This sweeping page-turner about a near-future apocalypse touches on divisive issues like race, religion, and free will. The writing is a step above the usual for a science fiction-ish epic like this, and anyone looking for a big, bold book will finding Wanderers both thought-provoking and satisfying.

Wanderers is an interesting take on the end of the world by plague trope, with interesting characters. At first I thought that it was going to be a zombie novel. Around 25% in I realized it’s actually a plague that kills all humanity/end of the world novel. At 75% in I finally realized it’s actually neither, and yet both, of those. It is full of characters you love and characters you love to hate. My only complaint is that there are two main characters that are both female whose names begin with S and I spent the entire first half of the novel confused about which was which. But that might just be me.

It took me five days to read Wanderers, but that’s only because I had to work; and one day I had a migraine headache and wasn’t able to read at all, which was horrible. Every minute I wasn’t reading I was trying to figure out when my next opportunity to read was going to be so I could get a bit further in the story. I stayed up way past my bedtime so I could read, and when I finally allowed myself to sleep I had weird dreams that I blame on Wanderers.
I highly recommend all of Chuck Wendig’s novels and I think Wanderers is a great choice for a summer read. But be warned, this novel is an epic, heavy read (I’m not just talking about the physical weight of the book) and once you start reading you won’t be able to stop.

800 pages.
3 days.
Soooo good.
If you like end of the world books, this one is a MUST read for you. It is similar to The Stand, but different at the same time in the appearances of good vs. evil and such. We have a right wing movement, determined to cleanse the world in the end times, and a horde of "sleepwalkers" crossing the country to some destination only they know.
Enter technology and science and you have the perfect blend of action, tension, plot movement, and even have some romance sprinkled in.
I could not put this one down and loved it so so much. Definitely in my top 5 for this year so far. Well done Mr. Wendig, well done.

Giant, crashing meteors. Zombie outbreaks. Alien invasions. Cataclysmic weather events. Earthquakes. Volcanic eruptions. Nuclear disasters. Insidious biological/viral maladies.
Why are so many of us drawn to tales that outline the destruction of life as we know it? These are not light things. Unimaginable loss of life and the complete breakdown of technological comforts and common social behavior are not the things we look for to inspire levity.
Hyong-Jun Moon (University of Wisconsin Milwaukee) states that “the extreme versions of future catastrophe in apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic narratives might function as a psychological buffer, through which [people] strive to accustom themselves to the coming realities of harshness, insufficiency, and antagonism” (241).
This explanation makes sense to me; we look to fiction such as this in order to view possible outcomes at a safe distance.. It is the possibility that these things may come to pass in some form that draws us in -- will we make it, is there hope?
I mention all of this to lead up to Chuck Wendig’s newest release, Wanderers. This is a BIG book, a chunky almost 800 page hardcover. It is a major time investment. And absolutely, 100% worth every second of it. As mentioned in the synopsis, a mysterious affliction manifests in part of the population. What follows is one of the most engaging, well-developed, and epic journeys I have ever read. And yeah, I’ve read and watched a LOT of apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction.
As one might expect in a book of this length, there is a veritable host of characters introduced throughout. Lay people, scientists, a preacher, CDC members, politicians, zealots, backwoods militia, and more. This unfolds organically and I had no issue keeping track of who was who and their relation to other characters. This is crucial. These people are crafted so beautifully and it was an easy, natural development for me to accept.
I don’t want to talk about plot. Read the book. What I will comment on is Wendig’s ability to tweak a thread here that becomes something of huge importance later, while still weaving these pieces into a tapestry of storytelling that left me in awe. I was never lost, often surprised, and always on the edge of my seat until the next discovery was revealed.
I could wax on for days about various thematic elements in this novel. There are so many. What effect have humans had on this world? Is where we are heading entirely our fault? How does the cultural system of religion play a part when the world we know goes sideways? Are there benefits to creating newer, better technology? What is good and what is evil? These are the things that draw me to books like The Stand, Swan Song, The Road, and most definitely Wanderers.
I didn't know how exactly to approach this review at first. I found myself falling into several internet rabbit holes on apocalyptic fiction because it is fascinating. . In fact, I’ve culled so much from this review already. You don’t need to hear more from me, but if you ask, I will most definitely have more to say.

