Well, that was a journey! My legs are tired from wandering! Thanks to Netgalley and Del-Rey for the advanced copy! This book is massive in scope. It has been compared to The Stand, and in fact The Stand is name-checked in this book. Sleepwalkers are traveling as a flock to a destination for some strange reason. Family members of the sleepwalkers are walking with them to protect them, and thus becoming 'shepherds.' The world is confused and captivated by this. An epidemic is destroying and breaking humanity into factions.
There are so many topics in this book, and contemporary at that. The political nature in this book is very familiar. Global warming, AI, vaccines, neo-nazis, world religion on all sides of the spectrum, gun laws, race and bias are just a few of the cast of characters in this 800-page whopper.
The characters are well-developed and unique. The locations are great. There were a few instances of the author giving us too much information that probably wouldn't come out in normal dialogue. I will let that slide, as some medical/scientific understanding does make the story better.
There is a tie-in that I loved. I love playing Fallout 4 on PS4. One of the songs in this post-apocalyptic game is "It's All Over But the Crying" by the Ink Spots. In this book, discussing the crumbling world, one of the characters mentions "It's All Over But The Crying" and says it's in their head because it was ironically placed in the Fallout 4 game.
I do feel the ending of the book was a little rushed. Have you heard this one is around 800 pages? What's another 15 pages to give us a little more finality? The book is a slow burn that doesn't pick up the pace for a while. It is one that I was wanting more. The acknowledgments page came up on my Kindle reader and I thought "NO!!!"
I should wrap this up. I like it, I love it, I want some more of it! I wish this book a lot of success upon release date. (less) [edit]
