The Breeders Blog Tour: review & giveaway
Hello and welcome to our stop on The Breeders Blog Tour. We have our review and a tour wide giveaway. This tour is hosted by Kismet Book Tours.
The Breeders by Katie French
YA dystopia*ebook, 276 pages
Self-published*Published August 1st 2012
Sixteen-year-old Riley Meemick is one of the world’s last free girls. When Riley was born, her mother escaped the Breeders, the group of doctors using cruel experiments to bolster the dwindling human race. Her parents do everything possible to keep her from their clutches– moving from one desolate farm after another to escape the Breeders’ long reach. The Breeders control everything- the local war lords, the remaining factories, the fuel. They have unchecked power in this lawless society. And they’re hunting Riley.
When the local Sheriff abducts the adult members of her family and hands her mother over to the Breeders, Riley and her eight-year-old brother, Ethan, hiding in a shelter, are left to starve. Then Clay arrives, the handsome gunslinger who seems determined to help to make up for past sins. The problem is Clay thinks Riley is a bender– a genderless mutation, neither male nor female. As Riley’s affection for Clay grows she wonders can she trust Clay with her secret and risk her freedom?
The three embark on a journey across the scarred remains of New Mexico– escaping the Riders who use human sacrifice to appease their Good Mother, various men scrambling for luck, and a deranged lone survivor of a plague. When Riley is shot and forced into the Breeder’s hospital, she learns the horrible fate of her mother—a fate she’ll share unless she can find a way out.
About Katie French:
Katie French imagined herself an author when her poem caught the eye of her second grade teacher.
In middle school she spent her free time locked in her room, writing her first young adult novel. Though her social life suffered, her love for literature thrived. She studied English at Eastern Michigan University, where she veered from writing and earned an education degree. She spent nine years teaching high school English.
Currently she is a school counselor, doing a job that is both one of the hardest things she’s ever done and the most rewarding. In her free time she writes, reads great books and takes care of her two beautiful and crazy children. She is a contributor and co-creator of Underground Book Reviews, a website dedicated to erasing the boundaries between traditional and non-traditional publishing. She lives in Michigan with her husband and two children.
What can I say about this book? If you like dystopian novels or are curious about futuristic worlds, pick up The Breeders and make sure you block off a chunk of time. You will get engulfed in The Breeders after it hits you with the quite grace of a tornado from the opening tension-dripping scene to the end. Intense.
The Breeders is definitely a weirdly intense, gripping and unsettling reading experience. I mean this in a good way. A very good way. The scary, uncomfortable world Katie French creates with the stark candidness of her descriptions and characters is unlike any other I've read in the dystopia genre.
Riley is a typical teen girl, frustrated that she cannot leave the confines of her family's farmland (which they inhabited after they found the previous owner's body decomposing on the lot) in a depressing and stark new New Mexico. The story begins instantly with our introudction into Riley's bleak world. Bleak for women. Females are in short supply and Breeders are groups of rogue men who search for girls to sell. Riley and her eight year old brother have to hide and the scene is vivid and unsettling. She live with her mom, a scarred survivior of the Breeders, her stepfather, Auntie and brother. Riley dresses like a boy, has short hair and wraps her chest everyday. Some teens think a couple of pimples is bad. Um, no.
Breeders grab girls and doctors artificially inseminate them to produce baby girls. There's more. Riders are another group and they grab boys to torture--all for the Great Mother. Katie French has crafted a unique futuristic society by employing characteristics of the old Wild Wild West. Men carry guns and knifes, wear badges proclaiming themselves Sheriff and travel in testosterone-filled packs to carry out their nauseating plans. The dank dark world of Mad Max is re-purposed, incorporating a new breed of rabid cowboys and among this is one gender-bending sixteen year old girl hell bent on rescuing her parents when they're abducted by the supposed lawman. My only comment is the book needed more editing to tighten sections and correct errors. Otherwise, I was quite impressed with Ms. French's writing.
I simply cannot go into more details about The Breeders. Mad Max meets the Wild West and one tough Katniss-minded teen girl sets out to find the ones she loves. The Breeders is a futuristic road trip into a dark new world where girls are almost extinct. What a carnival of characters and an emotionally charged read.
Rating: 4
Cover comment:
The picture depicts the grim conditions Riley has to endure but this photo doesn't do the book justice. I would put another cover on this stat.
Book source:
I received a promotional copy in return for my honest review.
Giveaway
There is a tour wide giveaway where readers can enter to win one of 10 eCopies of The Breeders. Enter below.
Dystopians often show us what could happen in the event of natural disasters, political shifts, war or just plain wide spread greed. Unlike fantasy and paranormal, dystopian books show us things we'd likely believe can happen.
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