This book is an experience, a treasure, and just an epic read. I will be re-reading this when I have a physical copy on hand. I want to hold the weight of it, flip the pages, and dive back into a world that completely immersed me. So yeah, read the book. I cannot recommend it more highly. Thank you, Mr. Wendig.

Shana stood looking at her little sister’s -Nessie- empty bed and though she ran away again. The first time Nessie ran away was when they went to Giant Eagle and their mother was just gone. After seeing the camera it showed their mother walking out the front door and out of their lives for good. So two years ago almost to the door Nessie packed some can goods, bottled water, and a couple of candy bars and ran away. They found Nessie four hours later at the wooden bus shelter in Granger. Nessie was fifteen now and Shana was almost eighteen and couldn’t figure out why she wanted to runaway. Than out of the corner of her eye she saw Nessie come up the driveway still in her pj’s and barefoot. Shana ran out to meet her and Nessie bumped into her and kept going, she didn’t blink , nothing, she had dead eyes and just kept going. Staring straight ahead Arms stiff by her side. Shana tried to stop nessie as they came to Herkimer Covered Bridgethat had broken glass all over and will cut Nessie’s feet all up. Shana hugged nessie to stop her and she did stop but she kept struggling to be free and her body temperature was going very high and her nose started to bleed , and a low whine, an animal sound rose out of Nessie. Shana let go and Nessie blinked for a minute but then her eyes clouded over again. Nessie kept walking. Right across the broken glass, seemingly not to feel it. Shana ran back to get her dad and he got his old truck and found Nessie still walking and staring at nothing. The Shana saw mr Blamie who was her geometry teacher. But he was just like Nessie and turned to go nessie’s way. Than he reached her and walked beside nessie. Benji ray felt teh jet lag in his bones. He just wanted to go home. As he went toward the front door, a young woman said his name and she said she was Sadie Erniku and she worked for Benz-Voyager. She needed to speak to him. He said not today , he just got off a very long trip. Then she said something’s gone wrong. An outbreak maybe… In Pennsylvania. He told her to come in he’d fix some coffee. She said her and Black Swan thought it maybe an outbreak. Benji told Sadie he was wary of their growing fascination with replacing human work with artificial intelligence. Black Swan was a PMI or predictive machine intelligence. Benji distrusted Black Swan and its predictions . Sadie said Black Swan wasn’t something she merely designed; it cut her. Benz-Voyager created Black Swan specifically with the ability to detect upcoming outbreaks, pandemus and every zoonetive jumps where a disease leapt from the animal to human. A third joined Shana sister and teacher. EMTs were called and tried to give Nessie a sedative by a needle in the butt but the needle broke. The three sleepwalkers and they became called just kept walking. Bengi went to CDC- which had been his home for almost two decades. Sadie had designed Black Swan -she lead the team. Benji was to meet black Swan. A cop had tried to force her teacher into the car. When he got him in there the man exploded. Shortly after the cop died in the hospital. The number of the sleepwalkers grew. Four more people joined Nessie and the woman they now knew was Rosie. Shana now thought of them as the herd. Shana’s father said it was time to go home, the farm wouldn’t run itself. But Shana refused to leave her sister, she had to protect Nessie. Shana called Zig -her best friend, to hang out with her as she followed nessie , he was always there for her. Zig loved her bust she didn’t love him like that. He had gotten a gun she put in her backpack that way she had it encase she had to use it to protect Nessie. Now there was a total of ten people that joined Nessie in their zombie like shape still walking. Shana’s father bought an old RV and he caught up to her again -saying he hadn’t been there for his girls since his wife had left but he was here now. The herd didn’t seem to have to eat or drink, or rest, or even go to the bathroom. As more people joined the “sleepwalkers” more family and friends joined to watch over their loved ones as the sleepwalkers walked to a destination only they knew of. They families and friends were eventually called “Shepherds” and the walkers “ the herd.” As time goes on Benji becomes a protector of the herd. Than a former rock idol joins the group of Shepherds but to be back in the limelight but things do change as time goes on as does reasoning for following the herd in some cases.
I really enjoyed this book. I loved the author brought in many things such as compassion and empathy, right or wrong. Or the way to treat the herd and so much more. I also really liked the author used people from all walks of life and ages both as Shepherds and Sleepwalkers-or part of the herd. I didn’t want to put this down. As I wanted to see what was going to happen next. This grabbed my attention right from the beginning until the very end. I also liked how the author brought in issues like politics, and religion as well as others. I did feel this book could have been a ;little shorter and I felt the end was a little rushed . This did drag for me at times but nowhere near enough to stop reading this book. I really enjoyed the characters and the ins and outs of this book and I recommend it.

There are apparently 800 pages in this book. I've read books that long (and longer) many times before. That wasn't a stumbling block for me, but damn were those a long 800 pages.

First, let me say how happy I am that this is NOT a series and that the story is wrapped up (mostly) in just the one book. I didn't have to wait for ten more sequels to come out to figure out what was happening. I didn't have to slog through thousands of pages of bullshit just so someone could drag out the story.

A lot of other people have talked about the themes of this book and all the issues it explores in much more detail and probably better than I can. We have the fundamentalist Christian pastor who gets into bed with neo-Nazis, a female president who apparently most of the country hates, a kind of strange look at homosexuality, there's even a pretty brutal male-male rape scene that I was...seriously disturbed by. The sickness itself is disgusting, frankly. And there is a lot going on that is left up in the air as mystery for a very long time.

And I'll admit it - Wendig got me. I'm usually sitting here reading and picking out the "twists" that are supposedly so hidden but are actually pretty plain. Not with this one. At first I couldn't figure out the purpose of the walkers. When that was revealed, awesome, I was surprised (although looking back it's probably pretty easy to spot and I just missed it in all the science talk). There was a lot of blatant commentary on the people who weren't getting sick, so I figured that one out early enough. But the ending - I always suspected Black Swan of being more than just the "benevolent AI who wants to save the human race," and while I wasn't surprised about what happened, I can say I didn't see that exact scenario playing out. And Shana's part in the end of it all was definitely unexpected.

There were a few characters I grew "close" to - Marcy, Pete, and Benji. Once Pete got over his rockstar status and became an actual human I liked him very much. Benji was always just trying to do the best he could for everyone else. And Marcy was such a good-hearted person that it wasn't hard to love her. I do still wish we had been told exactly what had happened between her and the "glow" - Sadie mentioned that Marcy was a receiver because of the metal plates in her head, but how that made her more functional is beyond me.

There are two reasons this does not get a 5 star review - first, I am not one to shy away from swearing in books, but I feel like it was over the top in this one. There were a lot of random fucks interjected into conversations, thoughts, revelations, etc. It was too much for me to even feel like it was realistic. Second, the ending wasn't quite satisfying after all we went through to get where we were going. It came too quickly after all of that, and it felt cut off (although very sinister - good job at upping the creep factor at the end there).

Thank you to NetGalley for the opportunity to read this book. My opinions are my own.

I had not heard of this writer, Chuck Wendig, prior to reading this book. I received an advance readers copy for a fair and honest review.
This novel is about the end of the world as we know it. It takes liberty with themes we have seen before from books like The Stand , Swan Song, and even comics like The Walking Dead.
Early in the book I felt kind of like BEEN HERE BEFORE, but as the story progresses it is not the same book as the others Sure, those themes are present to some degree...but the author has a nice set of characters , scenarios and also added more than a few swipes at the politics , global warming and violence, racism we are having in our country right now..
It is a long book. 800 pages. I like long books when written well and this one is a keeper..

Quite the epic post-apocalyptic tale

I have to admit that the thought of reading an 800 page post-apocalyptic story didn't have quite the allure it might have had in younger years. In fact, the thought was rather daunting.

But I've enjoyed Chuck Wendig in the past and I do love a well-written tale of TEOTWAWKI.

That written, I dived right in and the story kept my interest. There were only a couple short parts that felt draggy.

A pandemic of monstrous proportions crosses over from bats to humans and quickly the world falls into chaos. A sentient Artificial Intelligence helps gather a group of what become known as wanderers or sleepwalkers, all heading to an unknown destination - the hope of a decimated world.

I liked the characters, at least most of them. Wendig did a super job with the world building (or actually describing the world in chaos). There was a varied cast of characters including some likeable strong women.

All in all, it was worth reading and I thoroughly enjoyed most of the journey.

I received this book from Del Rey Books through Net Galley in the hopes that I would read it and leave an unbiased review.

Make no mistake this book is an epic beast. The story arcs are long but worthwhile. It can be said that there are many “comparison” books from the likes of King and others but the author does make a mark in the genre. I don’t think this book is for all readers by any stretch of the imagination. I say this without criticism but the overall attention span of society in general has shortened for literature and expanded for film. This novel has clear and obvious social commentary which I enjoyed as it felt feverish and present and not adhering to bygone wars. Don’t sleep on this one.

Chuck Wendig wrote an epic here about the apocalypse that happens to the world and we get to be right in the middle of it. A small group of sleepwalkers (who explode if restrained 😳) called the Wanderers march across the country. They are infected with a fungus that only Benji can diagnose. And there’s more: a small town preacher and an old rock star. You have to see how this works and boy, does it work. If you liked Stephen King’s The Stand, I know you will like this!



What I truly liked was how the author explores that the real danger of any type of epidemic is not the epidemic itself, but the fear that goes along with it. People do weird and crazy things when they fear something, and the author knows this and plays to it beautifully.



My favorite characters in the book are Shana, the one that has no agenda except to keep her sister safe. She is the one that first realizes you cannot restrain the Wanderers. She follows the group of Wanderers that form from all over American. They are all on a mysterious journey, and all Shana wants to do is protect her sister from those who want to harm them.



I also really like Benji. I am a bit confused about what happened to him. He is definitely been disgraced at a former lab and now works for himself. He's visited by another scientist from the same lab who knows that Benji holds information that may help them help the Wanderers. Benji is upfront and truthful and you can see his scars from his former self. You just want to give him all your confidence!



What I didn't like was that there is a militia out to exterminate the Wanderers. I feel like this is too close to what is really happening in the world, so maybe that does make a good way to look at it, to understand how these groups of people think and respond.



This is a thriller that makes you hang on to your seat. I hope they make it into a movie and that Tom Hanks is Benji.

The Wanderers is a fantastic, engaging, intense and absorbing thrill ride into a future America where disease, distrust, violence, and hope run side by side. Soon, America is in ruins. Groups of people, seemingly asleep and impervious to all stimulation, are walking together, but why and to where? How were they picked? Is it a disease or a blessing? Wanderers are surrounded by others who are shepherds, ensuring their safety and well-being. Doctors from the Center for Disease Control, A.K.A. the C.D.C. attempt multiple tests on the Wanderers but find that the Wanderers cannot be pinched and prodded. For if they are, an amazing event occurs. The story progresses unpredictably as the reader is ineluctably drawn to the fate of the Wanderers and their shepherds. The Wanderers is a fantastic ride that in Disneyland would be impossible to approach because so many people would be waiting online. I absolutely loved this book and you will too.

