Review: Forest of Hands and Teeth

by Carrie Ryan

Summary: Mary never questioned the Sisterhood or Guardians that kept her town safe from the Unconsecrated--those that used to be people, but now gnaw at the gates of the village for blood. Until now. When Mary joins the sisterhood, she comes across things she never imagined--particularly a woman from the Outside, named Gabrielle.

But that was before Mary's village is attacked by the Unconsecrated.

Review: In a word, creepy.

It's a mix of The Village and I Am Legend.

But it's good.

Plot. Mary's story instantly draws you in, and the love triangle keeps us in. Carrie Ryan has it all planned out; she has this huge tantalizing background story (that gets confusing sometimes). The whole story circles around a kind of Catholic church theme, which was really cool as well and added to the creepy feel. I must admit, the story starts out a tad slow and is kind of confusing for the first part of the story, but once you get into the action it gets much better.

Characters. Mary was a good protagonist-- confused but still pretty strong. Her pining after Travis gets a little annoying, but I could deal. I never saw much development in the other characters until the end. It didn't really bother me because the story was so exciting, but now that I think about it, I wish they had been a little more defined.

Overall. A very good book, with a very good 'wow' factor. The ending was fantastic. I would really reccommend this book if you aren't faint-hearted. Some have complained about it being too graphic/bloody for them, but I really didn't feel it was too graphic except in one part. Even then, it wasn't graphic, it was just horrible to imagine. Ryan doesn't linger.

4.5 Stars

320 Pages

YA

Released

*contains brief sexuality

here's an awesome trailer: