Marked By Books: Review of White Horse by Alex Adams

For me, this was one of those books that I saw, and I was like, "Hey, what the heck, I might as well try it out." The cover didn't exactly look very promising, but the summary on the back of the book seemed solid enough. I figured that I really didn't have anything to lose, and my hopes weren't extremely high when I started out, but this book does not disappoint. It was absolutely incredible.

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Thirty-year-old Zoe leads an ordinary life until the end of the world arrives. She is cleaning cages and floors at Pope Pharmaceuticals when the President of the United States announces that human beings are no longer a viable species. When Zoe realizes that everyone she loves is disappearing, she starts running. Scared and alone in a shockingly changed world, she embarks on a remarkable journey of survival and redemption. Along the way, Zoe comes to see that humans are not defined by their genetic code, but rather by their actions and choices. White Horse offers hope for a broken world, where love can lead to the most unexpected places.

Oh. My. Gosh.

This book is amazing! Without a doubt, it is one of the most incredible books I've read so far this year. And it's been a long year. The writing is beautiful beyond compare and the story is filled with so much emotion that it's bursting at the seams. Even without all of that, the very idea behind the story is intriguing. It doesn't need all of the glamor and glitz that a well versed author can tactfully shove in there because it's wonderful enough on its own. All of that is like the icing on top of the cake.

This book was one of those that I was just not able to put down no matter how hard I tried. Not that I really wanted to, but sometimes humans tend to need such trivial things along the lines of water and sleep. This is not one of those books that you can just read in one sitting, unless you've got a whole lot of time on your hands and a bladder the size of a swimming pool.

I think that there were pieces of this book that were for everybody. It's obviously a post-apocalyptic novel, but it's also a mystery, a contemporary novel, and, at times, a thriller. There's also a little bit of romance thrown in there for those who appreciate it, but it in no way takes over the story. Zoe is not your typical lovesick puppy type of heroine.

Absolutely everything she does in this novel feels justified to me, which I appreciate more than words can describe. There's nothing worse than a main character that you feel you can't rely on because their author doesn't know them well enough to develop them as people first, before they stick them in a story and shove them along. Book characters are people too, so they should act like such: rationalizing their own decisions and refraining from metaphorically jumping around too much in their own minds.

The best part about White Horse is that everything in it seems very real. The kind of events that take place here are not too absurd to believe, especially not the way Alex Adams describes them. Everything that happens in this novel could very well happen to us in the future, and that's what makes it such an interesting read. As all of the horrors are thrown at Zoe, we start to realize that her story is not so unlike our own, especially in the beginning.

White Horse also makes you feel. It is such an emotionally proactive novel. Now, that emotion may vary anywhere between gut wrenching pity, beaming pride, sickening disgust, or raging fury, but that's what a good book is supposed to make us feel. Certainly not all emotions in life are positive and one-sided, so they shouldn't be in books either.

And now for the icing on the aforementioned cake: the beautiful writing. There are so many passages in this book that I want to highlight, but most of them reveal something in one way or another. This one is still beautiful, not my absolute favorite, but at least it doesn't give away anything in the story.

"Miracles are tiny things, meaningless except to the person who seeks one. To that one person, a miracle is everything. One happy event can change the course of a life. In the blackest moments, they hide.

Wait...

Wait...

Ignoring prayers and pleading, miracles enjoy the element of surprise. They love those who would step forward and meet them halfway."

Rating: 5 stars

For When Words Aren't Enough

I think that both of these trailers are great, but I don't think they're a very good representation of Zoe. She's much stronger than she's made out to be here. And has no British accent. Oh well, creative license.