This is the first book I've read by Chuck Wendig, and I don't think I could've picked better. It is, unfortunately, the perfect book to read right now, as Wendig deftly pulls together current issues ranging from climate change, alt-right radicalization, and technological advances to form the groundwork for this book. The central plot reveals itself at a perfect pace, letting each revelation build upon itself almost like a tightly written TV season. I find it hard to succinctly categorize - a medical thriller with a bit of near-future dystopia? barely-on-the-edge-of-implausible science fiction? But whatever it is, I highly recommend it.

*Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for providing an arc of this book*

I received a copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. Thank you NetGalley.

holy cow... Wanderers truly is a genre-crossing book. There's a little bit of everything for everyone.. scifi, thriller, dystopian.

i wasn't sure what to expect, but i was not disappointed at all.. truly unique storyline... easy to relate to / like characters... fabulous book.

I love a good book about the apocalypse or the post-apocalyptic world. This book isn't just a book about the apocalypse though. Wanderers has sci-fi and action in it, and it is thought-provoking literary fiction. When people start "sleepwalking" and coming together as a flock that doesn't stop moving across America, nobody knows why or what to do. This book has a wide range of interesting characters that it follows. There's Shana, a 17 year old girl whose younger sister Nessie is the first of the sleepwalking flock, Benji, a former CDC scientist, Marcy, a former cop who suffered from a traumatic brain injury before the sleepwalkers change her life, Pete, a rockstar who has been living a double life, and Matthew, a pastor who gets in over his head when some people start to use him for their own good. This book is quite long, but it kept me interested for all 800 pages. I would have kept reading even more.

This is one of those genre-crossing novels that might leave purist fans in each camp disappointed: It's not true sci-fi, not a straight thriller, not classic apocalyptic fiction, nor unadulterated political drama.

It's a skillful blend of all those categories. There's a plague, there is nanotechnology and artificial intelligence, and there is terrifying political strife, with several love stories woven in.

Wanderers opens with a bright young woman walking away from her home in a somnambulatory fugue. Soon, she's joined by others like her, as they proceed -- on foot, apparently sleepwalking -- westward from Pennsylvania across the continent and halfway back again. Of course, they attract the attention of the media, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, right-wing militia groups, internet crackpots and a few displaced celebrities.

I loved the relationships (among the CDC scientists and between the scientists and the other groups: the walkers, whom they're studying, and the walkers' family members who have come along as protector on their loved ones' odyssey).

This book is both tender and horrific, but it is above all intelligent (FYI -- it's also long, but well worth it.)

Thanks to Net Galley for an advance readers copy.

Wanderers is an enormously ambitious novel that really took me by surprise. I had extremely high hopes for this book and I was not disappointed in the slightest. In all truthfulness, Wanderers is the first book that I have ever read by Chuck Wendig--and it certainly won't be the last. I didn't really know what to expect from his writing, but I was extremely pleasantly surprised by what I found.

Wendig has a very clear writing style; it's descriptive without being overboard and is entirely entertaining with plenty of interesting background tidbits given about various characters, locations, and events. I genuinely enjoyed every single page and minute I spent reading this book. Usually in an 800 page book, you're likely to feel bored at some point for a period of time, even if the writing is fantastic. It just feels inevitable to happen--except, somehow, for Wanderers. That feeling of a slowdown in pacing or a bit of boredom creeping in truly never happened in any sense that I can recall. I was hooked from page one all the way until the last.

The characters in Wanderers are remarkably well-written and developed. Wendig really dives into the background and history of each character, as well as their present day internal conflicts and frustrations with themselves and others, all of which lead to a plethora of interesting and unique characters to explore. There are characters that are easy to love, others that are easy to hate, and even more that straddle the line of love and hate and leave you feeling unsure how exactly you should feel about them. He also includes a large variety of people from all walks of life that really add some strong, unique perspectives to keep the story lively, realistic, and relatable The best part is that none of the characters were added in just to have another character; rather, each character had an important, vital role that fully expanded and developed.

