Thank you Netgalley for this Arc!

I was not really prepared for this one. The book has to do with a plague that really feels like an almost direct commentary on the pandemic we are currently going thru and while I thought the writing and character driven plot were very well done, this story just wasn't something I really wanted to focus on so much right now.

I think it's a great book and if this sounds like something you're interested in then I would definitely recommend it!

Where is the line between right and wrong when it comes to surviving a deadly pandemic? The young people living at Hope Juvenile Detention Center are all there under the pretense of being prepared for a successful reentry into society after intense circumstances left them in the hands of the law. Rules help to keep everyone in line at Hope, even when those rules do not apply the same way to every resident. One day, the guards appear distracted, and when the morning ritual fails to take place as usual, the residents of Hope discover they have been left alone to fend for themselves in the face of an invisible enemy. Life and death hang in the balance as each character comes to terms with who they truly are and their place in society outside of Hope’s walls.

This dialogue-centered story is perfect for young adult readers who have ever felt as though they are not seen as clearly as others in their world. While the characters in this book all come from some kind of troubled background, their innate human tendencies are recognizable no matter where readers themselves are found. A content warning at the beginning alerts sensitive readers to the presence of weighty subject matter within the narrative, and while this material exists throughout, it is presented in a tasteful and appropriate manner.

Told from several different perspectives, this narrative gives readers direct insight into each of the primary characters’ individual experiences within the context of the greater story. The truth about their pasts come to light at intentional moments within the novel, and the question of justice in the face of a pandemic is one that is repeated throughout. Uniquely presented, the story incorporates narrative, clips from news reports, and transcriptions of telephone conversations, which all help to provide a more complete picture of the events taking place within the story. Young adult readers will be riveted from the first moments, empathizing with each of the characters involved as their tales unfold.

Cinematically written, this book is easy to imagine taking place in the mind’s eye. Not only are the effects of the pandemic itself immediately palpable, but so too are the interactions among the varied personalities within the narrative. A variety of backgrounds are included, weaving together a rainbow of skin tones, abilities, and gender identities to create a tapestry of initially disparate humans that connect over a shared tragedy. At the end of the book, readers will discover some of the author’s intent in writing the story along with resources for learning more about how different communities have been treated during health crises like COVID-19. This is a powerful and thought-provoking story for young adult readers.

Perhaps I am spoiled since I just finished another plague masterpiece by SK but this book felt like a watered down and bare-bones version of that story.

This book takes place at a correctional facility for youth in Arkansas. They are abandoned as a mysterious plague sweeps the nation, sounding similar to the effects of TB, only more virulent and quicker acting. The book is of course trying to emulate the overwhelming toll COVID took on the world. A group of slowly dwindling prisoners are left to fend for themselves and they go a little Lord of the Flies when food becomes scarce. I feel like this was trying to be a sociological study of teens during an apocalyptic scenario but fell short of that ambition. Overall, I felt the story was a little strained and unrealistic given these kids are surviving winter conditions with minimal technology. The book almost feels like it takes place in the 80s before cell phones and internet, though that is not the case from the details in the story.

I have read other books by this author that are supposed to be suspenseful and edge of your seat gripping and so far her writing has failed to get me there. An okay book but not something I would read again.

Marieke Nijkamp's publisher made a bold decision to release _At the End of Everything_ during this pandemic era. Some readers might be experiencing crisis fatigue. Nijkamp wisely took a slightly different path in choosing to focus on the actual plague -- like, from 1300s Europe -- instead of Covid. While some of the symptoms and precautionary measures sound familiar, other elements connected to the illness and the way the characters handle it are different enough to keep readers from putting the book down right away.

Nijkamp's research and the book's heart-deep commitment to letting teens tell their own stories are rock solid, as always. Less compelling are some of the characters themselves. With the exceptions of Logan, Grace, and Emerson, readers really don't get a chance to spend significant time with anyone else. As a result, they may not feel as connected to those characters or their fates.

The premise of the book is interesting enough; teens in a juvenile detention facility are left behind to fend for themselves when a pandemic hits the area. Because the facility is located in the Ozark mountains of Arkansas, immediate resources are limited. The teens learn to fend for themselves and care for each other as they deal with the illness, death, their own weaknesses, and their dark pasts.

Unfortunately, readers don't get enough of those pasts to connect with the characters' present horrible circumstances. Also, due to the fact that there is a plethora of information on pandemic-style diseases these days, the book's dramatic impact goes down slightly, although it's not from a lack of trying. Nijkamp has done an excellent job of taking a medieval health disaster and plopping it into the 21st century. The author also reminds readers that while Covid is a threat, other diseases also loom on the danger list.

