Dread Nation audiobook

I shrug. “My momma always said the best way to get what you want from people is to give them what they think they want. Sometimes you have to live down to people’s expectations, Kate. If you can do that, you’ll get much further in life.” Honestly, black zombie hunters in the Reconstruction era is definitely the best historical fiction concept of all time. And the fact that this totally, completely lived up to my hopes? Even better. I think this is a book action fans are going to enjoy. Dread Nation may be a full 450 pages, but I felt like this book never stopped moving. I even felt - and I never say this about 500 page books, because come on - that I could've broken a reading slump with this. I solidly enjoyed every moment I spent reading. Beyond the nonstop action, I adored our two lead characters. Yes, I said two lead characters, but for once the other lead isn't our badass girl lead's love interest - she's her girl best friend. THANK GOD. ➽ Jane, our lead, is a fantastic actress, fantastic liar, and even, at times, a slightly unreliable narrator. And she loves dragging people. And she is the bi icon we all need in our lives. While I somewhat wished she has a more solid character arc - you all know me and my character arcs - her character has such a strong voice that I ended up loving her anyway. ➽ Katherine, a character so developed I'd almost consider her a protagonist, is so good. She's black, but light skinned enough to pass as white, something that leads to resentment from her fellow trainees. Also, she's established quite clearly as ace-aro without the terminology being used, which: A+.Besides the nonstop action and the character work, the best thing about this book is probably the theme work. Jane and Katherine's friendships originates from a plotline involving slut-shaming, girl competition, and Jane's own internalized dislike for lighter-skinned black people being majorly subverted. And given that there's no romance, the friendship between Jane and Katherine serves as the centerpiece of the book. And the themes around racism are so well-done - this is an ownvoices book and it definitely shows. Okay, and also, a rant: hooooooo boy, I am such a slut for history. This is un-boring historical fiction that still keeps all the nerdy references. The worldbuilding is full of nods to history. The use of terms like the Five Civilized Tribes, “War Between The States,” and “War Of Northern Aggression.” The entire thematic point of the combat schools for black and indigenous people. Deep South States are now called Lost States of the South due to lack of patrols and lack of winter during which dead lie down, the mention of germs as a controversial idea and idea of an original Gettysburg strain and a transferable Custer strain, the scientific racism developing around “coloreds,” the conflict of party-based Survivalists vs the Egalitarians, and the little details of the worldbuilding, like the fact that carriages are called ponies because all the horses have all been eaten - it's all there and it's all brilliant. YES, I AM A NERD. LEAVE ME ALONE. While there's a cast of intriguing side characters, something I really enjoyed here is that for the most part, the characters facing oppression are the focus. While characters like Professor Ghering and Miss Duncan are given dimension, the lens of the book falls mainly on characters like Red Jack, who are actually dealing with the problems caused by slavery. It's both a realistic aspect, considering Jane narrates, and an aspect that I really appreciate and haven't seen in enough books thus far. As several comments on negative or mediocre reviews of this book seem to imply that people only like this book because they respect the author, I want to clarify that at least for me, this is a review of the book, not the author . I have had no trouble in the past giving negative reviews to people I respect, and frankly, it seems disrespectful to both Ireland herself and to the positive reviewers on this page to imply that people only liked the book because they like the author. Like, dude, if you don't like this book that's fine, but don't get offended by the fact that other people did like this book? Maybe they just disagreed with you. Come on.Listen, diverse YA historical fiction is really bringing back literature right now. It's not a coincidence that all three of the BR Squad - Melanie, Destiny, and I - gave this a full five. Not only is this book relevant, especially now, it's also just one of the most enjoyable books I've read recently. I can hardly wait for Dread Nation to release. I don't even know how I'm going to wait for the sequel - reread, maybe? But either way, you are all going to love this.**I actually do want to note that the author tweeted something recently that seemed to imply Asian people are white, which was very odd, and then didn't really clarify and instead doubled down?? So idk how we're feeling about that. I would definitely recommend this book [I love this book]. I don't know about this author.Blog | Goodreads | Twitter | Youtube

3.75/5 ⭐Full review on my Blog: The Dacian She-Wolf 🐺Because February is always Black History Month (and, mind you, I've read this book in February), this fearless heroine of ours is a fearless girl of colour leaving in the times of the Civil War in the United States. You know the Civil War, right? The North starts battling the South in order to abolish slavery. There is blood, there is gore, there is loss and there are...zombies.Quick thingy here: does anyone actually remember that Scooby-Doo film though? That particular one when the whole gang travels to Zombie Island?If yes, I swear to God, the atmosphere of the book felt exactly the same to me. It even had a slight scare-factor the film has.Please do check it out if you don’t know what the hell I’m talking about. It’s going to put to shame all the contemporary horror films this industry has come up with recently, I promise you. Anyway, back to it, this book is good though. I mean, it has a killer potential. The idea of the plot is interesting enough and the world is built with historical accuracy.There is a whole, let’s say, educational system for Native Americans and Negro children implemented in the States in order to teach them the combat methods against the undead. This whole system was based on the already existent in our real-life chain of (re)educational schools for the Native Americans across the States. It is quite an interesting parallel that is very well adapted for the book. Historically, this could be accurate. The combat schools for Negroes could’ve been a real deal if the world was plagued by the undead.What bothered me about this book was the fact that it felt a bit uneventful. There’s not much action as the plot unravels and it makes me kind of sad. Killing the undead could be kind of exciting even though they are pathetically slow horror creatures. Or maybe I am being too pretentious now. I need for the sequel to pick up the pace a bit, it’s a lot of action to come from such a good book idea.Jane, our protagonist, is headstrong and smart and she has a need to be self-sufficient because this is how she was raised to be. Katherine is the one who wants to be praised for what she is as a complex creature of many talents and not only for her looks. Jackson is a rascal that is always ready to do anything to save the one he loves. “See, the problem in this world ain’t sinners, or even the dead. It is men who will step on anyone who stands in the way of their pursuit of power.” There are fanatics there. The religious kind. Or fanatics in the way of those who believe they can play god and get their way with it and those who blindly follow a path towards an ideal, without looking on which dead bodies they’re stepping. The course of history is sprinkled with people like that so I find their presence in the book very accurate. And I do blame them and I'm not excusing myself for it.There is also the matter of the supremacy of the white man. Race plays a crucial role in the society depicted in the book. If you’re not white, you’re unable to do anything else but “know your place” and “serve the whites”. Which is another historical fact that demanded to be abolished then and demands to be abolished now. Why do people love to play at life and anger heavens? Why does the lust for power blind people and pushes them toward abysmal deeds?There’s no love for people like that. And there’s also no hope.From the book itself, one can clearly see that the ones prone to gain power and absolute control are the most miserable ones. And the ones who struggle and fight and let themselves be are the ones who understand how life really works.Just take a look at Jane and everyone she befriends. Her friendship with Kate feels like the real deal because sometimes we don’t get to choose our friends but just happens to gravitate around each other. And the same goes for their friendship with Jackson. And with the young visionary Gideon who appeared from the beginning to be one of the kind-hearted ones. All four of them are just the perfect team (in my opinion).If this book had a bit more speed, some more dynamic force, I think it would’ve been better than it currently is but I guess it was kept to the pace of the shamblers (which are kind of lame if you ask me).I say it’s worth a shot, even if it’s only for the thrill of amazingly fearless girls slaying smelly, undead corpses!

A quintessential, suspenseful YA novel with a compelling lead character that is courageous and kind (although Jane may disagree with latter). Ms. Ireland sneaks in some not-so-well-known U.S. history about whites sending Native American children to boarding schools where they could learn to be "civilized", creating truly chilling story.

looking for great books to read during black history month...and the other eleven months? i'm going to float some of my favorites throughout the month, and i hope they will find new readers!fulfilling my 2020 goal to read (at least) one book each month that i bought in hardcover and put off reading long enough that it is now in paperback.why did it take me so long to read this book when i knew the first time i saw that cover that it was coming home with me? \THAT COVERit may have just been zombie-fatigue—i'm more inclined these days to read zombie-variants (like RABIES-ZOMBIES) or one where the zombie threat is more of a secondary/subplot conflict than the novel's main focus. this one features your straightforward nom nom zombies, but it has the novelty of being set in an alt-history reconstruction-era america where the (re)birth of a postwar nation and all of the expected challenges facing a fractured country are complicated further by the rebirth of SO MANY CORPSES!! and the students of Miss Preston's School of Combat for Negro Girls shall employ their scythes against them. so, yessssss, it's more of those same-old/been-there/done-that zombies, but the human characters are terrific and the story is great fun; fast-paced and actiony without being insubstantial and i loved it right down to its bones, both for what it is and for what it is not. i love jane's wry angry voice and general badassery; killing shamblers and kicking racists when they're down, not so focused that she doesn't notice when there are pretty boys around, but really just far too busy to engage in a romantic subplot, tyvm. equally busy but also refreshingly uninterested in any romantic entanglements at any time, secondary character/frenemy katherine is just as appealing a heroine, and an excellent foil to jane—a little more patient and adept at the long-game, weaponizing her beauty and trying to ignore the discomfort she feels in being white-passing, and all of the advantages that brings. i love their bicker and their banter; their vinegar turning into honey as they band together by necessity to take on whatever gets in their way. and while the zombies are certainly there, they're far from being the only or even the most prominent threat because white men have all kinds of ideas and no kind of restraint. and i hope i don't put off reading the second book as long as i did this one because that cliffhanger had teeth and this cover is equally swoony.come to my blog!!

4 stars! “It’s a cruel, cruel world. And the people are the worst part.” I listened to this audiobook on the recommendation of a friend and I really enjoyed it. Dread Nation is a book that's been in the back of my mind and I am really glad I read it, especially because there's another book coming out.Dread Nation is about a young woman named Jane about 15+ years after the Civil War. The twist is, the Civil War ended in this world because all the dead rose up and became "shamblers" or basically, zombies. In Jane's world, black girls are sent to schools by the government to learn how to fight so they can kill the dead. But in a world quickly being overrun by the dead and dirty politicians, Jane finds herself in places she never expected. “My momma always said the best way to get what you want from people is to give them what they think they want. They expected me to be stupid, so I used that to our advantage.” I really enjoyed this book, I thought the characters and world building were fantastic. Some of my favorite parts involved Jane and Katherine and their development from enemies to friends. There were some questions I had left unanswered, and I hope they are addressed in the next book. While I was listening I kept wondering when certain mysteries would be solved and then they weren't so that took away my enjoyment a little bit.If you're into audiobooks I recommend you listen to this one, the narrator did an amazing job. And I recommend this book in general because I enjoyed it very much and think many other readers will too. “Sometimes you have to live down to people's expectations, Kate. If you can do that, you'll get much further in life.” Follow me on ♥ Facebook ♥ Blog ♥ Instagram ♥ Twitter ♥

This was a pretty darn good world that Justina created. 😱 The short explanation is zombies pop up during the civil war. But it’s definitely got a lot more to it than that. Jane is one bad ass b. ❤️ I loved her character. I also loved the audiobook, choosing Bahni Turpin was a great choice for Jane’s voice. 👍 Given the time setting, the law set in place (“the Native and Negro Re-education Act”), the treatment of people in this book is gut wrenching and will make you steaming mad. I’m excited to read the next one!! ❤️📚

This book is fucking badass. Yes, there are zombies, but there are also young girls trying their damndest to survive in a world that doesn't want them. This book is just as important as The Hate U Give and Dear Martin. We like to romanticize the past and the old west, but need constant reminders about the ways that things haven't changed at all. It's an examination of America, old and new, and the idea that perhaps humanity is worse than a plague of zombies.Jane is someone I want to see slay the undead, but someone I also want to see protected above all.

I absolutely loved this book. Of course the alt-history post-civil war era setting tells you that the story will be harsh. It's a zombie book, yes, but the walking dead are just part of the larger landscape of horror that non-whites have to live in. The relationship between the two main characters, Jane and Katherine, is incredibly well done. They start out barely tolerating each other, but over time they become friends. How that relationship comes about and grows is integral to the story, and the focus on this friendship never wavers during the telling.My one critique relates to the author's statement about basing the combat schools on the American Indian Boarding Schools, which were the equivalent of native Residential Schools here in Canada. I don't know if the legacy of Residential Schools is as commonly kown and accepted in the US as it is in Canada, where it is seen as a great stain in our country's history, but I didn't feel the representation of the combat schools as analogous to Residential Schools was a good choice. In Dread Nation there is the feeling that despite the bad of the schools, that the attendees are essentially well treated and are actually getting some good from attending them. In fact, Residential Schools were one of the ultimate tools of colonialism and aimed at the cultural genocide of native people. I don't think any reasonable person would ever imply that there was any benefit at all to native children being put into the Residential School system.I realize that Ireland's main story centres on the experience of oppression and the legacy of slavery for Black Americans, but it felt like the whole experience of native people was subsumed unfairly into that narrative.If I hadn't read the author's notes at the end of the book, this wouldn't have bothered me quite as much, but from what I have heard about her, Ireland is one of those authors who feel strongly that Black authors can speak most effectively about the Black experience of oppression. Ironically, I felt that by explicitly modelling the Residential School in her story about Black oppression, she co-opted an equally important story, about which she is not at all well positioned to speak. The consequences of the Residential School system continue to be felt today, and survivors of the system still live with its terrible legacy.But, all that being said, I had a hard time putting this book down, and it was an emotional ride for me. One of my favourite books of 2018.

Wow! Wow! Wow! So much fun! 5 very enthusiastic stars for the audiobook as narrated by Bahni Turpin.I'd been putting this book off for quite a while and boy, do I regret that! This is the second book I've read in as many months that follows a tough chick in an alternate timeline where something supernatural has altered American history. I'm not sure what that genre is called, but gimme more -- I love it!In Dread Nation, we're introduced to a world in which the Civil War was interrupted when the dead suddenly started acting decidedly very undead. We follow Jane, a young woman born just days before the undead appeared, as she studies at Miss Preston’s School of Combat in Baltimore. Her classes there teach her both fighting and etiquette skills as is required by the Native and Negro Reeducation Act. Most graduates of the school hope to be assigned as an Attendant to one of the rich white women, to act as a bodyguard-cum-chaperone. The alternative often means heading to the front lines to keep the shamblers (zombies/undead) at bay.Although the shamblers are definitely very present in this story, instead of being the real focus, they act mostly as a vehicle to explain this alternate world and to add a bit of excitement here and there. Don't get me wrong, the battle scenes are definitely tons of fun, but this book has much deeper undertones than that.It's not difficult at all to draw comparisons between the misguided morality, political shenanigans, and outright unabashed bigoted actions portrayed in this book with what's been increasingly in the public eye over the past few years. In fact, the scariest, tensest scenes in this book have nothing to do with shambler attacks and everything to do with how terribly cruel power-hungry humans can be. I love the characters Justina Ireland has created here. Jane is snarky and strong, but never falls into the clichéd "quirky talent always saves the day" role. She is definitely flawed, and does not escape her mistakes comeuppance-free. The supporting characters are mostly all very well fleshed out and believable. A couple of characters do, at times, seem a bit like caricatures, but that was very minor, and it's possible it was exacerbated by the narration.Speaking of the narrator, now I get the Bahni Turpin love (I should never have doubted you, Erica!). Sign me up, I'm sold, and I'm diving into some other books she's narrated in the very near future.I strongly recommend this one to anyone who enjoys a rough-and-tumble action book with a snarky MC. I cannot wait to get my hands on the sequel!

I am so impressed with this novel. Dread Nation is a mosh posh of all the best things in life: zombies, hardcore heroines, BISEXUALS, and some superb snarkiness. Seriously. I couldn’t put this down. I didn’t want it to end. Every single character matters. Every single line is important. Jane McKeene is a badass lady. She is relatable, smart, strong, and somehow kept her shit together when everything went down. Something that is worth pointing out is how the chapters begin with bits of correspondence between Jane and her mother. This is so touching and how it relates with what is going on currently, is just so good! I am also quietly(loudly) shipping Jane + Kate.

Absolutely stunning. This will absolutely be one of my top 5 favorite books of the year.

8.1 out of 10 @ https://1000yearplan.com/2018/05/03/c...Dystopias are popular settings for YA novels; while most imagine a future where a class of people is oppressed by a system of authoritarian social control, Justina Ireland’s canny new horror western Dread Nation locates its dystopic vision in America’s past. History diverges when the dead start returning en masse, hungry for human flesh, bringing an early end to the Civil War and the institution of slavery – but only in the barest sense. No longer forced to work on plantations, Black Americans are instead conscripted at a young age to train as soldiers to battle the “shamblers” (my new favorite euphemism for the walking dead) that are overrunning the country.Jane McKeene is one such “attendant”-in-training, lucky enough to be receiving her education at the prestigious Miss Preston’s School for Combat in Baltimore in 1880. Her good fortune runs out when she and her class rival Katherine, along with runaway Red Jack, uncover an illegal scheme by the city’s mayor and are shipped off to Summerland – a frontier enclave in Kansas that promises to restore white Christian supremacy to America and treats its Black and Native American militia little better than chuck for the meat grinder.Many of the story elements that make dystopian YA fiction popular are also staples of the western genre – love triangles between characters from different classes, lone heroes standing up to injustice, landscapes defined by violence and industrial transformation – so the familiar elements are a comfortable fit in Ireland’s reformulation. The classic western narrative, though, depicts the westward march as an act of heroic advancement, a taming of the “wild” frontier for the benefit of civilization. Dread Nation may offer an alternative history of the west, but its depiction of institutionalized racism and classism – where marginalized peoples are forced into a perpetual fight for survival amidst the stampede of “progress” – is little changed by the disruptive insertion of the shambler hordes.Dread Nation’s genre-hybrid premise functions seamlessly on every level – as western, horror, YA, and alt-history (a toss-off General Custer joke is my favorite laugh-out-loud moment in the book). Jane is a fantastic protagonist, a trickster-like woman-at-arms who is loyal to her ideals and to the people she cares about above any nation or creed. Her budding friendship with Katherine (herself an excellent subversion of the “tragic mulatto” stereotype) is the most affecting relationship in the story. Of all the praiseworthy facets of Dread Nation, my favorite is how its episodic, cliffhanger structure – full of foot-dangling dangers and feats of boldness and bravado – parallels the classic (and historically, often woman-centered) newspaper serials Jane loves to read. Perhaps it will find a natural home as an adaptation for one of the online streaming services, whichever is gutsy enough to do it justice.

CW: (view spoiler)[sexism, extreme racism (hide spoiler)]Well I really enjoyed this book. It is seriously begging to be made into an action blockbuster movie. The book is set in an alternate post Civil War USA where slavery is no longer legal but racism is still running rampant, along with hordes of zombies. I think Jane is an excellent main protagonist and I really love the relationship she has with Kate (That’s not my name, it’s Katherine). It’s so great to see strong friendships develop between intelligent and confident women. Jane has such a no-nonsense approach to survival and her action scenes are epic. The zombies whilst well written and ever present are not the real monsters in this book. It’s in the holiest of places that you will find the demons in this book.I am going to leave this review here and let Justina Ireland’s own words tell you her thoughts about her brilliant book:“Dread Nation is a book about the American Dream, and how that dream only truly exists for a small subset of the country. It’s about who gets to lay claim to their humanity, and who is seen as little more than a tool that can be used to achieve the goals of others. It’s about loving a place that doesn’t love you back, no matter how much you might be willing to bleed and die for it. It’s about understanding that, maybe, the things we’re told and the things other people believe aren’t enough to keep us safe. We can follow the rules and do the right thing, but at the end of the day life isn’t fair for anyone. And for some of us, an equal chance was never even an option.” - Justina Ireland in Black Girl Nerds Source: https://blackgirlnerds.com/zombies-an...Come for the zombies, stay for Jane!A must read.