A few of the major characters include: Shana Stewart, whose younger sister Nessie was one of the first sleepwalkers; Benji, formerly an employee of the CDC who becomes tangled up in the sleepwalker fiasco despite being let go from the CDC years prior for morally questionable actions; Sadie, creator of the all-knowing, god-like Black Swan AI that is possibly the most crucial component to this book; Arav, a young member of the CDC who stays with the flock; Matthew, a pastor from a small town in Indiana who ends up on a journey in a role he never anticipated and can't seem to stop; and lastly, Pete, an out-of-time former rock god who wants to hold onto his youth and significance for as long as possible. Together, these character make up the general misfit cast of characters that have the most impact throughout this story and who truly make this book as memorable and incredible as it is. I really wanted to go into more detail about each of these characters in this review, but I have a feeling it's going to be a longer one so I'll leave it with those brief tidbits about each, leaving you to discover more about them and their journeys.

As mentioned, Wanderers is truly epic in scope and covers a myriad of themes and elements that are relevant to our daily lives even now without some unknown potentially apocalyptic flock of sleepwalkers present. He touched heavily on issues such as race and religion and how they can be amplified in various ways during crises and even turned into weapons and threats that can lead to even bigger and more terrifying outcomes than the main crisis itself (something that is not exactly unheard of throughout history, which we all know tends to repeat itself). He also explores many moral-related quandaries, including an exploration of empathy and compassion and how they both factor into a situation such as this one. Do you solely look out for yourself and your family in this scenario, or do you continue helping the others around you no matter whether you know them or not or how you feel about them? Is there a right or wrong way to treat people affected by the 'sleepwalking' epidemic? All of these questions and so many more are explored throughout Wanderers, which is part of what makes it so compelling.

As far as stylistic notes go for this book, the most notable component that I loved was the inclusion of small epigraph-like excerpts at the start of each chapter. Most of these seemed like a 'throwaway' sort of thing, but I loved the social commentary that was able to be conveyed through these. Wendig includes random excerpts from imagined posts on Reddit, excerpts from made-up podcasts or quotes from random Tweets on Twitter, and together all of these really added some unique depth and insight into how the public were reacting to the flock of sleepwalkers and the shepherds following them. I particularly liked this component since the majority of this novel follows those who are on the inside of the entire state of affairs, rather than being an average member of the public watching this occur.

Obviously I can't go into any details regarding the ending of the book, but I would just like to throw out there how much of a shock it was and how consistently unpredictable this book is. Sure, you can maybe hazard a guess about a few things here or there, but in the big picture Wendig keeps you guessing and completely unprepared for what he's about to throw at you. There are some incredibly impressive and unexpected plot lines and ideas about things that blew my mind and that I loved, and he continued to pull the rug out from under me through--quite literally--the last few pages.

Overall, there's nothing I could give Wanderers other than five stars, which it wholeheartedly deserves. If you like your books epic, imaginative, impossible to put down, and full of incredible characters, then you have to pick up Wanderers.

Great concept and a cast of characters that provide a range of portraits of modern America, including it's problems such as the pastor who gets sucked into the world of white supremacists. The details are rich and suffused with Wendig's signature quirkiness.

Reminiscent of The Stand but far more readable.

I really enjoyed this book! I agree with comparisons to The Stand, although it is more focused more on the build up and actual apocalypse, as opposed to the aftermath. I thought the characters were well-developed, and I really enjoy digging into a long (800 pages) story that spans different story lines. Definitely recommend!

Not only did I read this whole 800 page book in a pretty reasonable amount of time, I enjoyed every minute. And if you take nothing else away from my review, take away that. It seems intimidating when you first begin; I was certainly intimidated. But I shouldn't have been. It was engaging, entertaining, and I never once felt it drag.

We start out in a quaint Pennsylvania town (not unlike my own, if we're being honest- the beginning is set not far from my area) with a young woman who has no idea that she's quite literally going to stumble upon the end of the world when she finds her younger sister in a trace-like state. The book begins with Shana and her sister, and they feel like the epicenter throughout. But we also experience several other very key players' points of view as the book goes along. I didn't know that I would care for or about them when I first read their chapters, but shortly knew I had been wrong. Each character was incredibly well developed, and each had a role to play in the greater story. No one is a throwaway, so fret not.

