You will need to read the first book in this series The Hatching in order to understand what is going on with the spiders and how they came to be all over the Earth. Plus if you don't have a fear of spiders or want to test your fears, the first book is for you.

Ezekiel Boone, returns to a world that is haunted from a spider outbreak, while the World may be calm now, something more deadly is coming:

Millions of people are dead around the world. China has become mainly a nuclear wasteland. Flesh-eating spiders have devastated the human population, and now there is some sort of calm that has settled over the world. Have the spiders been defeated or is this just the beginning. As the researchers and military work to find and destroy any egg sacs that seems to be the solution until in Japan they find a monstrous egg sac that could only hold a new kind of terror. Quarantine zones are slowly being evacuated but not fast enough for some people and eventually they break through shattering what little hope they had at containment and difficult decisions are going to be made world wide in order to help save the human race.

I am really enjoying this series. I do not have a fear of spiders but there are times in this book that I need to make sure there is nothing creepy crawly around or if someone start to look really pale and sick around me I head the other direction, lol. I would say that this book is of a slower pace than the first with less of the spider frenzy and more about trying to figure out or understand the spiders than actually combating them. This does not mean that they do not make an appearance but there are way less scenes with them than the first one. This books also feature much more of the political sides of things than the raw panic that was in the first. The political aspect was very interesting and begs the kill a few to save the many, which is an ethical questions asked through out the book. Also how they hope to save the human race is very different and interesting but I still think everyone is underestimating the spiders.

There are points when this book does feel like a filler book, which many second books in a trilogy can have. Boone hints of bigger scarier spiders that we actually do not get to read or learn much about so you can tell that he is very much setting up for the third book in this series.

Boone once again has multiple points of view, some that are the same as the first but some new ones as well. Often we only get to hear from a character once as they describe where they are and what they are doing about the spiders or even if they are worried about them at all or we get to read about their death. Although there are points in the book where I wish there were less points of view as I want to get to the ones that reoccur I appreciate what Boone is doing by having these points of view. This book is not just about America but how the spiders are affecting places world wide and what people are doing about the chaos.

A fresh perspective of how the human race dies out is really why I am enjoying this trilogy so far and the far reaching affects that one species can have on the other...Sound familiar humans? I'm very much looking forward to the conclusion of this series. I hope that Boone does not play it save

Enjoy!!

Last year I was surprised by how much I enjoyed The Hatching, the first book in a spider-filled horror/thriller trilogy, so I was happy to pick up the sequel, Skitter by Ezekiel Boone, when it was released. Plus, that cliffhanger from The Hatching didn’t hurt. I don’t want to share any spoilers from The Hatching, but suffice it to say, the spiders are back..kinda. Skitter is much quieter than the novel before, and a lot of it is spent with things brewing in preparation for the final book, Zero Day.

Like The Hatching, Skitter switches between dozens of different countries (at least it feels like it) and perspectives, but a few favourites from the last book are back. There are some new characters too, but don’t get too attached to them… I am actually surprised by how much I enjoyed Skitter given that I missed some of the action from book 1, but even though a lot happens in meetings, it was intense and easy to read. Of course, I expect plenty more spiders for the finale next year…

The arachnopocalypse is on! Skitter picks up right where The Hatching left off, read The Hatching first, this is important. You don’t like spiders? Good! Read these books in an old barn, it will add ambience.

It has been a little under a year since I read The Hatching, that’s quite a few books and many lives since I left this world of Ezekiel Boone’s creation. In any series like this, it’s important for the author to answer one crucial question, “Where were we?” Boone did a fantastic job of reintegrating me into his world: reintroductions to the characters are needed, remind me what happened without retelling book one. Thank you, Mr. Boone.

The Hatching was fun, fast-paced and frickin’ creepy as hell. With Skitter, I really began to appreciate Boone’s craft. The best authors have a skill that they excel at, one that brings readers back for more. Ezekiel Boone is a master at developing his characters. With every character, I was pulled into their lives. What makes him tick? Where does she come from? What are their values and even their faults? Every character is unique; there are no one-dimensional characters. This brought the story to life.

Skitter has brought the saga to a whole new level, leaving me with many more questions. Where is this going? Is there any hope? How do I eradicate all of the spiders from my own home?

On many levels, Skitter feels like it was written to be made into a movie, and I suppose that is any author’s dream. And he did this well, I could picture the characters, events and setting, but it felt like the set-up for a movie.

Skitter was lots of fun. As for book three…Bring. It. On.

*4 Stars

Skitter is the second book in The Hatching trilogy. I read the first book, The Hatching, last year and enjoyed it a lot. There isn’t a lot I can say about this book without giving the plot away, but I still found the sequel to be an entertaining read.

Just like the previous book, I found that the whole story was extremely cinematic. It’s written in the same style as the previous novel – jumping between different groups of characters to show how they are all handling the spider invasion. In this novel, we see a few of these groups link up and I’m really looking forward to seeing how each group will be responsible for stopping the spiders in the final book.

I still really liked the characters, and while the female characters were still written in a slightly offensive manner, it was way more toned down than the previous novel. My biggest complaint in The Hatching were the female portrayals, but it wasn’t as overtly misogynistic in this book. There were a few more characters introduced, and I think they will be helping in some interesting ways, but I never found myself attached to any of them as much as I was to the original cast of people introduced in the first novel. There weren’t a lot of chapters that included the original cast, and I really wished I could have read more about them.

However, a major problem I had with this novel was that a lot of it just seemed to be filler. There were people introduced that died in the same chapter, which was fine, but it happened multiple times. No huge breakthroughs were really made, there was not much progress forward. I feel like this didn’t need to be a trilogy, it could have been compressed down into a duology.

Of course, I will be reading the final book in the series because I really want to know how everything will be resolved. These novels are fun and complete page-turners. It’s escapism at its best. I can’t wait until the final book is released!

The second wave is coming…..

This book picks up just as I believe a sequel should, right in the middle of the action. I was hooked instantly. The first waves of spiders are all dead; seemingly perished simultaneously. This book introduces the next wave of spider. As the last novel focused on the outbreak of the spider infestation and the initial fear, this novel dove into the human nature element and how people are reacting to this outbreak. Rebellions breaking out, people turning against on another, the government turning against its people. The waves of man-eating spiders are all good and scary but the human reaction to this type of stressor is the real scary part. This second instalment also focuses largely on how to “deal” with the outbreak and the desperate attempts to figure out what is causing them.

I obsessed with Boone’s writing style. I love how he is able to create multiple characters narrating, in multiple story arcs and yet, they never become confusing. It takes a pretty talented writer to make that work and Boone does so effortlessly. I also loved the imagery in the book was fantastic; the spider egg sacs as “ticking time bombs” and the wording surrounding the spiders and the events gave me chills. Boone makes something so unrealistic- a giant spider invasion- feel like it is completely plausible.

The ending of this one was horrifying. I still cannot believe I’ll have to wait to read the third instalment, but I will be waiting for it!!

Just as the first in the series, I couldn’t help but imagine how this story would play out in a movie or as a television series. I think that would be fantastic. I really hope that someone out there catches on to this and makes it happen!