoun weaves a captivating tale of a society more like our own than we may want to admit. From the tension-laced first scene to the captivating last page, Thunder is an epic journey into the heart of humankind that explores how far we are willing to go when we're pushed to the limit.


My review:
  This book is dystopian, which is basically the opposite of utopian. Books that are dystopian are usually set in a time period after some major catastrophic event that most of humanity has been wiped out. It isn't my favorite genre', so I almost didn't review this book, but the lady who wrote it is in charge of the Christian Fiction Blog Alliance, where I get a lot of books to review, so to help her out, I decided to give it a try. And I am glad I did.

 This book was an exciting read full of drama, chases, bad guys, and suspense. I loved the setting and descriptions of different locations in the book, and the author did such a good job that I felt I could almost step into the story.

 I loved the main characters, Selah and Bodhi, and everything they stood for. There wasn't what I would call any overt Christian message in the book, but the main characters were bound to do what was right no matter what, and didn't let anything stand in their way, and it was a very positive story.

 There wasn't much explanation given for where the people called "Landers" came from and why, but that may be covered more in the other books in the series.

 I did have a hard time putting the book down, and read it in one evening, which is always a good sign that I liked a book. In spite of it not being my favorite genre', I thoroughly enjoyed it and am looking forward to reading the others in the series.

 And although the book is fictional, it presents an interesting look at what life might be like for those who remain if there is a nuclear disaster that destroys most of civilization and its people.

  The book is geared for young adult, but is a book that most adults will also enjoy.

About the author:

Bonnie S. Calhoun teaches workshops on Facebook, Twitter, HTML, and social media at writers conferences. In her everyday life she is a seamstress and clothing designer. Bonnie and her husband live in a log home in upstate New York with a dog and two cats who think she's wait staff. Thunder is her first YA novel. Learn more at www.bonniescalhoun.com.
  

Thunder is available from Revell, a division of Baker Publishing Group.

Thanks to Revell for the review copy.


Book trailer:
  

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