The plot itself is incredibly gripping. The author delves into a lot of big issues that would likely become extra relevant in the event of an actual plague. People in crisis are often unsure of what to do and who to turn to, and this both brings out the best and worst in people. The author explores this in several arenas: a grab for political power (in a series of individuals who are not unlike those we're witnessing in real-time); religion being used as a manipulation tactic; fame being used to influence.

Of course as the story goes on, there's a ton of gray morality and thought provoking questions presented. What would you do in some of the characters' shoes? Is it okay to be selfish or selfless at the end of days? And that's really just the tip of the iceberg as the secrets unfurl. There were admittedly a few places that the story could have been cut down just a bit, but as a whole it was incredibly well-paced and well-thought out and I enjoyed it wholly.

Bottom Line: This epic novel explores who people can and will become when their backs are against the wall, when there's nothing left to lose. It's honest and realistic, and therefore utterly terrifying.

Dear Chuck Wendig,

How did you do that? How did you take every gloomy, depressing, unnerving, alarming, confusing thing... all the things... that are in the news, that are reality and weave them into an 800 page narrative that I could not put down? How did you take the things we humans take great pains to avoid, if possible, and be indignantly outspoken about, when the mood suits us, and use them to tell a compelling, fascinating story of humanity forced to confront all the things we'd far rather ignore?

How?

Maybe it's better that I don't know. Maybe then WANDERERS wouldn't be quite as stunning as it is. And I am stunned.

In WANDERERS, humanity isn't the good guy. And you wouldn't think an epic novel with humanity as the unreliable main character would be appealing. Some of us probably far prefer to see ours as the great saviors of, well, of ourselves. Isn't most of life saving us from ourselves, after all?

That's what WANDERERS is. It's a story of a flock of humans who seem to be sleepwalking across the country, and that makes it a story of America... warts and all. The gun culture, the racial prejudices, the religious evangelicalism, the gaping chasm of our two political parties, denials of climate change... it's all there. But so are the non-warty parts of America. The way we band together in times of crisis, the way we stand up for each other in the face of the proverbial warts, the way we fight for the things that matter to us whether or not they matter to anyone else.

These things don't often work well together, one always seems to be fighting a losing battle. And WANDERERS shows that hauntingly.

WANDERERS is a story of humanity - white and black, gay and straight, teenager and adult, man and woman, powerful and powerless, educated and everyday. All of those things are represented near flawlessly in this book, as they are represented in humanity. And they all become equals.

I learned things reading WANDERERS, something as important in works of fiction as in works of nonfiction. Some of the things I learned shocked me and some made me happy. They all made me think.

I think that maybe that's the moral of WANDERERS - to make a reader think. Think about the stories we see in our feeds and timelines before scrolling to videos of adorable puppies barking at themselves in mirrors, the tl;dr things that are a part of life now - because they can be too long, too detailed, or too hard to face.

I follow the creator of this fantastic novel on Twitter so I know his politics, and his politics shows through in the book. That's fine with me, because they're my politics too. But it isn't a book about politics, not really. It's a book about current events, about life as we know it. It's a book about what might happen if we don't pay attention.

And, through all of that doom and gloom, WANDERERS is a book about hope, about courage, and about survival.

The moral of the story, if I had to pick just one, would be "get off your ass and fight for something, anything."

So, in summary, I don't know how you managed to pull all of this together so seamlessly, Chuck Wendig. But I don't need an explanation. I just need this book, to read it again and again and to get other people to read it.

I am in awe and I am awed.

Thank you, Chuck Wendig, for writing this book so I could read it. Thank you.

~Nicole

(I received a copy of WANDERERS through NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest and original review. All thoughts are my own.)