Sci-fi isn't always my cup of tea, and this story always felt a little unconnected. Or maybe I just couldn't connect to it, but I did enjoy the characters and their development, and I was interested enough to finish.

The Planetsider is a wonderfully written, albeit slow burning, post-apocalyptic story. The books starts out a bit slow, but once it grips the reader it doesn't let go. Ogden is brilliant with his plot and storytelling alike; keeping the reader on the edge of their seat the whole time. It's hard to believe this is a debut novel! I will definitely recommend this book to my fellow dystopian junkies!

I stalled out at 26%. It could have used a little editing at the beginning, there was a little too much “tell” as opposed to “show”. But, I’ve had this book on my reading list for far too long so I’m calling it. I just don’t think I’m the right reader for this book. It was a very interesting concept, but I struggled to get into the plot. I think the story was too much serious sci-fi for me. (I just remembered another thing: I was having a lot of trouble figuring out the age of the characters.)

I apologize to the author, I wish my feedback could have been more useful to them.

The book is filled with lush descriptions not usually found in the genre. It makes the reading fly by. The main perspective is from Ethan, but you get pov from Maria as well. It all takes place in some distant Earth future, where the world has ended but left small groups of survivers that really only have time to gather food and keep their shelter safe. Nobody cares about why the world fell, they are far too busy just trying to keep living. Enter strangers who know everything about the Fall and all hell breaks loose, throwing a small settlement into chaos.

The backstory and plot are interesting enough to want to make you keep reading. The start seemed bit slow as I just wanted to get to the part where the sets of main characters actually met, but the pacing picks up quickly and shoots along merrily after that. The ending was not hard to guess but still good. I feel like it's open to more books in the world, or capped off enough to be a stand alone.

Many predictors of what will happen if the Bomb is dropped claim that it is unknown how such a war would go, but they are sure about what would happen if there were to be a World War 4, and that is, it would be fought with sticks and stones.

Sticks and stones is where humanity is on Earth in this post-apocalyptic tale - small rural communities struggling without technology or luxuries far beyond the polluted ruins of the cities to rebuild, hopefully a better world.

Actually, it then transpires that in this case it was not the Bomb that brought about the destruction of the old order - nothing so grand. It was not even about nation rising against nation, but rather a form of us-versus-them group think about something far more powerful than nations may be today - and far more cynical.

This is what the Ethan, the hero of this tale, discovers when he encounters two individuals that crash-landed on Earth from a moon base where humanity did not lose their technological might.

This is where this novel becomes something of a boy-meets-girl tale as he falls for Captain Salus, who tells him that only he can save her community from a terrible disease created by the conflagration that has left his home planet in ruins.

His own people fight to keep him away from Salus and whatever her people may want from him. However, he is to find that old agendas are still jostling for his loyalties away from Earth too.

There is a sense here and the basic question - will humanity every truly be able to create a better society and secondly, will they ever be able be evolved enough to deal with any kind of technology beyond sticks and stones, without bringing ruin upon themselves?

In the mean time, the plot in this story had plenty of twists and turns that will keep the reader guessing until the very end. Whether or not Ethan will ever find peace, either on Earth or with his lived one above beyond sectarian interests, is another question though.

DNF. Sorry, I just found it boring and hard to keep my interest. After three chapters I gave up.

In an apocalyptic future, the settlements is one of the only places that is survivable and danger surrounds them completely. The toxins in the atmosphere had driven people into madness. Most of the survivors don’t bother with understanding why they’re living like this. They just focus on living.
Ethan, or main character, learns what happened to cause the world he knows to become what it has as he encounters strangers.
What I really enjoyed was how rich in detail this is. I was put right into the story and could see it playing like a movie in my head. The characters were strong and well written.
An excellent debut novel.

I thoroughly enjoyed this well-written post apocalyptic story, good strong characters and a challenging plot. Recommended.

The story takes place in a planetary system not unlike the Earth/Moon system we know and love. Maybe the same. the zombie like creatures that dominate the background are interesting but there is a lack of explanation of how they still exist after multiple generations after the disaster. Minor detail. It was also hard to get through through the overly long paragraphs that were used to describe the characters thought process The author needed to tighten these up. All this being said, the story is very unique, was enjoyable and lends itself to follow-on books.