The novel does tend to drag a little in some parts when the characters are weighing their present challenges with what brought them to the facility. Overall, however, for fans of Marieke Nijkamp, this is a solid book.

I was really looking forward to this book, I loved Nijkamp’s book This is Where it Ends, and couldn’t wait to read this one. It is told from multiple perspectives: Logan a non-verbal female, whose verbal twin Leah is also in the facility, Grace a long-time female patient, and Emerson a non-binary new arrival. We follow these three though the discovery of the plague and the months that follow as they work to survive.

This book started my year off with a bang, and some tears. This book gave me so many feels. It was a gut wrenching read, but in the best way. The characters made my heart ache, I wanted so much to hug the pain away. As reader, you can’t help but too root for them. You know that they won’t all survive, but you want them to beat the odds, and your heart breaks when they don’t. Just like your heart sings when they do.

This book is a great story about a deadly pandemic sweeping the country and its effects on the residents of a youth correctional facility. The group of young adults is diverse enough, and their reactions are fairly realistic. It was a good story, but I found myself getting hung up on the feelings of 'being misgendered' they kept complaining about. There really wasn't any mistreatment or 'misgendering' portrayed by any adult in the facility; there was more mistreatment among/between the residents. I would have enjoyed the book more if not for the author trying to make a gender statement. The author's note afterward mentioned that she purposefully made all of the characters Caucasian to prevent race issues from obscuring the gender issues. She didn't need to worry about this because the characters could have been any race based on their names and reactions. Even so, the story is a good read.

The Hope Juvenile Treatment Center is not a place of hope. It's where troubled teens are sent when few other options exist. Then one day the guards start acting strange--and then they don't return. When some of the teens leave the facility, they find a group of armed soldiers. They tell them there is a respiratory plague spreading throughout the country and no one is allowed to leave their homes. The group realizes this means they've been abandoned to try to survive a plague at Hope.

This was my 150th book of the year, and it was a terrifying plague thriller that hit way too close to home right now! Honestly, it was almost too hard to read about a respiratory plague at the moment, especially with COVID ramping up again!

I think this is my favorite Nijkamp book so far. It grew on me--I really started to care for the teens left behind at Hope, and this book really makes you think. Because, let's be honest--the Government abandoning a group of wayward teens to survive the plague doesn't sound too farfetched right now, does it? The book involves things like total lockdowns and ration cards and while it's billed as apocalyptic, it does not sound like a world too far from our own.

The representation in EVERYTHING is excellent, with a cast of queer and non-binary characters. You do not get to know the teens too well, but well enough to form attachments to several of them. As with any group in a dangerous situation, some move to the forefront and others blend in. The moral questions abound--both on a larger scale (why were they left there)--but also within the facility. How will they govern themselves? What do they do with their dead? What is the right and wrong way to obtain food and supplies? It really brings up some interesting ideas on morality and what these kids should be allowed to do after being abandoned.

Overall, this book was hard to read, but it brings up interesting and thoughtful questions. It takes you into the teen's world and offers a sad but hopeful story. 4 stars.

DNF at 15%.

I think I chose badly and this book just wasn't for me. I am obviously not the intended audience, so I will not review this book anywhere else.

I'm a character-driven reader, so if the characters are not likable, they need to be at least interesting. These were neither. I just did not care what happened to any of them.

This book had a lot of heart. It wasn't for me because for this type of book I need some action, but this book was just to realistic and mundane.
But it such a good representation of how people who don't fit into societies boxes are left behind,thought of as less and disposable. But these kids showed who they really were.

Wow. This book is phenomenal. I wasn't quite sure how well a book about a highly infectious disease would sit with me because of the world we have lived in for the last two years, but I couldn't put it down. The fear and sense of isolation was easy to relate to. The kids are from all walks of life, but they realize that their best chance of survival is to stick together.

Marieke Nijkamp did a fantastic job writing about several tough subjects that are the center of our real-world headlines. They have created a powerful, emotional book about strength, perseverance, resilience, and always finding a glimmer of hope in the direst circumstances. I highly recommend At the End of Everything.

Thank you to NetGalley and Sourcebooks Fire for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

I don’t even know where to start with this book. I started it a few days before I started feeling ill. A few days before several in our house tested positive for COVID. How is this relevant to the book? Well, Hope Facility is a home for rejects/troubled teens and one day, the guards and everyone who runs it, disappears. Poof, gone. Not like vanished but they left these kids to fend for themselves without saying a word. A word about the pandemic that is sweeping their world outside. The teens have to learn how to survive and deal with the deaths going on around them all along trying to deal with each other’s personalities & way of being. This gave me very much The Walking Dead vibes in regards to the running, hiding and our current world in which masks are worn. It was a quick read with LGTBQ representation and one of our main characters was non verbal! The story is told in alternating POVs between the 3 MC’s. I really enjoyed the diversity and representation throughout. This really was a CANT put down book!

Thank you @netgalley & @sourcebooksfire for the ARC

Title: At the End of Everything
Author: Marieke Nijkamp
Genre: YA
Rating: 4 out of 5

The Hope Juvenile Treatment Center is ironically named. No one has hope for the delinquent teenagers who have been exiled there; the world barely acknowledges that they exist.

Then the guards at Hope start acting strange. And one day...they don't show up. But when the teens band together to make a break from the facility, they encounter soldiers outside the gates. There's a rapidly spreading infectious disease outside, and no one can leave their houses or travel without a permit. Which means that they're stuck at Hope. And this time, no one is watching out for them at all.

As supplies quickly dwindle and a deadly plague tears through their ranks, the group has to decide whom among them they can trust and figure out how they can survive in a world that has never wanted them in the first place.

I enjoyed this kind of dark, kind of hopeful read. Some of the teenagers have done some truly awful things, some have just done thing the adults don’t understand, but they’re all there in need of rehabilitation. When the plague starts, they’re abandoned and left to fend for themselves.

The story is told in three main viewpoints, which gives a much more well-rounded perspective than a single main character would have done. There were moments of fear, panic, and pain mixed with the hope and determination, and this was a solid, entertaining read.

Marieke Nijkamp is a bestselling author. At the End of Everything is her newest novel.

(Galley courtesy of Sourcebooks Fire in exchange for an honest review.)

"When everything is too scary and too overwhelming, we all want to go home."

When is it too soon to read books about a deadly pandemic? I wasn't sure what to expect from this book and honestly, some of it was a bit triggering as we still live through the lingering effects of Covid-19. (Will it ever end?) At the End of Everything tells the story of what happens to those who are forgotten and left behind in the wake of a global pandemic. We start off by meeting several teenagers who are living at the Hope Juvenile Treatment Center. Logan and her sister Leah are there and protected by the bullies of the center. Logan doesn't talk and communicates with Leah through their own made up hand signals. Grace is a firey teenager who doesn't hesitate to stand up for what's right. Consequently, she spends a lot of time in isolation. Finally, we meet Emerson, who has just arrived at Hope. The guards have no intention of using Emerson's correct pronouns (they/them) and Grace is there to support Emerson. When Grace gets out of social isolation, she realizes the guards are acting strange but she isn't quite sure why.

It doesn't take long for the residents of Hope to figure out what's going on. The guards, therapist, and warden leave Hope unattended and unlocked one night. Some of the teens decide to walk to the nearby town of Sam’s Thorne, Arkansas. There they encounter a heavily guarded barricade and are told they aren't allowed to proceed further. One of the teens ends up shot to death and the rest of the group heads back to Hope to figure out what to do now that they have been left behind. As soon as they get back, some of the teens start to fall ill. This virus takes the form of coughing up blood and affecting part of the brain causing seizures and other medical issues. The teens split up with some of them deciding to travel outside of Hope to make it on their own while the other teens decide to stay at Hope and figure out how to make things work.

Be warned: this story isn't uplifting. It is horrific to see how quickly the virus spreads and the damage it has. It is equally horrific to see how quickly these teenagers have been forgotten and left to fend for themselves. Despite their attempts to reach out to family, friends, elected officials, and the company that runs Hope, no help arrives. The teens are left to figure things out which no supplies and no hope of rescue. This book served as a reminder to remember all members of society. Too often in the midst of a global pandemic, it's easy to stop and think about yourself and your immediate family members. I can't help but wonder how many people were forgotten about in the early days of Covid-19. In the author's note, Nijkamp mentions how she wanted to bring awareness to those folks who are not immediately thought of when it comes to global issues like pandemics. I appreciated getting to know the teens that are immediately labeled as delinquents and unworthy of our time and attention.

This story is bound to be one that sticks with me for a while. Thank you Marieke Nijkamp for writing a story that forced me to think about those who are not often on my radar.

TW: pandemic, death, violence

**Thank you to NetGalley and Sourcebooks Fire for the advanced reader's copy of this book in exchange for my honest opinion.

This book is set at a juvenile facility for kids that got into trouble with the law and were seen as being able to improve their lives and being normal, average citizens after getting help for their issues. Unfortunately, a plague starts and the guards and doctors desert the building. The kids are left alone to fend for themselves. Will they make it? Read to find out!

Unfortunately for me this book was just okay. It was very tense and interesting at points, but reading a book about a plague DURING a plague seems a little too meta. It was hard to focus on, because my brain kept making comparisons between Covid and the plague in the book. So if you can handle that, read on! If not, do not pick this book up because the plague is the main focus in this story. All in all 3 stars.

I got this from NetGalley and these opinions are my own. Logan, Emerson, and Grace are all teens in Hope Juvenile Treatment Center. All of the teens have either done some not great things or had a difficult time with life! For the most part they are just trying to make it through. One day they wake up and the guards are gone and there is military keeping them locked inside. Turns out a plague has hit, can they survive on their own? Given our current pandemic this book brought a touch of reality to todays current times. I enjoyed all of the characters and the three main characters were well supported by other characters in the book! There was great character development and I enjoyed the touch of having the phone calls in the book! I also think it ended well and showed the resilience of people, even teens, in difficult times! Marieke Nijkamp did a wonderful job with this one!

Well I did not know what to make of this book to start with. The blurb looked interesting and so I thought okay lets go with a YA book. I am so glad I did, it is engrossing and really makes you think about what could have happened in the last two years and wonder what did happen in the prisons and young offender pleases. How easy is it for people to fall through the cracks.

I cannot recommend this book highly enough - it is so well written, thought out and engaging.

I was given an advance copy by netgalley and the publishers but the review is entirely my own.

What happens when teens in a youth family are abandoned during a plague? Yes some of them might leave, some of them might do bad things but the majority of them band together to support one another. Logan, Grace, and Emerson tell this tale of horror and resilience. Logan, twin to Leah, is non-verbal, Emerson is non-binary, and Grace is more or less the leader of the group left behind. Death stalks these teens, as does hunger as the plague hits them and their supplies dwindle. I liked the different perspectives (each voice stood on its own). The scenario is frighteningly real, which might make this a tough read for some. At the same time Nijkamp has important messages to convey. Thanks to netgalley for the ARC. A YA novel that made an impression on this older reader.

Thank you for the arc! I'm very grateful but unfortunately didn't rate this. Admittedly YA isn't my usual genre so others may love this for different reasons.

I just couldn't get into it and contemplated DNFing multiple times but struggled to piece bits together or find parts at all memorable.

Marieke Nijkamp is a favorite of mine. Her writing always evokes a strong emotional response from me and At The End of Everything was no exception. It follows a group of characters in a Juvenile detention center when a plague hits. If it was difficult to survive before, now it’s really become tricky as things become progressively worse.

The most striking – and heartbreaking – parts of the book revolve around the mistreatment of the kids but especially of those that are deemed ‘different’. I think the show of strength and community, even by a group of misfit teens during a terrifying time made for an interesting and timely read.

My thanks to Sourcebooks Fire and NetGalley for the gifted DRC.

I loved this book. First and foremost, the diversity in characters was really nice. I also liked that they were a group of "troubled kids" and yet, we saw so many redeeming qualities in them to make every individual worth something, rather than the worthless that they themselves feel. This novel is told from multiple perspectives so we get a solid sense of of our three main speakers: Emerson, Grace, and Logan. Each person has their own sad and scary back story; while also having these beautifully done story arcs within the main plot.
Timing is everything, and this novel is as disturbing as it gets during our own pandemic. We find ourselves in a facility for "troubled teens" - a place both horrific and safe at the same time for many of this kids, particularly since they have come here from worse situations. Emerson is non-binary and after being kicked out of their religious home is arrested and placed at Hope (the facility). Grace bounced around foster homes until she helped defend a girl from being assaulted and ended up at Hope, and Logan doesn't speak - she and her twin sister set fire to a building where terrible things happened with a man inside. The rest of the kids at Hope have equally as tragic pasts -- but when a deadly respiratory plague breaks out, the guards/doctors/staff from Hope abandon their posts and leave the kids to fend for themselves. What a perfect opportunity for redemption, growth, and bonds of friendship.
This novel is timely; it deals with a pandemic, LGBTQIA+, prison systems, socio-economic inequalities, and of course, the main YA focus of growing up. We don't learn everything about every character. We don't even meet some of the characters who leave Hope voluntarily or those that die - but each loss, each setback these characters face makes your insides ache - because we see this in today's society. And the best fiction stories are those that are submerged in tangible, real-life moments: this book has them.
These characters are strong, not because they are rough and tough, but because they are afraid and choose to continue forward, because they recognize their weaknesses but do not let it stop them; and they do not let fear drive them in their choices but instead: hope and the sense of community.
Highly recommend!